Interdisciplinarity as a multidimensional concept: its measure in three different research areas

Sanz‐Menéndez, Luis; Bordons, María; Zulueta, María Ángeles

doi:10.3152/147154401781777123

Cited by 53 publications

(34 citation statements)

References 22 publications

(12 reference statements)

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“…As suggested by Sanz-Menéndez et al (2001), a simple and useful manner to categorize these notions is to separate the ones applied to research groups based on team composition (multidisciplinarity) from the ones applied to research outcomes (interdisciplinarity).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Sanz-Menéndez et al (2001) interviewed researchers in order to assess the disciplinary diversity of team members and to give a qualitative appreciation of the degree of multidisciplinarity of their team. More precisely, the interviewed researchers are requested to assess the "disciplinary diversity" of their research team in four intensity categories.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although an abundant literature substantially improved our understanding of interdisciplinary research (Morreale and Howery, 2002 ;Ziman, 1997 ;Qin et al, 1997 ;Schmoch et al, 1994 ;Sanz-Menéndez et al, 2001 ;Tomov and Mutafov, 1996 ;Morillo et al, 2001), it remains a difficult and quite fuzzy concept (Klein, 1990 andAcutt et al, 2000). For the purpose of this study, we propose and make use of two new measures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Why do academic scientists engage in interdisciplinary research?

Carayol¹,

Thi²

2005

res. eval.

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: This article provides a first empirical study of the determinants of the interdisciplinarity of academic researchers production. For that purpose we measure interdisciplinarity as the diversity of their research production across scientific domains. Our evidence is based on more than nine hundred permanent researchers employed by a large French university which is ranked first among French universities in terms of Impact. Our main results are that the traditional academic career incentives do not stimulate interdisciplinary research while having connections with industry does. The context of work in the laboratory strongly affects the propensity to undertake interdisciplinary research. Key words : Economics of science, Academic incentives, Interdisciplinary research, Laboratory, University. JEL classification : L31, 031, 032, 034, 038. * Corresponding author. BETA, PEGE-ULP, 61, avenue de la Forêt Noire, F-67085, Strasbourg Cedex ; tel : +33-390242104 ; fax : +33-390242071 ; email : .φ This work is part of a larger project on knowledge production at ULP. We are grateful to P. Llerena, M. Matt, S. Wolff and all other members of the team. L. Bach's comments helped us to improve the paper. Acknowledgements extend to the administrative departments and the Technology Transfer Office at ULP, and to the CNRS Industrial Liaison Office.

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Why do academic scientists engage in interdisciplinary research?

Carayol¹,

Thi²

2005

res. eval.

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“…I want to uncover the knowledge acquisition strategies (social processes) through which knowledge integration (a cognitive process) is achieved. Based on previous studies (Palmer, 1999;Sanz-Menéndez et al, 2001;Laudel, 2001), I hypothesize that there are various possible forms and rationales for knowledge acquisition.…”

Section: Conceptual and Methodological Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Strategies for Knowledge Acquisition in Bionanotechnology

Ràfols¹

2007

Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research

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Discourses on convergent technologies claim that fields such as bionanotechnology are interdisciplinary and, therefore, require specific organizational forms, such as laboratories with researchers from many different disciplinary backgrounds. However, empirical investigations challenge the intrinsic interdisciplinarity of these emergent fields, and some analysts criticize the discourses as prescriptive. In order to investigate actual laboratory practices in bionanoscience, this article explores the dynamics of knowledge integration and the knowledge acquisition strategies of 10 research projects in two research specialties, namely biomolecular motors and lab-on-a-chip. The research shows that knowledge integration is, in fact, very asymmetrical: typically, a project will use materials and techniques from various disciplines at a standard level of know-how, but focus its research effort on the unique expertise of the home laboratory. Furthermore, projects use various strategies to acquire knowledge: interdisciplinary practices involving deep collaborations and exchanges between distinct disciplines at either the personal or institutional level are only one strategy to acquire knowledge and, indeed, not the most common. The majority of projects combine different strategies, including service collaboration, limited recruitment and in-house learning. These observations can be explained by a trade-off between the benefits of cognitive diversity set against the costs of team cohesion and learning.

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“…Schummer, 2004), their educational background (e.g. -Menéndez et al, 2001), the citation flows among disciplines (e.g. Porter and Chubin, 1985), and the co-occurrence of disciplines in references/citations (Porter et al, 2007) or in article headings (e.g.…”

Section: The Assessment Of Interdisciplinaritymentioning

confidence: 99%