Intelligentsia
Publication bias in the social sciences: Unlocking the file drawer
Annie Franco, Neil Malhotra & Gabor Simonovits
Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We study publication bias in the social sciences by analyzing a known population of conducted studies - 221 in total - where there is a full accounting of what is published and unpublished. We leverage TESS, an NSF-sponsored program where researchers propose survey-based experiments to be run on representative samples of American adults. Because TESS proposals undergo rigorous peer review, the studies in the sample all exceed a substantial quality threshold. Strong results are 40 percentage points more likely to be published than null results, and 60 percentage points more likely to be written up. We provide not only direct evidence of publication bias, but also identify the stage of research production at which publication bias occurs - authors do not write up and submit null findings.
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Dean Keith Simonton
Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, forthcoming
Abstract:
Thomas Edison is widely considered to be one of the greatest inventive geniuses who ever lived. Therefore, his total output of 1,093 patents was used to study the trajectory of his creative career, including both failures and triumphs. The study specifically examined 2 hypotheses about how the creative process operates across the career course. First, creativity will incorporate some form of blind-variation and selective-retention. Second, creative productivity will be enhanced by engagement in a "network of enterprises." To test these 2 hypotheses, the 1,093 patents were first assigned to 8 separate subject areas: (a) miscellany, (b) telegraphy and telephony, (c) phonographs and sound recording, (d) electric light and power, (e) mining and ore milling, (f) batteries, (g) motion pictures, and (h) cement. The patents were then tabulated into both 1- and 5-year age periods according to Edison's chronological age at the time each was executed. Quantitative analyses were then applied to determine the age-wise trends and clustering of the patents across the course of his 64-year career. In addition, direct comparisons were made to a nomothetic baseline predicted by a mathematical model of creative productivity. The quantitative analyses were complemented by qualitative treatments of Edison's creative career. All told, the 2 hypotheses received considerable empirical support. Tellingly, the inventor's phenomenal triumphs notwithstanding, he could not avoid even catastrophic failures.
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Scientific misbehavior in economics
Sarah Necker
Research Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study reports the results of a survey of professional, mostly academic economists about their research norms and scientific misbehavior. Behavior such as data fabrication or plagiarism are (almost) unanimously rejected and admitted by less than 4% of participants. Research practices that are often considered "questionable," e.g., strategic behavior while analyzing results or in the publication process, are rejected by at least 60%. Despite their low justifiability, these behaviors are widespread. Ninety-four percent report having engaged in at least one unaccepted research practice. Surveyed economists perceive strong pressure to publish. The level of justifiability assigned to different misdemeanors does not increase with the perception of pressure. However, perceived pressure is found to be positively related to the admission of being involved in several unaccepted research practices. Although the results cannot prove causality, they are consistent with the notion that the "publish or perish" culture motivates researchers to violate research norms.
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John Conley & Ali Sina Onder
Journal of Economic Perspectives, Summer 2014, Pages 205-216
Abstract:
We study the research productivity of new graduates from North American PhD programs in economics from 1986 to 2000. We find that research productivity drops off very quickly with class rank at all departments, and that the rank of the graduate departments themselves provides a surprisingly poor prediction of future research success. For example, at the top ten departments as a group, the median graduate has fewer than 0.03 American Economic Review (AER)-equivalent publications at year six after graduation, an untenurable record almost anywhere. We also find that PhD graduates of equal percentile rank from certain lower-ranked departments have stronger publication records than their counterparts at higher-ranked departments. In our data, for example, Carnegie Mellon's graduates at the 85th percentile of year-six research productivity outperform 85th percentile graduates of the University of Chicago, the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford, and Berkeley. These results suggest that even the top departments are not doing a very good job of training the great majority of their students to be successful research economists. Hiring committees may find these results helpful when trying to balance class rank and place of graduate in evaluating job candidates, and current graduate students may wish to re-evaluate their academic strategies in light of these findings.
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Academic Honors and Performance
Ho Fai Chan et al.
