Academic inbreeding and research productivity and impact in Australian law schools

Authors:
Russell Smyth;Vinod Mishra
Affiliations:
Department of Economics, Monash University, Clayton, Australia 3800;Department of Economics, Monash University, Clayton, Australia 3800
Venue:
Scientometrics
Year:
2014

Citing 8
Cited 0

Learning-by-Hiring: When Is Mobility More Likely to Facilitate Interfirm Knowledge Transfer?

Management Science
Navel Gazing: Academic Inbreeding and Scientific Productivity

Management Science
The effect of academic inbreeding on scientific effectiveness

Scientometrics
Research productivity: Are higher academic ranks more productive than lower ones?

Scientometrics
Academic productivity correlated with well-being at work

Scientometrics
A preliminary test of Google Scholar as a source for citation data: a longitudinal study of Nobel prize winners

Scientometrics
Exploring the bibliometric and semantic nature of negative results

Scientometrics
Are more senior academics really more research productive than junior academics? Evidence from Australian law schools

Scientometrics

Quantified Score

Hi-index	0.00

Visualization

Abstract

This study compares the research productivity and impact of inbred and non-inbred faculty employed at Australian law schools. The sample consists of 429 academics, employed at 21 law schools. To measure research productivity and impact we use articles published in top law journals, defined in six different ways, as well as total citations and two different citation indices. We report results including, and excluding, publications in the academic's home law review. We find evidence that silver-corded faculty outperform other faculty on one of the measures of publications in top journals, once the endogeneity of academic seniority, grant history and the status of the law school at which the individual is employed is addressed, but this finding is not robust across alternative measures of articles published in the top journals. We find that there is no statistically significant difference between the research productivity and impact of inbred and non-inbred faculty. This finding is robust to a range of different ways of measuring research productivity and impact and alternative econometric approaches, including using two-stage least squares to address the endogeneity of academic seniority, grant history and the status of the law school at which the legal academic is employed.