Archive for August, 2011

Race and R01s

Friday, August 19th, 2011

A study in Science reports findings from an analysis of over 83,000 applications for R01 funding between 2000 and 2006. The researchers identified the race of the applicants to determine the likelihood of receiving an NIH grant.

They found that self-identified Asian investigators are 4% less likely and African-American investigators 13% less likely to receive funding than white applicants. The disparity went away among applications with similar priority scores.Science 2011 Aug 333(6045) 1015-9, Fig. 1

It seems that very little in the application would distinguish the race of the principal investigator, so reviewer bias (unconscious or not) is probably not the main cause. Rather, minority applicants may receive less mentoring in how to formulate and write a proposal.

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Posted in Faculty development | 4 Comments »

Appearance Matters

Monday, August 15th, 2011

Academics like to think that rational, intellectual thought motivates their decisions. But a new book, Beauty Pays: Why Attractive People Are More Successful, reveals that even scholars let looks influence them. k9516

The author describes a study he conducted with members of the American Economic Association. Like many scholarly societies, the AEA holds competitive elections for officers and include photographs of the candidates along with the ballots.

He had subjects rate the relative attractiveness of the candidates and found that, "The results show that moving from the 84th to the 16th percentile of looks lowers a candidate’s chance of winning the election — of obtaining this honor — from 56 percent to 44 percent."

These conclusions hold even when adjusting for gender and scholarly accomplishments. The study and others correlating attractiveness with professors' salary reveal the persistent bias that governs many seemingly objective decisions.

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Posted in Faculty development | 6 Comments »

Performing Database Searches

Wednesday, August 10th, 2011

AM_Last_Page__How_to_Perform_an_Effective_Database.31

Maggio, Lauren A. MS(LIS), MA; Tannery, Nancy H. MLS; Kanter, Steven L. MD. AM Last Page: How to Perform an Effective Database Search. Academic Medicine 2011. 86(8):1057.

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Posted in Faculty development | 11 Comments »

Incentives to Publish

Wednesday, August 10th, 2011

South Korean scientists who publish in top-flight journals like Science and Nature receive a $2800 bonus from their government. Turkish scientists who do the same can count on a bonus worth 7.5% of their salary. Other countries reward institutions for publication rates.

Researchers have now looked at whether such incentives have resulted in a greater publication success. Of the 110,870 original research articles submitted to Science over the last 10 years, first authors came from 144 different countries. 7.3% of submissions were accepted.

The study concludes that cash incentives indeed increase journal submissions, but not necessarily acceptance. Rewarding publication with career promotion leads to both greater submission and acceptance rates. Their findings suggest that monetary bonuses are enough to affect the quantity of research, but to improve quality, more symbolic prizes are needed.

first authors from 144 different countries submitted 110,870 original research articles; 7.3% of these submissions were accepted for publication, with first authors from 53 different countries

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Fair Use

Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011

Presentation documents for the AAMC Group on Faculty Affairs conference later this week have been posted. I noticed in one of the presenter's PowerPoint slides several humorous images taken from the web to illustrate her points.

Adding stock images to academic presentations has become so routine that we don't think about the legality of using someone else's content. After all, what's the likelihood that the copyright holder for a movie poster will sue a professor who has co-opted it to liven up a talk?

A new book argues that academics should familiarize themselves with the legal concept of fair use. 9780226032283The authors warn that even if your use of licensed content is educational, it still must follow the guidelines for fair use. Judges have used two questions to determine if an appropriation counts as fair use:

  1. Do you employ the content for a different use than the owner created it for?
  2. Do you use enough of the content to achieve that new purpose?

If the answers are yes, you probably have a strong standing to claim fair use. If not, you may be violating copyright. Academics understand that all knowledge builds on existing ideas, but you still have to give credit to those who came before you.

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Posted in Faculty development | 5 Comments »