EVALUATING RESEARCH PRODUCTIVITY

Defining productivity in a research environment has been difficult because perceptions about productivity differ in the scientific and administrative communities. As research administrators, we need to reach general agreement on what constitutes research productivity, and we need a way to accurately portray and report on research productivity in our institutions. This study compares the attitudes of research scientists with those of research administrators to 1) determine whether the two groups differ in their perceptions of research productivity, and 2) suggest which measures might be used in assessing research productivity. The results include a rank-order comparison of the relative importance of several items that measure research productivity as perceived by scientists and administrators.