Trends in Research Collaborations: An Overview

The importance of research collaborations 

Research collaborations are associations among researchers, authors, universities, and organizations, all of whom have a mutual benefit from developing these connections. These include access to otherwise restricted data, learning from others’ expertise in areas in which you’re not adept, learning new skills, and exploring opportunities for further research. 

Collaborative research has gained much traction in the last 50 years when researchers were increasingly required to work across geographies, cultures, and disciplines. Such scientific collaborations can boost your research career in several ways, some of which are listed below:¹ 

• Combining expertise and resources can help maximize outputs by being able to answer complex research questions. 
• There is a positive correlation between scientific collaborations and the number of citations. According to an analysis of 28 million papers from the humanities and the sciences published between 1900 and 2011, papers with more authors received more citations, especially if the authors were from different institutions. 
• Studies involving more academic collaborations also seem to attract more funders, especially if the study’s outputs are expected to have a significant impact on policymaking, health care, etc. Some funding organizations are increasingly preferring international and industry-academia collaborations for funding. For instance, the EU Commission’s Horizon 2020 program, which offered about 80 billion Euros of funding between 2014 and 2020, prioritized collaborative research projects. 
• Academic collaborations are an excellent networking opportunity to meet peers and experts in your discipline and explore opportunities for further research. 

Earlier trends in academic collaborations^2,3

According to the National Science Board, between 2008 and 2018 the percentage of science and engineering articles published with international research collaborations (including authors from at least two countries) increased from 17% to 23%. As of 2018, most of the 15 largest producers of science and engineering articles had high rates of international collaborations: the UK (62%), Australia (60%), France (59%), Canada (56%), Germany (53%), Spain (53%), and Italy (50%). The figure shows that from 2002 to 2020 there was an upswing in the number of international collaborations. 

A 2020 study also indicated that citation rates increased steadily with each additional country represented among the authors (as shown in the figure).  

A major factor for the increase in the number of scientific collaborations during this period was the rise of China as a significant player in research, with authors from other countries very keen on developing collaborations and partnerships with authors from China.

Current scenario in academic collaborations⁴ 

Despite the continual increase in the number of academic collaborations over the years, the scenario seems to be slightly different now in post-pandemic times. Initially, the number of international collaborations for COVID-19 research was quite high but toward the end of 2020 this trend took a dive with fewer international collaborations and more domestic ones. International collaborations were found to be less common on COVID-19-related papers in 2020 than they were for research on other coronaviruses in the previous years. This downward trend could be attributed to curbs on international travel with several countries being locked down and the remote working infrastructure not really in place, and the governments, private organizations, and educational institutions worldwide scrambling to adapt to the constantly changing conditions.  

Challenges in maintaining research collaborations^4,5 

Initiating and maintaining research collaborations comes with its own set of challenges. Such associations are always a coming together of brilliant minds who have their own perspectives. In every collaboration, each stakeholder must be open to accepting the other’s perspective and engaging in constructive discussions.

The many challenges that researchers may face in international collaborations can be categorized into the following types: 

• Political: The recent political developments across the globe have significantly affected research collaborations. 

1. China and the US: Because most of the early researchers on COVID-19 were from China, during the initial days these two countries saw several partnerships. However, gradually, as the pandemic situation worsened worldwide, the US switched to collaborating with other countries, such as the UK. In addition, there was some government intervention regarding the extent of information flow from China, which affected the scientific output significantly. Adding to this, visa restrictions and policy changes in both countries affected the relationships, contributing to fewer partnerships. Being the two countries accounting for the highest amount of scientific output worldwide, these communication gaps between China and the US affected the number of scientific collaborations globally. 
2. Russia and the US⁶: The US is Russia’s single biggest scientific collaborator. According to UNESCO, from 2017 to 2019, 14,476 scientific papers were co-authored by Russian and American researchers. However, because of the Russia-Ukraine tensions, the US imposed several sanctions against Russia, which in June 2022 came to include scientific collaborations, mainly targeting individuals and institutions that supported the war in Ukraine. Most European countries had already imposed sanctions as soon as the war began, with Germany taking the lead, followed by Denmark, Sweden, France, and others. The restrictions also included suspending grant payments. 

• Sociocultural: Language barriers among people from different countries, conflicting working styles, differences in communication styles and preferences, and other social practices may affect the communication across different geographies.
•  Legal: Countries may differ in their laws pertaining to data handling, documentation, permits, allocation of intellectual property rights, etc. 

Several challenges at the individual or institutional level (not the political challenges, because they are beyond an individual’s control) could be addressed by clear communication and planning before beginning the collaborative research. A few such methods that could help address issues and prevent potential delays in the project include the following: 

1. Communication: Clearly discuss the working styles, times, and sociocultural practices followed by all the stakeholders. Although ensuring everyone’s satisfaction is not quite possible, an agreement could be reached wherein everyone is relatively flexible and open to adapting to others’ working styles to an extent. 
2. One point of contact: Assigning one person from each team as the key spokesperson would help prevent any type of miscommunication or language translation issues. 
3. Planning: Planning and setting timelines would help everyone stay on track. Also, periodic review meetings would help getting updates on the project’s status and discuss any potential bottlenecks. However, constant communication should still be between the points of contact. 
4. Assigning roles, responsibilities, and credits: Deciding on all the stakeholders’ roles and responsibilities and ensuring all co-authors get their due credit is essential to prevent misunderstandings toward the end of the project. 
5. Funding and legal aspects: These two aspects should be discussed at the planning stage so that the authors can spend all their time on conducting the research and on data analysis and reporting. 

Thus, while collaborative research is the need of the hour for the advancement of research in various fields, it’s essential to understand and be empathetic toward other researchers’ roles and practices. This can help sustain the associations and possibly help increase the number of research collaborations. 

We hope that this article has helped you in understanding the past and current trends in academic collaborations, the challenges faced by researchers worldwide, and some methods to address them. 

References 

1. 5 Ways that collaboration can further your research and your career. Springer Nature. 2019. Accessed November 7, 2022. https://www.springernature.com/gp/researchers/the-source/blog/blogposts-life-in-research/benefits-of-research-collaboration/17360752 
2. Publications output: U.S. trends and internal comparisons. National Science Board. Accessed November 8, 2022. https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsb20206/international-collaboration 
3. Maher, B. and Noorden RV. How the COVID pandemic is changing global science collaborations. Published June 16, 2021. Accessed November 8, 2022. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01570-2 
4. Research collaborations bring big rewards: The world needs more. Published June 16, 2021. Accessed November 8, 2022. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01581-z 
5. Research collaborations: Drivers, challenges, and tips. Editage Insights. 2022. https://www.editage.com/insights/research-collaborations-drivers-challenges-and-tips 
6. Hudson RL. US to ‘wind down’ research collaboration with Russia. Science Business. Published June 13, 2022. Accessed November 9, 2022. https://sciencebusiness.net/news/us-wind-down-research-collaboration-russia