Modelling and quantifying the impacts of open science practice

Topic description

ExpectedOutcome:

Projects are expected to contribute to the following expected outcomes:

• Structured evidence of scientific, societal and economic impacts of open science practice, complemented by the new methods, tools and data required to measure them.
• Better knowledge on how impacts develop and how a diversity of benefits can be achieved at scientific, societal and economic levels.
• Better understanding on how the practice of open science can contribute to the increased reproducibility of research results.

These targeted outcomes in turn contribute to medium and long-term impacts:

• Prioritisation of policy actions for open science, and improved policy making on open science.
• Maximised impact of open science.
• Increased capacity in the EU R&I system to conduct open science and to set it as a modus operandi of modern science.

Open science consists of sharing knowledge and data as early as possible in the research process, in open collaboration with all relevant actors, including citizens. The mainstreaming of open science practice^[1] is driven by expected impacts: (i) on the research system, e.g. increased efficiency, better reliability, and better responsiveness towards societal challenges; (ii) on the innovation system, e.g. faster innovation when results are shared earlier, and innovations more directed towards societal challenges; (iii) on the interface between science and society, e.g. more productive interactions among academia and other knowledge actors, and higher trust of society in the science system when researchers and citizens are engaged. While past projects have started building an evidence base, this remains fragmented and incomplete. A broad and comprehensive evidence base would help define new policies for open science, drive further uptake and help communicate on open science.

Proposals are expected to:

• systematise and evaluate the validity and robustness of existing literature, data and evidence of impacts of open science practice, including potential legal and licensing issues;
• leverage and valorise the body of knowledge resulting from the Science and Society (FP6), Science in Society (FP7) and Science with and for Society (Horizon 2020) programmes;
• complement existing evidence and develop scientific methodologies and models to capture impacts, notably those relating to socio-economic, including gender equality related, environmental and public health aspects. It is in particular expected to develop and implement methods for measuring the contribution of open science practice to the reproducibility of research results, and the implications of involving citizens, civil society and end-users in R&I;
• perform cost/benefit analyses of open science practice and conduct research to identify by which causality/mechanisms the impacts develop.

International Cooperation
Societal Engagement

[1]Open science practice includes: providing open access to research outputs (such as publications, data, software, models, algorithms, and workflows); early and open sharing of research (for example through preregistration, registered reports, pre-prints, crowd-sourcing of solutions to a specific problem); participation in open peer-review; measures to ensure reproducibility of results; and involving citizens, civil society and end-users in the co-creation of R&I agendas and content, including citizen science.