Substantiality:A Construct Indicating Research Excellence to Measure University Research Performance

Purpose:The adequacy of research performance of universities or research institutes have often been evaluated and understood in two axes:“quantity”(i.e.size or volume)and“quality”(i.e.what we define here as a measure of excellence that is considered theoretically independent of size or volume,such as clarity in diamond grading).The purpose of this article is,however,to introduce a third construct named“substantiality”(“ATSUMI”in Japanese)of research performance and to demonstrate its importance in evaluating/understanding research universities.Design/methodology/approach:We take a two-step approach to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed construct by showing that(1)some characteristics of research universities are not well captured by the conventional constructs(“quantity”and“quality”)-based indicators,and(2)the“substantiality”indicators can capture them.Furthermore,by suggesting that“substantiality”indicators appear linked to the reputation that appeared in university reputation rankings by simple statistical analysis,we reveal additional benefits of the construct.Findings:We propose a new construct named“substantiality”for measuring research performance.We show that indicators based on“substantiality”can capture important characteristics of research institutes.“Substantiality”indicators demonstrate their“predictive powers”on research reputation.Research limitations:The concept of“substantiality”originated from IGO game;therefore the ease/difficulty of accepting the concept is culturally dependent.In other words,while it is easily accepted by people from Japan and other East Asian countries and regions,it might be difficult for researchers from other cultural regions to accept it.Practical implications:There is no simple solution to the challenge of evaluating research universities’research performance.It is vital to combine different types of indicators to understand the excellence of research institutes.Substantiality indicators could be part of such a combination of indicators.Originality/value:The authors propose a new construct named substantiality for measuring research performance.They show that indicators based on this construct can capture the important characteristics of research institutes.

Towards a Framework for Evaluating the Research Performance of Chinese Double First-Class Universities

The study focuses on the research performance of Double First-Class(DFC)universities in China.A theoretical framework based on economic theory and the Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP)method for a novel evaluation model is proposed.The model is performed on a sample of 41 participant DFC universities in China.Using data collected from these universities,it was found that there is no consistency between performance ranking,input ranking,and output ranking,with the best ranked universities far from the most efficient.These findings provide empirical evidence of DFC universities’research performance situation and suggest strategies that the government can use to propel their sustainable development.

Research performance evaluation of Chinese university:A non-homogeneous network DEA approach

Performance evaluation for universities or research institutions has become a hot topic in recent years.However,the previous works rarely investigate the multiple departments’performance of a university,and especially,none of them consider the non-homogeneity among the universities’departments.In this paper,we develop data envelopment analysis(DEA)models to evaluate the performance of general non-homogeneous decision making units(DMUs)with two-stage network structures and then apply them to a university in China.Specifically,the first stage is faculty research process,and the second stage is student research process.We first spit each DMU(i.e.department)into a combination of several mutually exclusive maximal input subgroups and output subgroups in terms of their homogeneity in both stages.Then an additive DEA model is proposed to evaluate the performance of the overall efficiency of the non-homogeneous DMUs with two-stage network structure.By analyzing the empirical results,some implications are provided to support the university to promote the research performance of each department as well as the whole university.

Preparation and Performance Research of Cement-based Grouting Materials with High Early Strength and Expansion

Main performance of the cement grouting materials made up by Portland cement（PC） and sulphoaluminate cement（SAC） was investigated in this program, a kind of expanding agent（EA） which was mainly constituted by metakaolin and alunite was utilized for the compensation of the shrinkage, the hydration products and micro structure of the grouting materials were researched by X-ray diffraction（XRD） and scanning electron microscopy（SEM）. The results showed that a high expansion rate of the grouting materials could be reached as the expanding agent mixed in 6% of PC mass; the addition of SAC in the S2（PC：SAC：EA=34：6：2.25） brought a further improvement of the expansion rate of the grouting materials, the analysis of XRD and SEM showed that due to the reaction of expanding agent and SAC in the grouting materials, more ettringite crystal was generated, which resulted in a higher early strength, the addition of SAC played an expansion and strength reinforcement role in the grouting materials.

Research on High Performance New Refractories

At the age of 86, Prof. Zhong Xiangchong has his new book—＂Research on High Performance New Refractories＂ published by Henan Science and Technology Publishing House to commemorate his 65 years service in the refractories science and technology including the recent 6 years at High Temperature Ceramics Institute which he founded in Zhengzhou University in 2001.

A causational analysis of scholars' years of active academic careers vis-à-vis their academic productivity and academic influence

Taking the scholarly activities of 73 doctoral program mentors working at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College(the CAMS &PUMC) as a sample of our investigative survey, we tried using such statistical methods as the analysis of variance(ANOVA), factor analysis and correlation analysis to compare the different characteristics of scholarship assessment of Chinese medical scholars as exhibited in their published papers in domestic and foreign journals. Our research findings show that citations per paper and A-index are more suitable for assessing the highly accomplished senior Chinese medical professionals(e.g. academicians) for their domestic and international scholarship attainment. In contrast, the m-quotient is not deemed appropriate to assess their academic influence both at home and abroad. Upon our further analysis of 6 evaluative indicators, we noticed that these indicators might be applied in two different aspects: One is from the viewpoint of Chinese scholars' academic influence at home, which has been evaluated mainly from the perspective of 'total' amount and 'average' amount of both publications and citations. The other is from their academic impact embodied by the means of documents retrieved from the Web of Science, which is mainly assessed from the two viewpoints of publications and citations. It is suggested that the accumulated time-length of a given scholar's active engagement in professional practice in a specific subject area be taken into consideration while assessing a researcher's performance at home and abroad.