Gregor Fabian

The DZHW Scientists Survey 2023 is an online survey of full-time academic and artistic staff at German universities and equivalent institutions of higher education with the right to award doctorates. It is repeated at regular intervals as a trend study to explore the working and research conditions at German universities and equivalent institutions of higher education. The DZHW Scientists Survey 2023 was conducted from January to March 2023. The respondents therefore take a retrospective look at their working and research conditions during the Covid-19 pandemic and their current post-pandemic situation. The previous Scientists Surveys took place in 2010, 2016 and 2019/2020. [...] Full Abstract: https://doi.org/10.21249/DZHW:scs2023:1.0.0

The number of researchers' publications is a widely used proxy measure for scientific output, individual achievement, and performance. Despite well-known criticism from the bibliometric community, the use of bibliometric databases as a basis for measuring publication output is widespread. At the same time, there are established survey instruments that also measure the publication output per researcher. We use survey-bibliometric matching with Scopus publication records to compare the alternative publication counts. A Scopus author ID match could be found for 70 % of the respondent researchers. The number of publications per researcher varies greatly between these data sources. [...]

The Scientists Survey was initiated in 2010. It is intended as a long-term barometer for science. Because the 2023 edition was the fourth wave, many topics, such as attitudes and opinions on science policy for example, can be examined over time in trends analyses. Additionally, the timing of the surveys waves has enabled a particular set of research questions: while the current cohort was surveyed directly at the end of the pandemic, the preceding wave took place directly before the start of the first extensive restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This "historical coincidence" gives insights into the way researchers worked in the time before, during and after the pandemic.

Starting from the observation that questionnaires for appropriately measuring the changing working conditions and requirements of the highly qualified workforce do not exist, we developed a new German-language instrument focussing on knowledge work. Based on theoretical considerations, we first identified three basic dimensions that constitute knowledge work: novelty, complexity, and autonomy. During the subsequent process of questionnaire development with higher education graduates, including a cognitive pretest, a quantitative development study, and a replication study, these dimensions were operationalised by initially 173 and finally 22 items.