Labour Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Despite the social importance of awards, they have been largely disregarded by academic research in economics. This paper investigates whether receiving prestigious academic awards -- the John Bates Clark Medal and the Fellowship of the Econometric Society -- is associated with higher subsequent research productivity and status compared to a synthetic control group of non-recipient scholars with similar previous research performance. Our results suggest statistically significant positive publication and citation differences after award receipt.
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Preventing Economists' Capture
Luigi Zingales
University of Chicago Working Paper, March 2014
Abstract:
The very same forces that induce economists to conclude that regulators are captured should lead us to conclude that the economic profession is captured as well. As evidence of this capture, I show that papers whose conclusions are pro-management are more likely to be published in economic journals and more likely to be cited. I also show that business schools' faculty write papers that are more pro management. I highlight possible remedies to reduce the extent of this capture: from a reform of the publication process, to an enhanced data disclosure, from a stronger theoretical foundation to a mechanism of peer pressure. Ultimately, the most important remedy, however, is awareness, an awareness most economists still do not have.
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Do ABCs Get More Citations than XYZs?
Wei Huang
Economic Inquiry, forthcoming
Abstract:
Using a sample of U.S.-based scientific journal articles, I examine the relationship between author surname initials and paper citations, finding that the papers with first authors whose surname initials appear earlier in the alphabet get more citations, and that this effect does not exist for non-first authors. Further analysis shows that the alphabetical order effect is stronger in those fields with longer reference lists, and that such alphabetical bias exists among citations by others and not for self-citations. In addition, estimates also reveal that the alphabetical order effect is stronger when the length of reference lists in citing papers is longer. These findings suggest that the order in reference lists plays an important role in the alphabetical bias.
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Linguistic Traces of a Scientific Fraud: The Case of Diederik Stapel
David Markowitz & Jeffrey Hancock
PLoS ONE, August 2014
Abstract:
When scientists report false data, does their writing style reflect their deception? In this study, we investigated the linguistic patterns of fraudulent (N = 24; 170,008 words) and genuine publications (N = 25; 189,705 words) first-authored by social psychologist Diederik Stapel. The analysis revealed that Stapel's fraudulent papers contained linguistic changes in science-related discourse dimensions, including more terms pertaining to methods, investigation, and certainty than his genuine papers. His writing style also matched patterns in other deceptive language, including fewer adjectives in fraudulent publications relative to genuine publications. Using differences in language dimensions we were able to classify Stapel's publications with above chance accuracy. Beyond these discourse dimensions, Stapel included fewer co-authors when reporting fake data than genuine data, although other evidentiary claims (e.g., number of references and experiments) did not differ across the two article types. This research supports recent findings that language cues vary systematically with deception, and that deception can be revealed in fraudulent scientific discourse.
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Piracy and New Product Creation: A Bollywood Story
Rahul Telang & Joel Waldfogel
Carnegie Mellon University Working Paper, August 2014
Abstract:
While copyright research in the decade following Napster focused mostly on whether file sharing undermines demand, research has more recently asked how piracy and other aspects of digitization affect the supply of new products. Although revenue has declined sharply, evidence that weakened effective copyright protection undermines creation has been elusive. Instead, because of cost-reducing effects of digitization, the number of new recorded music products - and their apparent quality - has increased. This study examines movie production in India during a period of technological change that facilitated large-scale piracy. The diffusion of the VCR and cable television in India between 1985 and 2000 created substantial opportunities for unpaid movie consumption. We use this episode to study possible impacts of piracy on supply. We first document, from narrative sources, conditions conducive to piracy as these technologies diffused. We then provide strong circumstantial evidence of piracy in diminished appropriability: movies' revenues fell by a third to a half, conditional on their ratings by movie-goers and their ranks in their annual revenue distributions. Weaker effective demand undermined creative incentives. While the number of new movies released had grown steadily from 1960 to 1985, it fell markedly between 1985 and 2000, suggesting a supply elasticity in the range of 0.2-0.7. Thus, our study provides affirmative evidence on a central tenet of copyright policy, that stronger effective copyright protection effects more creation. We contrast our findings with evidence from other contexts.
