The Science week closed with the conference of Doctor Atilio Bustos-González, Associate Director of SCImago Research Group, which analyzed the status of scientific research in the Dominican Republic, with the participation of hundreds of students and professors of Universidad Nacional Pedro Henriquez Ureña (UNPHU).
Doctor Bustos-González showed the strengths and weaknesses of the generated science in the country. He indicated that according to colleges’ taxonomies, no institutions research nor teaching universities are investigating, but universities with academic emphasis; This is expressed in yearly productions yet very far from the 100 articles edited per year, a requirement to enter in the classification per teaching universities doing research (Bustos Gonzalez, 2019),
In the country, we can observe a growing interest of universities to increase the scientific production indicated the country, creating the opportunity for a more significant number of students during their education to contact professors in active research.
The international guest added that the development of the countries and the solution of social problems need science in the current world. The pandemic evidenced how the explained above-gained strength and the scientists worldwide received acknowledgment for their work.
Governments and institutions of research face limits on budgets; there is not enough money to finance a minimal reasonable level of activity to guarantee the country’s development. The Dominican Republic is not exempt from these limitations.
Scientific investigation in Dominican Republic is mainly supported by private universities as UNPHU, Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra (PUCMM), Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo (INTEC), and Universidad Iberoamericana (UNIBE), all these institutions are the 43% of produced science in the country in 2020.
Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo (UASD) participated in 15,8% of the produced science in the country in 2020, and in general, the public institutions 16,2% for the term 2016-2020.
If this reality is compared with the other countries of Latin America, the low participation from the State in the developed investigation is evident. The private sector mainly supports the effort. For all data, the source is from Scopus, and the analysis is from SCImago.
Bustos González states the quality of science is not only measured as the only indicator and the impact generated can be scientific, over the quality of education of the students at institutions in research, to develop innovation with impact on the economy, quality of life of people, respect to the environment and material patrimony over the quality of the chosen political decisions. These last elements are denominated in generic terms, social appropriation of science.
A way to measure the grade of appropriation made by the national and international scientific community is by the normalized impact indicator. This measurement of major trends offers an indicator independent of the institutional size. They are allowing to make valid comparisons among institutions of the country or with institutions located abroad.
The normalized impact is calculated over the production of each institution following the methodology Item-oriented field normalized citation score average from the Karolinska Institute. This indicator reflects the influence of knowledge generated by an institution towards the interior of the international scientific community. The normalization of the expressed values is at the individual level per each article. The defined values in decimals take as a central point the world measurement of impact (1); This is, if an institution has an Individual level of 0,8, this means that its production is 20% below the world average. On the contrary, if an institution with an individual level of 1,3, its output is 30% over the world average of citation. (Rehn & Kronman, 2008; Gonzalez-Pereira, Guerrero-Bote, & De Moya-Anegón, 2010); Guerrero -Bote & De Moya Anegón, 2012).
Comparing universities of the country for 2016-2020, UNPHU is the only institution achieving a Normalized Impact of 1. The other institutions are at 16 or more percentile points of the world average. See Chart 1.
Chart 1. Normalized Impact Universities in the Dominican Republic in 2016-2020.
Source: Scopus: SCImago analysis
Threshold: Universities with accumulated production superior to 20 documents in 2003-2020.
A second indicator featuring the behavior of the best researchers of an institution is Excelencia 10. This indicator is independent of institutional sizes. Excelencia 10 is also separated from institutional dimensions. Excelencia 10 shows what proportion of the scientific production of an institution is within 10% of the most cited work in their respective scientific field. It is a performance measure of institutions’ high quality. (Bornmann; De-Moya-Anegón; Leydesdorff, 2012; Bornmann et al., 2014).
This indicator shows how UNPHU is average in 14,04% of Excelencia 10; This is 4,04 over the expected level worldwide. Again, UNPHU is the only university in the country achieving this performance. PUCMM is located 32 points below the 10% desired level, and the different institutions are situated at significative greater distances. See chart 2.
Chart 2Excelencia 10 in Universities in the Dominican Republic in 2016-2020.
Source: Scopus: SCImago analysis
Threshold: Universities with accumulated production superior to 20 documents in 2003-2020.
Based on this evidence, Doctor Bustos-Gonzalez congratulated the students at the University of the country, which is making science with qualitative indicators and placing the institution in and over an average of the world; He encouraged the students to make the scientific knowledge part of their lives; continue reading science and thinking how to apply this knowledge in their professional environment, as citizens and family leaders.
SCImago is an international group of specialized research in scientometrics, scientific edition, and web visibility. SCImago is led by Doctor Felix de Moya-Anegón and integrated by senior researchers located in CSIC of Spain and Europe and Latin America universities.
Among their projects is the site of evaluation of magazines SCImago Journal and Country Rank and the SCImago Institutions Rankings (SIR), a classification of academic institutions and research classified by a complex indicator, based in the performance researcher, innovative results, and impact in the society, measured from its visibility on the web.
Mr. Bustos-Gonzalez is a doctor in Sciences of Information specialized in Scientometrics and Scientific Politics; is Associate Director of SCImago Research Group since 2012 and a researcher of the same Group since 2008. He collaborated on the design of public research policy in Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. Visitor Professor in Science of Information of the Universidad Pompeu Fabra, Universidad Politecnica de Valencia and Maestría Universitaria in Argentina. Also worked as a consultant in more than ten universities in Spain, France, Nederland, Mexico, Central, and South America.
