Potential catalysts in the adoption of e-Infrastructure technology The respondents were also asked to identify the important factors that were

particularly important in their development of or work with e-Infrastructure, and the results are reported in Table 3.19 (see QD1 in the annexed questionnaire). Not surprisingly, given our earlier review of the literature, the overwhelming view of the respondents was that three factors were of critical importance: seed funding, collaboration, and the possibility of doing interesting research. Interestingly, given the regional differences in funding levels observed in the previous section, there were no regional differences in this view. Respondents from all regions felt that seed funding from an outside agency, collaboration and expected contribution to interesting research were the most important factors driving adoption.

Table 3.21: Catalysts for e-Infrastructure (in % of valid responses)

Catalyst Very

Important

Somewhat

Important Neutral Somewhat Unimportant

Not at all Important Seed funding from an outside

agency 57.8% 23.1% 9.2% 2.9% 6.9%

Seed funding from home

institutions 34.5% 30.4% 15.2% 9.4% 10.5%

Organizational incentives within

your institution 26.2% 31.5% 22.6% 6.5% 13.1%

Collaboration 65.4% 25.1% 7.8% 1.7% 0.0%

Observation of successful

projects in other areas 25.1% 41.9% 22.2% 6.6% 4.2%

The computational requirements

of your research 31.8% 31.8% 22.4% 6.5% 7.6%

Contribution to interesting

research expected 54.3% 31.2% 12.7% 0.0% 1.7%

Support for teaching activities 15.2% 28.7% 24.6% 17.0% 14.6%

Emerging standardization of

available tools 23.2% 35.7% 19.6% 13.1% 8.3%

There appear to be few regional differences in catalysts, with two notable exceptions (see Figure 3.27). Respondents from the USA were more likely than those from the European continent to point to the beneficial character of external seed funding and/or seed funding from the home institutions. And European respondents, both from the UK and continental Europe, highlighted the computational requirements of their research as a catalyst for e-Infrastructure adoption.

Figure 3.27: Catalysts for e-Infrastructure adoption by country of the respondent (% of respondents who considered this catalyst as very or somewhat important)

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Seed funding from an outside agency

Seed funding from home institutions

Organizational incentives

Collaboration

Observation of successful projects Computational

require-ments of your research Contribution to

interesting research Support for teaching

Emerging standardization of available tools

UK Continental Europe USA Other countries

See Table A.13 in Annex I.3 on the data.

Source: AVROSS WP2 survey.

Disciplinary differences between catalysts

There was not much variation by major discipline. As is evident from Table 3.22, respondents involved in projects from the humanities, natural sciences and social sciences alike pointed to the importance of collaborators, seed funding from

outside agencies and contributions to existing research as their top three catalysts.

When we break out the results by whether the scientists are local or non-local in their research collaborations, however, Table 3.23 reveals a striking difference among the social sciences: Those that are locally oriented emphasise the role of collaboration; those with a more widespread base of collaborators emphasise seed funding, interesting research and observation of successful projects.

Table 3.22: Catalysts for work with e-Infrastructure by discipline

(responses who considered a catalyst as important in % of all responses)

Catalyst Humanities Social

Sciences

Neither humanities nor social scienc Seed funding from an outside agency 62.0% 76.9% 81.6%

Seed funding from home institutions 78.9% 42.3% 64.9%

Organizational incentives within your institution 63.2% 45.8% 57.7%

Collaboration 97.3% 81.5% 90.5%

Observation of successful projects in other areas 63.2% 54.2% 67.1%

The computational requirements of your research 50.0% 45.8% 63.5%

Contribution to interesting research expected 86.5% 73.1% 85.5%

Support for teaching activities 51.4% 48.1% 43.9%

Emerging standardization of available tools 60.5% 56.0% 58.9%

Source: AVROSS WP2 survey.

