IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v104y2015i3d10.1007_s11192-015-1584-8.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Measuring university quality

Author

Listed:
  • Christopher Claassen

    (University of Essex)

Abstract

This paper uses a Bayesian hierarchical latent trait model, and data from eight different university ranking systems, to measure university quality. There are five contributions. First, I find that ratings tap a unidimensional, underlying trait of university quality. Second, by combining information from different systems, I obtain more accurate ratings than are currently available from any single source. And rather than dropping institutions that receive only a few ratings, the model simply uses whatever information is available. Third, while most ratings focus on point estimates and their attendant ranks, I focus on the uncertainty in quality estimates, showing that the difference between universities ranked 50th and 100th, and 100th and 250th, is insignificant. Finally, by measuring the accuracy of each ranking system, as well as the degree of bias toward universities in particular countries, I am able to rank the rankings.

Suggested Citation

  • Christopher Claassen, 2015. "Measuring university quality," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 104(3), pages 793-807, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:104:y:2015:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-015-1584-8
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-015-1584-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-015-1584-8
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11192-015-1584-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Grewal, Rajdeep & Dearden, James A. & Lilien, Gary L., 2008. "The University Rankings Game: Modeling the Competition Among Universities for Ranking," The American Statistician, American Statistical Association, vol. 62, pages 232-237, August.
    2. Jamil Salmi & Alenoush Saroyan, 2007. "League Tables as Policy Instruments: Uses and Misuses," Higher Education Management and Policy, OECD Publishing, vol. 19(2), pages 1-38.
    3. Lutz Bornmann & Rüdiger Mutz & Hans‐Dieter Daniel, 2013. "Multilevel‐statistical reformulation of citation‐based university rankings: The Leiden ranking 2011/2012," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(8), pages 1649-1658, August.
    4. Isidro F. Aguillo & Judit Bar-Ilan & Mark Levene & José Luis Ortega, 2010. "Comparing university rankings," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 85(1), pages 243-256, October.
    5. Ludo Waltman & Clara Calero-Medina & Joost Kosten & Ed C.M. Noyons & Robert J.W. Tijssen & Nees Jan Eck & Thed N. Leeuwen & Anthony F.J. Raan & Martijn S. Visser & Paul Wouters, 2012. "The Leiden ranking 2011/2012: Data collection, indicators, and interpretation," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2419-2432, December.
    6. James Monks & Ronald G. Ehrenberg, 1999. "The Impact of US News and World Report College Rankings on Admission Outcomes and Pricing Decisions at Selective Private Institutions," NBER Working Papers 7227, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Lewandowski, Daniel & Kurowicka, Dorota & Joe, Harry, 2009. "Generating random correlation matrices based on vines and extended onion method," Journal of Multivariate Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 100(9), pages 1989-2001, October.
    8. Bafumi, Joseph & Gelman, Andrew & Park, David K. & Kaplan, Noah, 2005. "Practical Issues in Implementing and Understanding Bayesian Ideal Point Estimation," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 13(2), pages 171-187, April.
    9. Thed N. Van Leeuwen & Henk F. Moed & Robert J. W. Tijssen & Martijn S. Visser & Anthony F. J. Van Raan, 2001. "Language biases in the coverage of the Science Citation Index and its consequencesfor international comparisons of national research performance," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 51(1), pages 335-346, April.
    10. Harvey Goldstein & David J. Spiegelhalter, 1996. "League Tables and Their Limitations: Statistical Issues in Comparisons of Institutional Performance," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 159(3), pages 385-409, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lutz Bornmann & Werner Marx, 2020. "Thomas theorem in research evaluation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(1), pages 553-555, April.
    2. Csóka, Imola & Sebestyén, Géza & Neszveda, Gábor, 2019. "Tudományos teljesítmény mérése a magyar felsőoktatás gazdasági képzéseiben [Measuring scientific performance of business and economics faculties in Hungarian higher education]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(7), pages 751-770.
    3. Wenqiang Fan & Qinghui Liu, 2016. "Open scholarship ranking of Chinese research universities," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 108(2), pages 673-691, August.
    4. Elisabeth Maria Schlagberger & Lutz Bornmann & Johann Bauer, 2016. "At what institutions did Nobel laureates do their prize-winning work? An analysis of biographical information on Nobel laureates from 1994 to 2014," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(2), pages 723-767, November.
    5. Lutz Bornmann & Alexander Butz & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2018. "What are the top five journals in economics? A new meta-ranking," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(6), pages 659-675, February.