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Patent Trolls: Evidence from Targeted Firms
Lauren Cohen, Umit Gurun & Scott Duke Kominers
NBER Working Paper, August 2014
Abstract:
We provide theoretical and empirical evidence on the evolution and impact of non-practicing entities (NPEs) in the intellectual property space. Heterogeneity in innovation, given a cost of commercialization, results in NPEs that choose to act as "patent trolls" that chase operating firms' innovations even if those innovations are not clearly infringing on the NPEs' patents. We support these predictions using a novel, large dataset of patents targeted by NPEs. We show that NPEs on average target firms that are flush with cash (or have just had large positive cash shocks). Furthermore, NPEs target firm profits arising from exogenous cash shocks unrelated to the allegedly infringing patents. We next show that NPEs target firms irrespective of the closeness of those firms' patents to the NPEs', and that NPEs typically target firms that are busy with other (non-IP related) lawsuits or are likely to settle. Lastly, we show that NPE litigation has a negative real impact on the future innovative activity of targeted firms.
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Michael Frakes & Melissa Wasserman
NBER Working Paper, July 2014
Abstract:
This paper explores how examiner behavior is altered by the time allocated for reviewing a patent application. Insufficient examination time may crowd out examiner search effort, impeding the ability to form time-intensive prior-art-based rejections (especially, obviousness rejections) and thus leaving examiners more inclined to grant otherwise invalid applications. To test this prediction, we trace the behavior of individual examiners over the course of a series of certain promotions that carry with them a substantial reduction in expected examination time. For these purposes, we use novel micro-level application data spanning a ten year period and estimate examiner fixed-effects specifications that allow us to control flexibly for examiner heterogeneity. We find evidence demonstrating that search efforts and time-intensive rejections indeed fall, while granting tendencies rise, upon the promotions of interest. Assuming that patent examiners will tend to make the correct patentability determinations when provided sufficient examination time, our results suggest that the present schedule of time allotments may be inducing patent examiners to grant patents that otherwise fail to meet the patentability requirements.
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Patents and Cumulative Innovation: Causal Evidence from the Courts
Alberto Galasso & Mark Schankerman
NBER Working Paper, June 2014
Abstract:
Cumulative innovation is central to economic growth. Do patent rights facilitate or impede follow-on innovation? We study the causal effect of removing patent rights by court invalidation on subsequent research related to the focal patent, as measured by later citations. We exploit random allocation of judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to control for endogeneity of patent invalidation. Patent invalidation leads to a 50 percent increase in citations to the focal patent, on average, but the impact is heterogeneous and depends on characteristics of the bargaining environment. Patent rights block downstream innovation in computers, electronics and medical instruments, but not in drugs, chemicals or mechanical technologies. Moreover, the effect is entirely driven by invalidation of patents owned by large patentees that triggers more follow-on innovation by small firms.
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Ajay Agrawal, Alberto Galasso & Alexander Oettl
University of Toronto Working Paper, August 2014
Abstract:
We study the interplay between transportation infrastructure, knowledge flows, and innovation. Exploiting historical data on planned portions of the interstate highway system, railroads, and exploration routes as sources of exogenous variation, we estimate the effect of U.S. interstate highways on regional innovation. We find that a 10% increase in a region's stock of highways causes a 1.7% increase in regional patenting over a five-year period. We show that roads facilitate the flow of local knowledge and allow innovators to access more distant knowledge inputs. This finding suggests that transportation infrastructure may spur regional growth above and beyond the more commonly discussed agglomeration economies that are predicated on an inflow of new workers.
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Michel Grossetti et al.
Urban Studies, August 2014, Pages 2219-2234
Abstract:
Most current scientific policies incorporate debates on cities and the geographic organisation of scientific activity. Research on 'world cities' develops the idea that interconnected agglomerations can better take advantage of international competition. Thus, the increasing concentration of activities in these cities at the expense of others could be observed by certain scholars using measures based on scientific publications. Others, however, show that an opposite trend is emerging: the largest cities are undergoing a relative decline in a country's scientific activities. To go beyond this seeming contradiction, this paper provides a global analysis of all countries with papers in the Web of Science over the period 1987-2007. The author's addresses were geocoded and grouped into agglomerations. Registering of papers was based on the fractional counting of multi-authored publications, and the results are unambiguous: deconcentration is the dominant trend both globally and within countries, with some exceptions for which explanations are suggested.
