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[runwithscissors]

Wow. Mingus. Just wow. Impressive bile. Seriously impressive.

[mingus]

Wow. Mingus. Just wow. Impressive bile. Seriously impressive.

I regard regard as fundamentally anit-intellectual any parading of "mighty" announcements and "facts" when there is no basis for the same.  I abhor anti-intellectual tendencies.

[runwithscissors]

From a brief perusal of your posts it appears that your comments are predominantly concerned with declaring people to be either stupid or lazy, or both. Thank you so much for keeping us all on the straight and narrow. Though if you need me to clarify that last statement, perhaps I should use quotation marks or bold typeface to indicate my sarcasm.

[mingus]

From a brief perusal of your posts it appears that your comments are predominantly concerned with declaring people to be either stupid or lazy, or both. Thank you so much for keeping us all on the straight and narrow. Though if you need me to clarify that last statement, perhaps I should use quotation marks or bold typeface to indicate my sarcasm.

You really need to read many more of my posts.  I calls them like I sees them.  Your wringing hands over that won't change my style; so, unless you have something useful to add, I encourage you to move on.  Would you like bold typeface with any of that, or did you get it straight away?

[hegemony]

I'm very interested in this discussion, so let's ignore mingus and procced.

[mingus]

The OP's question was: "My question is, what counts as good publication in the U.K.?"

Answer: A publication that has something useful to say and which makes a genuine contribution in its field.

[totoro]

I was wrong on the number of points research outputs count for in Aus. A book is 5 points and journal articles, book chapters, and refereed conference papers are all one point. These are the weightings used in the allocation of block grant research funding. But now quality is also beginning to be assessed and used under the ERA modelled to some degree on the RAE.

[busyslinky]

A journal article is equal to a book chapter or conference proceedings?  That will really skew the publication portfolio of Australian researchers.  But, if any of them wish to focus on international influence, chapters and proceedings will probably mean very little (in most disciplines).

[runwithscissors]

In light of my recent Mingus-scolding, let me be specific. I speak in terms of a social science discipline. The big issue for scholars outside of the UK who are thinking to move to the UK is to consider where they fit in terms of the Research Excellence Framework (the REF). Candidates are assessed on the basis of their four strongest publications, which will ultimately be ranked from 1-4* (4* being internationally excellent or somesuch). Quantity of publications is, to be honest, relatively unimportant - it's all about the 'quality' of your top 4 over the assessment period, which I think runs until Dec 2013 - [though I'd have to check - I don't want to be (erroneously) accused of being quote unquote anti-intellectual].

At my insitution (a Redbrick), publication in proceedings, edited volumes, and indeed editing volumes, is largely discouraged at the moment in favour of journal articles, for this reason. My shiny new book contract, according to my HoD, is less valuable becuase the final product won't come out for another 9 months, and might not have time to garner a lot of citations. Though for social sciences things like publisher name and citation counts are supposed not to count (as it's based upon a peer assessment of the work rather than metrics) no-one is taking any chances.

[bwwm1]

I was wrong on the number of points research outputs count for in Aus. A book is 5 points and journal articles, book chapters, and refereed conference papers are all one point. These are the weightings used in the allocation of block grant research funding. But now quality is also beginning to be assessed and used under the ERA modelled to some degree on the RAE.

5 to 1 seems to me to be much more reflective of the amount of work a book represents, at least in my experience.

[mingus]

A journal article is equal to a book chapter or conference proceedings?  That will really skew the publication portfolio of Australian researchers.  But, if any of them wish to focus on international influence, chapters and proceedings will probably mean very little (in most disciplines).

That has been the case for 20 years or so, and there is still work of very high standards coming from Australia.  Do you have evidence that it has skewed things?

[totoro]

A journal article is equal to a book chapter or conference proceedings?  That will really skew the publication portfolio of Australian researchers.  But, if any of them wish to focus on international influence, chapters and proceedings will probably mean very little (in most disciplines).

I think the fact that *any* journal article was worth the same amount has skewed things and resulted in some researchers publishing lots of junk in very low ranked refereed journals. There is some evidence on this and the reason they are now moving to more of a RAE/REF style system.

Of course, when it comes to getting research grants here they apply the same international standards as everywhere more or less and track record is generally very important in getting grants in Australia. And the top universities probably applied similar standards in hiring. And now some money will be allocated on the basis of the quality assessment and presumably more and more over time.

[busyslinky]

A journal article is equal to a book chapter or conference proceedings?  That will really skew the publication portfolio of Australian researchers.  But, if any of them wish to focus on international influence, chapters and proceedings will probably mean very little (in most disciplines).

I think the fact that *any* journal article was worth the same amount has skewed things and resulted in some researchers publishing lots of junk in very low ranked refereed journals. There is some evidence on this and the reason they are now moving to more of a RAE/REF style system.

Of course, when it comes to getting research grants here they apply the same international standards as everywhere more or less and track record is generally very important in getting grants in Australia. And the top universities probably applied similar standards in hiring. And now some money will be allocated on the basis of the quality assessment and presumably more and more over time.

I heard that they were trying to do something along the lines with ARCS but there was some controversy about journals listed and levels.  But, I also wondered if this was because people who benefited from the old system didn't want it to change.

[totoro]

A journal article is equal to a book chapter or conference proceedings?  That will really skew the publication portfolio of Australian researchers.  But, if any of them wish to focus on international influence, chapters and proceedings will probably mean very little (in most disciplines).

I think the fact that *any* journal article was worth the same amount has skewed things and resulted in some researchers publishing lots of junk in very low ranked refereed journals. There is some evidence on this and the reason they are now moving to more of a RAE/REF style system.

Of course, when it comes to getting research grants here they apply the same international standards as everywhere more or less and track record is generally very important in getting grants in Australia. And the top universities probably applied similar standards in hiring. And now some money will be allocated on the basis of the quality assessment and presumably more and more over time.

I heard that they were trying to do something along the lines with ARCS but there was some controversy about journals listed and levels.  But, I also wondered if this was because people who benefited from the old system didn't want it to change.

In the 2010 ERA (Excellence in Research for Australia - 2010 was the first such exercise and was largely a pilot - it ranks research in each discipline and field for each university from a  1 to a 5 - 3 is world average and 5 is a lot above world average) journals were rated A*, A, B, C and this was one of the inputs to the exercise. This was one of the tools used to evaluate research. In the social sciences (apart from Psych) and the humanities peer review of a subset of outputs is the main tool used in the exercise. In STEM it's citation analysis (using Scopus). But the list was very controversial and was dropped. The main reason was because it was seen as discouraging publication in Australian journals. None in my field is an A*. I think actually some of them were rated higher than they should have been to counter such an effect but it wasn't enough. Some low ranked journals were shut down. In ERA 2012 review panels will be told how the profile of publication in journals compares to the average or global average instead. Everyone is using the A* to C system informally though still. It really seems to have captured people's imagination. Some money will be allocated using ERA 2012 as an input and obviously more will over time.