    6. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Andrea Ciriaco & Grilli, Leonardo, 2016. "From rankings to funnel plots: The question of accounting for uncertainty when assessing university research performance," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 854-862.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Daraio, Cinzia & Bonaccorsi, Andrea & Simar, Léopold, 2015. "Rankings and university performance: A conditional multidimensional approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 244(3), pages 918-930.
    2. Murat Perit Çakır & Cengiz Acartürk & Oğuzhan Alaşehir & Canan Çilingir, 2015. "A comparative analysis of global and national university ranking systems," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 103(3), pages 813-848, June.
    3. Brigida Blasi & Sandra Romagnosi & Andrea Bonaccorsi, 2018. "Universities as celebrities? How the media select information from a large research assessment exercise," Science and Public Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 45(4), pages 503-514.
    4. Andrea Bonaccorsi & Cinzia Daraio, 2014. "Beyond university rankings ? Generating new indicators on European universities by linking data in open platforms," DIAG Technical Reports 2014-12, Department of Computer, Control and Management Engineering, Universita' degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza".
    5. Esteban Fernández Tuesta & Máxima Bolaños-Pizarro & Daniel Pimentel Neves & Geziel Fernández & Justin Axel-Berg, 2020. "Complex networks for benchmarking in global universities rankings," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(1), pages 405-425, October.
    6. Nicolás Robinson-García & Daniel Torres-Salinas & Emilio Delgado López-Cózar & Francisco Herrera, 2014. "An insight into the importance of national university rankings in an international context: the case of the I-UGR rankings of Spanish universities," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(2), pages 1309-1324, November.
    7. Bornmann, Lutz & Leydesdorff, Loet & Wang, Jian, 2014. "How to improve the prediction based on citation impact percentiles for years shortly after the publication date?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 175-180.
    8. Shahryar Rahnamayan & Sedigheh Mahdavi & Kalyanmoy Deb & Azam Asilian Bidgoli, 2020. "Ranking Multi-Metric Scientific Achievements Using a Concept of Pareto Optimality," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 8(6), pages 1-46, June.
    9. Jeongeun Kim, 2018. "The Functions and Dysfunctions of College Rankings: An Analysis of Institutional Expenditure," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 59(1), pages 54-87, February.
    10. Ellen Hazelkorn, 2011. "Measuring World-class Excellence and the Global Obsession with Rankings," Chapters, in: Roger King & Simon Marginson & Rajani Naidoo (ed.), Handbook on Globalization and Higher Education, chapter 29, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. Fairclough, Ruth & Thelwall, Mike, 2015. "National research impact indicators from Mendeley readers," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 845-859.
    12. Enar Ruiz-Conde & Aurora Calderón-Martínez, 2014. "University institutional repositories: competitive environment and their role as communication media of scientific knowledge," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 98(2), pages 1283-1299, February.
    13. Roger King & Simon Marginson & Rajani Naidoo (ed.), 2011. "Handbook on Globalization and Higher Education," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 13590.
    14. Ibrahim Shehatta & Khalid Mahmood, 2016. "Correlation among top 100 universities in the major six global rankings: policy implications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(2), pages 1231-1254, November.
    15. Massucci, Francesco Alessandro & Docampo, Domingo, 2019. "Measuring the academic reputation through citation networks via PageRank," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 185-201.
    16. Maryam Moshtagh & Tahereh Jowkar & Maryam Yaghtin & Hajar Sotudeh, 2023. "The moderating effect of altmetrics on the correlations between single and multi-faceted university ranking systems: the case of THE and QS vs. Nature Index and Leiden," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(1), pages 761-781, January.
    17. Feiheng Luo & Aixin Sun & Mojisola Erdt & Aravind Sesagiri Raamkumar & Yin-Leng Theng, 2018. "Exploring prestigious citations sourced from top universities in bibliometrics and altmetrics: a case study in the computer science discipline," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 114(1), pages 1-17, January.
    18. Ludo Waltman & Clara Calero-Medina & Joost Kosten & Ed C.M. Noyons & Robert J.W. Tijssen & Nees Jan Eck & Thed N. Leeuwen & Anthony F.J. Raan & Martijn S. Visser & Paul Wouters, 2012. "The Leiden ranking 2011/2012: Data collection, indicators, and interpretation," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2419-2432, December.
    19. Robert J. W. Tijssen & Alfredo Yegros-Yegros & Jos J. Winnink, 2016. "University–industry R&D linkage metrics: validity and applicability in world university rankings," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(2), pages 677-696, November.
    20. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:104:y:2015:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-015-1584-8. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.