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- Environ Eng Sci
- PMC5206685
Environmental Engineering Science
Environ Eng Sci. 2017 Jan 1; 34(1): 51–61.
Published online 2017 Jan 1. doi: 10.1089/ees.2016.0223
PMCID: PMC5206685
PMID: 28115824
Academic Research in the 21st Century: Maintaining Scientific Integrity in a Climate of Perverse Incentives and Hypercompetition
This article has been corrected. See Environ Eng Sci. 2017 August 01; 34(8): 616.
This article has been cited by other articles in PMC.
Introduction
The incentives and reward structure of academia have undergone a dramatic change in the last half century. Competition has increased for tenure-track positions, and most U.S. PhD graduates are selecting careers in industry, government, or elsewhere partly because the current supply of PhDs far exceeds available academic positions (Cyranoski et al., 2011; Stephan, 2012a; Aitkenhead, 2013; Ladner et al., 2013; Dzeng, 2014; Kolata, 2016). Universities are also increasingly “balance their budgets on the backs of adjuncts” given that part-time or adjunct professor jobs make up 76% of the academic labor force, while getting paid on average $2,700 per class, without benefits or job security (Curtis and Thornton, 2013; U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce, 2014). There are other concerns about the culture of modern academia, as reflected by studies showing that the attractiveness of academic research careers decreases over the course of students' PhD program at Tier-1 institutions relative to other careers (Sauermann and Roach, 2012; Schneider et al., 2014), reflecting the overemphasis on quantitative metrics, competition for limited funding, and difficulties pursuing science as a public good.
In this article, we will (1) describe how perverse incentives and hypercompetition are altering academic behavior of researchers and universities, reducing scientific progress and increasing unethical actions, (2) propose a conceptual model that describes how emphasis on quantity versus quality can adversely affect true scientific progress, (3) consider ramifications of this environment on the next generation of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) researchers, public perception, and the future of science itself, and finally, (4) offer recommendations that could help our scientific institutions increase productivity and maintain public trust. We hope to begin a conversation among all stakeholders who acknowledge perverse incentives throughout academia, consider changes to increase scientific progress, and uphold “high ethical standards” in the profession (NAE, 2004).
Perverse Incentives in Research Academia: The New Normal?
When you rely on incentives, you undermine virtues. Then when you discover that you actually need people who want to do the right thing, those people don't exist…—Barry Schwartz, Swarthmore College (Zetter, 2009)
Academics are human and readily respond to incentives. The need to achieve tenure has influenced faculty decisions, priorities, and activities since the concept first became popular (Wolverton, 1998). Recently, however, an emphasis on quantitative performance metrics (Van Noorden, 2010), increased competition for static or reduced federal research funding (e.g., NIH, NSF, and EPA), and a steady shift toward operating public universities on a private business model (Plerou, et al., 1999; Brownlee, 2014; Kasperkevic, 2014) are creating an increasingly perverse academic culture. These changes may be creating problems in academia at both individual and institutional levels (Table 1).
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