Science and the process of research

Scientific inquiry is not a set of proscribed steps with a known outcome... but rather an exploration into the unknown, but knowable world. (Harwood, et al., 2005, p. 26)

Over the past century, there has been a major shift in the way scientific work is organised (Hara, Solomon, Kim, & Sonnenwald, 2003; Stokols, Hall, Taylor, & Moser, 2008), and the independent scientist, or “the lone wolf scholar” (Cronin, 2003), has been largely, although by no means entirely, replaced by teams of scientific specialists (Adams, et al., 2005; Andrade, et al., 2009; Chompalov, Genuth, & Shrum, 2002). The scientific researcher’s role has changed from one of being highly individualistic, to one of being more social and collaborative (Glanzel & Schubert, 2004; Jones, 2011) and the organisational

units of modern science are groups rather than individuals (Ziman, 1994). Scientific research has become collaborative.

Some writers claim that because new knowledge always builds on earlier knowledge, scientific research, has always been a collaborative activity (N. Fox, 2003), but others consider that collaboration didn’t start until the 17th or 18th century (Beaver & Rosen, 1978; Lorigo & Pellacini, 2007; Price & Beaver, 1966). It is true that senior researchers have always tended to collaborate, and this is particularly so of many Nobel prize winners (Mulkay, 1976; Zuckerman, 1967), however the increase in collaborative research over recent years has brought collaboration to the point where it is no longer confined to just the elite in the scientific community, but is now regarded as the norm in research practice in many scientific disciplines (Beaver & Rosen, 1978; Katz & Martin, 1997; Morrison, et al., 2003); and for academics, particularly in physics and biology, it is now the most common way of adding to a body of knowledge (Hand, 2010). These fields of research tend to be experimental, or applied and broad in their nature, and require a wider range of skills and knowledge than is possible from a single discipline approach and as a result there has been a shift from single discipline to multi and interdisciplinary projects (Hagstrom, 1964; Toomela, 2007).

Since the 1960s the collaboration phenomenon in scientific research has been systematically studied, and the increase over the last thirty years has been well documented with the evidence suggesting that the increase has been global and in every discipline (Beaver, 2001; B L Clarke, 1964; Corley, et al., 2006; Frenken, et al., 2005; Glanzel, 2002; Klein, 1996; Porac, et al., 2004; Stokols, Harvey, Gress, Fuqua, & Phillips, 2005). Analysis of the Web of Science shows that by the 1950s, 83 percent of papers in selected journals in the physical and biological sciences were collaborative efforts, compared to 32 percent in the social sciences and only 1-2 percent in the humanities (Thagard, 1997).

Further analysis also shows that in the natural sciences between 1900 and 1909 collaborative papers comprised about 25 percent of the published papers rising to 80 percent by the 1960s and since the 1970s, in some journals over 94 percent of the articles have been co-authored (Wray, 2006).

Whilst some writers claim that in the scientific disciplines collaboration has been the norm for many decades (Beaver & Rosen, 1978; Katz & Martin, 1997; Morrison, et al., 2003), much of the early 17th and 18th century research in physics and chemistry was more appropriately termed collective research as it was the result of the collective efforts of many people although the credit and responsibility rested with one person. In modern day ‘collaborative’ research the credit and responsibility are shared, to a greater or lesser degree, amongst all those participating.

Despite the volumes of research undertaken in the search for the reasons for the increase in collaboration, and the countless reasons given, it is not clear why it is growing so rapidly (Bozeman & Corley, 2004; Katz & Martin, 1997; Melin, 2000). Usually the growth is attributed to the rising costs of research and restraint on resources whilst at the same time large scale, complicated projects of scientific research today are demanding very large resources for their support (B L Clarke, 1964; Wray, 2002). Researchers are being encouraged to find more efficient ways of using those resources (Adams, et al., 2005; Black, 1997; Cavusgil, Calantone, & Zhao, 2003; Gibbons, et al., 1999; Luukkonen, Persson, & Sivertsen, 1992); and the increasing professionalization of science has also influenced the rise in collaboration (Lorigo & Pellacini, 2007).

The adjective ‘big’ is often used to describe the character of modern science, whether measured by the number of scientific papers published each year, the amount of money expended on research, the size of the scientific work force, or the enormous resources required to support much of it (Capshew & Rader, 1992). The term ‘big science’, was coined by physicist Alvin Weinberg in 1961, to describe the very large programmes such as the high-energy accelerators and programmes of the National Aeronautical and Space Administration. These programmes were ushered in by the Manhattan Project undertaken during World War ll and involved the mobilization of much of the U.S. community of physical scientists in an engineering project of unprecedented magnitude . The ‘big science’ phase in scientific history was characterised by research projects being enormous in scope, scale, complexity, or impact requiring such large investments they were possible only through large scale

investment by the state. Often the media with its powers of persuasion, and the military with its enormous resources were essential components in the pursuit of big science (Capshew & Rader, 1992; Welsh, Jirotka, & Gavaghan, 2006).

A wider currency was given to the term ‘big science’ with the publication of De Solla Price’s book ‘Big science, Little Science’ in 1963. Price’s concerns with "science-in-the-large" dated from the 1940s (Price, 1956, 1961, 1963, 1986) and he stressed the importance of technological innovation (e.g. instruments, machines, automata) as an engine of scientific change, in contrast to Weinberg, who was concerned about large machines and large programmes (Capshew & Rader, 1992).

Throughout the 1990s we have seen the rise of ‘big biology’. Like the ‘big science’ of the 1960s which focused on physics, ‘big biology’ is large-scale, cross and multi-discipline, and resource-hungry. The first ‘big biology’ project (1990- 2003) is considered to be the Human Genome Project (F Collins, Morgan, & Patrinos, 2003). The ‘big science’ movement has been described as the “industrialisation of science” (Ravetz, 1973, p.31). The 1990s saw the beginnings of a shift from normal science (routine, expert driven, reductionist science) to a

new paradigm termed post normal science (also termed Mode 2 or post-

academic science). Post normal science, unlike normal science, does not claim to be certain and value-free, and is, in fact, characterised by uncertainty, multiple values frameworks, high stakes, urgent decisions, judgement, extended peer communities, and the scientific goals are largely controlled by political or societal agencies (Kunseler, 2007).

Science and scientific research seems to entering another phase as around the world reports are coming in of governments tightening budgets, looking for greater efficiencies, questioning the size of the funding, seeking value for money and focusing the money on identified priorities. In Europe ‘big science’ programmes such as space programmes are being reviewed and the big programmes, such as the European Space Agency (ESA), and CERN (particle- physics laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland) are facing cuts over the next five years (Brumfiel, 2010). In Japan the competitive grants are being boosted but at the expense of ‘big science’ (Normile, 2011); and in the United States, despite

the feared major cuts to research funding in the 2011 federal budget, the reductions were not as bad as had been anticipated .

Within this framework of reducing and redirecting funding, governments, institutions and individual researchers are looking for ways of stretching the money going into research and at the same time pushing out the intellectual boundaries. Collaboration is being encouraged as one way of doing both.