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Do Art Galleries Stimulate Redevelopment?
Jenny Schuetz
Journal of Urban Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
New York City is often held up as a successful example of arts-led economic development. Case studies have documented the influx of avant-garde artists and galleries into several neighborhoods, including Greenwich Village, Soho, and Chelsea, followed by yuppies and boutiques. Some researchers have used these examples to argue that artists and galleries can spur gentrification. An alternative hypothesis is that galleries choose to locate in neighborhoods with high levels of amenities. In this paper, I examine whether concentrations of galleries in Manhattan are associated with redevelopment of surrounding neighborhoods, conditional on initial neighborhood amenities. Results indicate that new galleries locate in high amenity, affluent neighborhoods, and near existing star galleries. In simple bivariate regressions, star gallery density is positively correlated with several metrics of building change. However, these correlations diminish when controls are added for initial neighborhood physical and economic conditions, and weaken still further under an IV approach. Results are consistent with galleries selecting neighborhoods that have a higher propensity to redevelop, due to the presence of observed and unobserved amenities.
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Migrant and ethnic diversity, cities and innovation: Firm effects or city effects?
Neil Lee
Journal of Economic Geography, forthcoming
Abstract:
The growing cultural diversity caused by immigration is seen as important for innovation. Research has focused on two potential mechanisms: a firm effect, with diversity at the firm level improving knowledge sourcing or ideas generation, and a city effect, where diverse cities help firms innovate. This article uses a dataset of over 2000 UK small- and medium-sized enterprises to test between these two. Controlling for firm characteristics, city characteristics and firm and city diversity, there is strong evidence for the firm effect. Firms with a greater share of migrant owners or partners are more likely to introduce new products and processes. This effect has diminishing returns, suggesting that it is a 'diversity' effect rather than simply the benefits of migrant run firms. However, there is no relationship between the share of foreign workers in a local labour market or fractionalization by country of birth and firm level innovation, nor do migrant-run firms in diverse cities appear particularly innovative. But urban context does matter and firms in London with more migrant owners and partners are more innovative than others. Firms in cities with high levels of human capital are also more innovative.
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Defensive Publishing by a Leading Firm
Justin Johnson
Information Economics and Policy, September 2014, Pages 15-27
Abstract:
I consider the use of defensive publishing by a firm with a patentable innovation in hand. Such publishing discloses technical information to rivals and foregoes the publisher's legal right to exclude, but also prevents rivals from patenting. My analysis identifies why firms choose defensive publishing over patenting and trade secrecy. I present summary data suggesting that defensive publishing has become more common recently, that the composition of firms using it is changing, and that it has emerged especially as a response to the fear of bad patents being issued in the area of software and business methods. These data are consistent with my theoretical results.
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Keith Drake, Martha Starr & Thomas McGuire
NBER Working Paper, July 2014
Abstract:
Brand and generic drug manufacturers frequently settle patent litigation on terms that include a payment to the generic manufacturer along with a specified date at which the generic would enter the market. The Federal Trade Commission contends that these agreements extend the brand's market exclusivity and amount to anticompetitive divisions of the market. The parties involved defend the settlements as normal business agreements that reduce business risk associated with litigation. The anticompetitive hypothesis implies brand stock prices should rise with announcement of the settlement. We classify 68 brand-generic settlements from 1993 to the present into those with and without an indication of a "reverse payment" from the brand to the generic, and conduct an event study of the announcement of the patent settlements on the stock price of the brand. For settlements with an indication of a reverse payment, brand stock prices rise on average 6% at the announcement. A "control group" of brand-generic settlements without indication of a reverse payment had no significant effect on the brands' stock prices. Our results support the hypothesis that settlements with a reverse payment increase the expected profits of the brand manufacturer and are anticompetitive.