Why the US lost leadership in scientific papers, and will soon lose in other indicators

R. D. Shelton and Lance MillerWTEC

Sponsored by NSF coop agreement ENG-0844639.

Outline: Some Q and A

Problem: US publication plateau (or share decline) despite huge and increasing R&D investmentsSolution: Shelton Model reveals that the driver is world share of R&D funding, not its absolute valueRefinement: The government part of R&D funding, and higher education spending are even better predictors, which can explain why the US lost leadership to the EU. Shelton-Leydesdorff Model.Generalization: Models of other indicators (patents, PhDs in science, Hi-tech market share) also help explain US declines. The drivers are identified by regression over the OECD data, and provide policy levers for remedies.

US Paper Share and GERD

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Q: The American Paradox: Declining SCI paper shares despite increasing R&D (GERD*) Why?

*Gross domestic expenditures on R&D (OECD Constant $ PPP), fractional paper share from NSF National Science Indicators.

US Paper Share Compared to GERD and GERD Share

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Clue: US paper share depends more on its share of GERD than its total GERD

A: Shelton (2006) model of publication system

$ Inputs

US

EU

AT

ROW

Papers

Published

National Research Systems -- Fairly Independent

Highly Interdependent Paper Selection

Journal

Editors

g1p1

G (total) P (total)

wi = gi/G

GERD share

mi = pi/P

Paper shareModel: mi = ki wi

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PRC Forecast

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Performance of Shelton Model (mi = kiwi) in forecasting paper share from 2005 to 2010

Based on forecasts from 2005 data of GERD and ki . The relative efficiencies ki

are fairly constant for these three. Accuracy is not bad, but PRC is growing slower than forecast. Whole counts in the WoS. (Shelton & Leydesdorff, 2011)

Q: This model can account for the recent US & EU decline of due to the rising GERD share of China, but, why did the US lose the lead in the mid-90s?

SCI and SSCI Papers

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Relative Efficiency ki

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Relative efficiency ki is this ratio normalized by 39 OECDg country values. In 1990 EU and US had the same ki , but curves diverged in 1990s. (Foland & Shelton, 2010)

Clue: EU passed the US because it sharply increased its ratio of papers/R&D $.

A: The EU increased paper share in the 90s by sharpening focus on sectors that maximize papers

Government funding instead of industry

University instead of business R&D spendingCivilian instead of military R&D

Multiple regression shows these input components are more effective in producing paper outputs—first two much more so.

Regression analysis of which GERD components best account for paper outputs

Year = 1999, Constant $ PPP series usedDependent Variable (DV) = papers in SEI, fractional counts Independent Variables = two components of R&D funding (IV1, IV2)—several typesN = 39 countries in OECD Group, sometimes fewerP is significance probability of IV; if p < 0.05, variable is importantR2 > 96% always – IVs are very good predictors

Government vs. Industrial funding of R&D

IV1 = government funded part of GERD

IV2 = industry likewise

Much smaller components omitted

IV1: P = 0.000 (very significant)

IV2: P = 0.838 (not significant)

Regression equation:

Papers = 2.73 IV1 – 0.031 IV2 + 1957

Part of GERD From Public vs. Private Funding

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In 1990s, both shifted R&D funding from government to industry, but this change was much smaller in the EU

Government funding is much more likely to produce papers. Paper advantage: EU.

SCI and SSCI Papers

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GERD from Govt Constant $ PPP

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Patterns are almost identical with a small lag. The slight shift of EU is due to its HERD focus.

Regression identifies drivers for other indicators

Patents. Complementary drivers: industrial funding and business spending are best. (Shelton & Leydesdorff, 2011) PhDs in S&E: Current stock of researchers High-tech market shares: stock of researchers, but this is a proxy for a real underlying variable, perhaps location of research—correlated with location of manufacturing.

National positions (Shelton & Foland, 2009) Stop press updates in red

In 2005 data the leader was: US: GERD, researchers, impacts, patents, hi-tech exports EU: papers in SCI, S&E PhDs, Nobels PRC: trade balance

But forecasts show the PRC will gain: Lead hi-tech exports and researchers by 2010 Pass EU in GERD by 2015 (Still a good bet) Pass US in S&E PhDs by 2015 (Probably in 2008) Lead in papers in SCI by 2017 (Chinese growth slowed,

but it leads in INSPEC, Scopus, et al.)

