A lire sur: http://www.atelier.net/en/trends/articles/social-media-can-influence-life-cycle-scientific-publications_424288
Social networks have now put down firm
roots in both the public and private spheres, but what about the
scientific community? Evidence clearly shows that social ecosystems are
able to provide support to academic research work as well.
One North American scientist in 40 is now active on Twitter, reveals a study published online by Queen’s University,
Ontario, Canada. In addition thousands of blog entries have been
indexed on research blogging platforms and two million scientists make
use of Mendeley, a reference-sharing tool. The four authors of the
report point out that the power of social media can radically speed up
dissemination of scientific work, but perhaps even more importantly it
can improve knowledge-sharing. In order to measure the contribution made
by social media, the authors examined the growth of a scientific
network through the use of Twitter. They conclude that, in addition to
requiring very little investment, setting up a ‘virtual’ network can not
only be achieved far more quickly than a network built on interpersonal
relationships but it also raises the profile of the research work more
effectively.
‘Virtual’ departments comprising people of varying experience
Comparing the relative sizes of physical university
departments and the ‘virtual’ departments created by online social
networks, the authors calculated that the median number of Twitter
followers was approximately 730 times larger than the average number of
full-time faculty members in each scientist’s department. The majority
of the followers (55%) comprise science students, scientists and
scientific organisations. However, the remaining 45% make up a
significant minority of non-scientists – interested media workers or
members of the general public. These figures seem to show that while in
the past research tended to be commented on and added to solely by
scientists’ peers, it might now benefit from conversations with and
contributions from non-specialists. Citing previous research showing
that 19% of links to peer-reviewed articles sent by a small sample of
academics were retweets, the authors point out that by contrast nearly
half (47%) of all tweets sent by the publication Nature Chemistry (2013) were retweeted on average four times each.
New dimension for feedback
The number of published citations of a scientific study has
traditionally been a key measure of its success. Now it appears that
tweeting can influence this metric to a considerable extent. The authors
quote a previous paper indicating that articles published in the
Journal of Medical Internet Research that were tweeted about frequently
in the first three days following publication were 11 times more likely
to be highly cited 17 to 29 months later than less tweeted-about
articles. However, the era of social media also enables the use of
alternative metrics, which are more comprehensive and more qualitative
than the rather narrow measurement based on citations in other published
works. These ‘altmetrics’ aim to quantify the broader impact and reach
of scientific work beyond traditional journals. Many are based on data
derived from sharing on social media and the volume of downloads for a
paper or data repository. Clearly, Twitter can foster online discussion
of scientific work, although this approach is still scorned by many
professional scientists. Their fears and hesitations may well centre on
potential “misrepresentations of science sound-bites” and possible “loss
of important nuances” in the desire to broaden the level of sharing and
popularise science, say the report’s authors.
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