IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0340642.html

The national survey of academic researchers: New facts and data

Author

Listed:
  • Kyle Myers
  • Wei Yang Tham
  • Jerry Thursby
  • Marie Thursby
  • Nina Cohodes
  • Karim Lakhani
  • Rachel Mural
  • Yilun Xu

Abstract

We introduce a new survey of professors at roughly 150 of the most research-intensive institutions of higher education in the US. We document seven new features of how research-active professors are compensated, how they spend their time, and how they perceive their research pursuits, which we organize under three themes. Earnings and inequality: (1) there is more inequality in earnings within fields than there is across fields; (2) institutions, ranks, tasks, and sources of earnings can account for roughly half of the total variation in earnings; (3) there is significant variation across fields in the correlations between earnings and different kinds of research output, but these account for a small amount of earnings variation. Research productivity and inputs: (4) measuring professors’ productivity in terms of output-per-year versus output-per-research-hour can yield substantial differences; (5) professors’ beliefs about the riskiness of their research are best predicted by their fundraising intensity, their risk aversion in their personal lives, and the degree to which their research involves generating new hypotheses. Research output choices: (6) older and younger professors have very different research outputs and time allocations, but their intended audiences are quite similar; (7) personal risk-taking is highly predictive of professors’ orientation towards applied, commercially relevant research. An anonymized version of the data is publicly available at: https://tny.sh/nsar.

Suggested Citation

  • Kyle Myers & Wei Yang Tham & Jerry Thursby & Marie Thursby & Nina Cohodes & Karim Lakhani & Rachel Mural & Yilun Xu, 2026. "The national survey of academic researchers: New facts and data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 21(2), pages 1-26, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0340642
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0340642
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0340642
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0340642&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0340642?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Charles I. Jones, 2022. "The Past and Future of Economic Growth: A Semi-Endogenous Perspective," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 14(1), pages 125-152, August.
    2. Ashish Arora & Sharon Belenzon & Andrea Patacconi & Jungkyu Suh, 2020. "The Changing Structure of American Innovation: Some Cautionary Remarks for Economic Growth," Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 39-93.
    3. Cohen, Wesley M., 2010. "Fifty Years of Empirical Studies of Innovative Activity and Performance," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 129-213, Elsevier.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Ceccagnoli, Marco & Lee, You-Na & Walsh, John P., 2024. "Reaching beyond low-hanging fruit: Basic research and innovativeness," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(1).
    2. Kyle R. Myers & Wei Yang Tham & Jerry Thursby & Marie Thursby & Nina Cohodes & Karim Lakhani & Rachel Mural & Yilun Xu, 2023. "New Facts and Data about Professors and their Research," Papers 2312.01442, arXiv.org.
    3. Shanchao Wang & Julian M. Alston & Philip G. Pardey, 2025. "R&D lags in economic models," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(6), pages 842-862, August.
    4. Dachs, Bernhard & Biege, Sabine & Borowiecki, Marcin & Lay, Gunther & Jäger, Angela & Schartinger, Doris, 2012. "The Servitization of European Manufacturing Industries," MPRA Paper 38873, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Chang, Chia-Lin & Hsu, Hui-Kuang, 2013. "Modelling Volatility Size Effects for Firm Performance: The Impact of Chinese Tourists to Taiwan," MPRA Paper 45691, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Laura Barbieri & Daniela Bragoli & Flavia Cortelezzi & Giovanni Marseguerra, 2015. "Public Support to Innovation Strategies," DISCE - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali dises1509, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    7. Baldwin, Carliss Y. & Bogers, Marcel L.A.M. & Kapoor, Rahul & West, Joel, 2024. "Focusing the ecosystem lens on innovation studies," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(3).
    8. Bettina Peters & Rebecca Riley & Iulia Siedschlag & Priit Vahter & John McQuinn, 2014. "Innovation and Productivity in Services: Evidence from Germany, Ireland and the United Kingdom," JRC Working Papers on Corporate R&D and Innovation 2014-04, Joint Research Centre.
    9. Z. Jun Lin & Shengqiang Liu & Fangcheng Sun, 2017. "The Impact of Financing Constraints and Agency Costs on Corporate R&D Investment: Evidence from China," International Review of Finance, International Review of Finance Ltd., vol. 17(1), pages 3-42, March.
    10. Naudé, Wim & Nagler, Paula, 2022. "The Ossified Economy: The Case of Germany, 1870-2020," IZA Discussion Papers 15607, IZA Network @ LISER.
    11. Daniel Alonso-Martínez & Nuria González-Álvarez & Mariano Nieto, 2021. "Does international patent collaboration have an effect on entrepreneurship?," Journal of International Entrepreneurship, Springer, vol. 19(4), pages 539-559, December.
    12. Barge-Gil, Andrés & López, Alberto, 2014. "R&D determinants: Accounting for the differences between research and development," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(9), pages 1634-1648.
    13. Ujjayant Chakravorty & Runjuan Liu & Ruotao Tang & Long Zhao, 2024. "Firm innovation under import competition from low‐wage countries," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(5), pages 2063-2093, May.
    14. Silvia Dalla Fontana & Ramana Nanda, 2023. "Innovating to Net Zero: Can Venture Capital and Start-Ups Play a Meaningful Role?," Entrepreneurship and Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(1), pages 79-105.
    15. Breandán Ó hUallacháin, 2025. "Organisations and the dynamics of change in the location of American invention," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 62(6), pages 1099-1122, May.
    16. Alex Coad & Agustí Segarra-Blasco & Mercedes Teruel, 2021. "A bit of basic, a bit of applied? R&D strategies and firm performance," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 46(6), pages 1758-1783, December.
    17. T. Gries & R. Grundmann & I. Palnau & M. Redlin, 2017. "Innovations, growth and participation in advanced economies - a review of major concepts and findings," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 14(2), pages 293-351, April.
    18. Spyros Arvanitis & Florian Seliger & Tobias Stucki, 2013. "The Relative Importance of Human Resource Management Practices for a Firm's Innovation Performance," KOF Working papers 13-341, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    19. Link, Albert N. & Ruhm, Christopher J., 2011. "Creativity and the Family Tree: Human Capital Endowments and the Propensity of Entrepreneurs to Patent," IZA Discussion Papers 5988, IZA Network @ LISER.
    20. Bianchini, Stefano & Pellegrino, Gabriele, 2019. "Innovation persistence and employment dynamics," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(5), pages 1171-1186.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:plo:pone00:0340642. 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: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    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.