Table 3.23: Catalysts for e-Infrastructure adoption by discipline in the project and location of the collaborators of the respondent

(respondents who considered this catalyst as important in % of all respondents) Humanities Social Sciences

Neither humanities nor social sciences Catalysts Local Non-local Local Non-local Local Non-local Seed funding from an outside

agency 100% 84.4% 66.7% 78.3% 86.7% 84.7%

Seed funding from home inst. 75% 78.8% 66.7% 39.1% 58.3% 65.5%

Organizational incentives within

your institution 50% 63.6% 66.7% 42.9% 50.0% 60.3%

Collaboration 75% 100% 66.7% 83.3% 92.8% 93.4%

Observation of successful

projects in other areas 75% 60.6% 0% 61.9% 72.7% 67.9%

The computational requirements

of your research 25% 53.1% 66.7% 42.9% 60.0% 75.4%

Contribution to interesting

research expected 100% 84.8% 66.7% 73.9% 100.0% 93.0%

Support for teaching activities 75% 46.9% 33.3% 50.0% 30.8% 42.9%

Emerging standardization of

available tools 100% 54.5% 33.3% 59.1% 61.5% 58.9%

Source: AVROSS WP2 survey.

We can also examine the views of respondents about key catalysts by whether they adopted e-Infrastructure technologies before or after 2000 (early or late adopters). We report the results in Table 3.24. The results do not vary

systematically by date of adoption or by discipline. Both early and late adopters report that collaboration is an important catalyst, regardless of their discipline, and identify initial seed funding as important.

Table 3.24: Catalysts for e-Infrastructure adoption by discipline in the project and year of e-Infrastructure adoption of the respondent

(respondents who considered this catalyst as important in % of all respondents) Humanities Social Sciences

Neither humanities nor social sciences

Catalysts Early Late Early Late Early Late

Seed funding from an outside

agency 82.4% 81.8% 100.0% 53.8% 88.9% 86.5%

Seed funding from home

institutions 88.9% 75.0% 50.0% 16.7% 69.2% 61.1%

Organizational incentives within

your institution 61.1% 66.7% 33.3% 41.7% 59.3% 60.0%

Collaboration 100.0% 90.9% 100.0% 69.2% 96.6% 89.2%

Observation of successful

projects in other areas 72.2% 66.7% 42.9% 63.6% 75.0% 58.8%

The computational requirements

of your research 52.9% 50.0% 42.9% 45.5% 57.7% 77.8%

Contribution to interesting

research expected 94.4% 83.3% 75.0% 66.7% 92.3% 94.4%

Support for teaching activities 61.1% 36.4% 50.0% 46.2% 34.6% 51.5%

Emerging standardization of

available tools 55.6% 58.3% 75.0% 54.5% 63.0% 59.4%

Source: AVROSS WP2 survey.

Focussing on the five fields of interest, as reported in Figure 3.28, it is clear that there are not large differences across fields. Indeed, the percentage of respondents who ranked a catalyst as important are more or less the same. Seed funding from an outside agency or the home institution was a little bit more important for projects with archaeologists; the result is similar for collaboration. Factors such as organisa-tional incentives and the computaorganisa-tional requirements of the research seem to be lower for projects with sociologists.

Figure 3.28: Catalysts for work with e-Infrastructure in five fields (% of responses who considered a catalyst as important)

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Seed funding from an outside agency

Seed funding from home institutions

Organizational incentives

Collaboration Contribution to

interesting research Support for teaching

Emerging standardization of available tools

Archaeology Economics and business

Sociology Social geography, regional science Linguistics

Catalysts and activity profiles

The catalysts to e-Infrastructure involvement can also be differentiated between the four groups of activity profiles. The groups differ only for two of the listed catalysts (see Figure 3.29 and Table A.15 in Annex I.3). In particular, professionals rate the emerging standardization of available tools to be more important than do the other groups of researchers, scholars and administrators. Professionals were more likely to respond that the observation of successful projects in other areas was an important catalyst, in contrast to the responses by scholars.

Figure 3.29: Catalysts for work with e-Infrastructure by activity profiles

(arithmetic mean of the responses from 1=very unimportant to 5=very important)

1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0

Researchers Professionals Administrators Scholars Emerging standardization of available tools

Observation of successful projects in other areas Very

unimportant Very important

Data for this figure in Annex I.3, Table A.15.

Source: AVROSS WP2 survey.

There are not strong differences between the way in which former and current e-Infrastructure users view the different catalysts. Both groups rate collaboration as the most important catalyst, followed by expected contribution to interesting research and seed funding of an outside agency.

Im Dokument Accelerating Transition to Virtual Research Organisation in Social Science (AVROSS) (Seite 59-63)