US scientific publication decline can be explained by examination of two decades. In the 1990s the US was passed by the EU. In the 2000s the shares of both were decreased by the rise of China.In the 1990s, US R&D funding shifted from 1/2 government & 1/2 industry to 1/3 & 2/3. Since regression shows that industry-funded R&D produces far fewer papers, US paper production sagged. The EU also spends more on R&D that produces papers, particularly in universities, making it the world leader.This explains the American Paradox: the decline of US paper share as it increased its R&D investment.In the 2000s the PRC curve was far below those of the US and EU, but models based on its rapidly increasing share of world R&D investment, forecast that it will pass both.Similar data and models for patents, PhDs grads in science and engineering, and high-tech market share show continuing decline of the West with the rise of China.

Conclusions

For more information

•Foland, P & Shelton RD (2010) Why is Europe so efficient at producing scientific papers, and does this explain the European Paradox? 11th International Conference on S&T Indicators, Leiden, Sept. 2010.

•Leydesdorff, L., & Wagner, CS. (2009a). Macro-level indicators of the relations between research funding and research output. Journal of Informetrics, 3, 353-362.

•Leydesdorff, L., & Wagner, CS. (2009b) Is the United States losing ground in science? A global perspective on the world science system Scientometrics, 78, 23-36.

•Shelton, RD., (2008), Relations between national research investment and publication output: Application to an American paradox. Scientometrics 74, 191-205.

References-1

•Shelton, RD. & Foland, P. (2010) The race for world leadership of science and technology: Status and forecasts.  Science Focus 5, pp. 1-9 (Feb. 2010) in Chinese.  Also, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, pp. 369-380, Rio de Janeiro, July, 2009.  

•Shelton, RD and Leydesdorff, L (2011a) Bibliometric evidence for an empirical trade-off in national funding strategies. Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, pp. 763-774. Durban, July, 2011.

•Shelton, RD and Leydesdorff, L (2011b) Publish or Patent: Bibliometric evidence for an empirical trade-off in national funding strategies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, in press.

References-2

Posted at itri2.org/s/ or www.leydesdorff.net

University vs. Business Expenditure of R&D

IV1 = HERD, higher education part of GERD spending

IV2 = BERD, business part likewise

IV1: P = 0.009 (very significant)

IV2: P = 0.000 (very significant, but coefficient is much smaller)

Regression equation:

Papers = 2.53 IV1 +0.58 IV2 + 2136

HERD Constant$ PPP

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Higher Education Expenditure on R&D

Despite much smaller overall GERD, the EU spends more on university R&D. Paper advantage: EU.

In 2010 PRC increased at 26%, EU declined slightly. If this continued, curves would cross in 2015.

GERD $2000 PPP

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Total International Patents from Derwent

Paper Forecasts from Shelton-Leydesdorff Model

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wi’ is national share of OECDg government R&D funding; ki’ is the relative efficiency for this component. Uses 5-year average of rates of Government R&D funding increases. EU and PRC fit well, but US is worse than forecast, because its rate of Government increase has plummeted to near zero. (Shelton & Leydesdorff, 2011)

Performance of Shelton-Leydesdorff Model mi = ki’wi’ in forecasting from 2005

USPTO Patents Worldwide

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This is almost a zero-sum game. Or an unstable queue with arrival rate > service rate. It’s even worse, because the arrival rate is increasing. Thus the delay time and backlog must increase without bound.

USPTO is failing to keep up. Although users pay fees that could hire more examiners, the Congress siphons that off to pay other bills

Share of USPTO Patent Grants

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One consequence is that US applications are being crowded out by foreign applications. In 2008, there were more foreign grants than domestic ones. The trends are slow, so it will take years before no Americans get US patents.

Total R&D Spending

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The US invests far more in R&D than the EU

Q: But, after 1995, the EU publishes slightly more scientific papers than the US. Why?

Government and Industry Funding of R&D

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Because US investment mainly comes from industry, and industry funded R&D is far less likely to result in papers

And the EU overcomes the US slight advantage in government funding by spending more in the higher education sector that also produces more papers.