Journal article
Research impact: a narrative review.
- Abstract:
- Impact occurs when research generates benefits (health, economic, cultural) in addition to building the academic knowledge base. Its mechanisms are complex and reflect the multiple ways in which knowledge is generated and utilised. Much progress has been made in measuring both the outcomes of research and the processes and activities through which these are achieved, though the measurement of impact is not without its critics. We review the strengths and limitations of six established approaches (Payback, Research Impact Framework, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, monetisation, societal impact assessment, UK Research Excellence Framework) plus recently developed and largely untested ones (including metrics and electronic databases). We conclude that (1) different approaches to impact assessment are appropriate in different circumstances; (2) the most robust and sophisticated approaches are labour-intensive and not always feasible or affordable; (3) whilst most metrics tend to capture direct and proximate impacts, more indirect and diffuse elements of the research-impact link can and should be measured; and (4) research on research impact is a rapidly developing field with new methodologies on the horizon.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
Actions
Access Document
- Files:
-
-
(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 2.5MB, Terms of use)
-
- Publisher copy:
- 10.1186/s12916-016-0620-8
Authors
- Publisher:
- BioMed Central
- Journal:
- BMC Medicine More from this journal
- Volume:
- 14
- Issue:
- 1
- Pages:
- 78
- Publication date:
- 2016-05-01
- Acceptance date:
- 2016-04-27
- DOI:
- EISSN:
-
1741-7015
- ISSN:
-
1741-7015
- Pmid:
-
27211576
- Language:
-
English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
-
pubs:624660
- UUID:
-
uuid:c628b70f-8472-4fac-9bd0-b975009138d2
- Local pid:
-
pubs:624660
- Source identifiers:
-
624660
- Deposit date:
-
2018-01-19
- ARK identifier:
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Greenhalgh et al
- Copyright date:
- 2016
- Notes:
- © 2016 Greenhalgh et al. Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
If you are the owner of this record, you can report an update to it here: Report update to this record