Institute projects at CWTS are projects that are acquired through different funding sources, such as Horizon2020, tenders set out by the European Commission, but also national funding, such as NWO in the Netherlands. Usually, we work on the institute projects within a consortium of multiple organisations, such as universities, public institutions, or sometimes companies. Projects generally are focused on themes such as research integrity, Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI), Open Science, researcher mobility, and academic careers. This can be either by means of quantitative research or qualitative research, or a combination of both. In this blog post I will give you some examples of several types of projects.

Research integrity

A project relating to research integrity is the Standard Operating Procedures for Research Integrity, or in short: SOPs4RI, because we like to work with acronyms. In the SOPs4RI project CWTS has conducted focus group interviews with researchers from several disciplines and other relevant stakeholders from the same areas of research who could provide information on Standard Operating Procedures and guidelines relating to research integrity. Most of the focus groups were conducted in the beginning of 2020 just before travelling restrictions were introduced because of COVID-19. However, some of the focus groups had to be held online, which was a challenge at first, and currently more qualitative research is taking place online.

Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI)

Projects that are currently running at CWTS and that relate to Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) are Excellence in science and innovation for Europe by adopting the concept of RRI (NewHoRRIzon), Scientific Understanding and Provision of an Enhanced and Robust Monitoring System (SUPER_MoRRI) and Constructing Healthcare Environments through RRI and Entrepreneurship Strategies (CHERRIES). In February 2021 a new RRI-related project will start which is called RRI Policy Experimentations for Energy Transition (RIPEET). While NewHoRRIzon is working out the conceptual and operational basis to integrate RRI into European and national R&I practice and funding on a more general level, SUPER_MoRRI departs from the previous Monitoring the Evolution and Benefits of RRI (MoRRI) project to develop a monitoring system for RRI. CHERRIES and RIPEET are both looking at RRI in different themes (healthcare and energy respectively) at the regional level.

Open Science

Open Science is an important theme for CWTS as well. One of the projects that were performed in the past is the Open Science Monitor. In this project different methods, such as bibliometric analyses and interviews for case studies, were combined to track trends in open access and collaborative and transparent research across countries and disciplines.

Variety of themes

Of course, we also work on projects in which different themes are combined with multiple forms of research. An example of such a project is RISIS2 for which the A-team unifies organisations in a database. Furthermore, a RISIS Core Facility is being developed to provide an infrastructure for Science, Technology and Innovation studies. It will facilitate the collection of new data around the themes of public sector research, corporate innovation capabilities, R&I outputs and projects, policy learning, and academic careers.

With the variety of projects CWTS is active in, it has always been very interesting for me to work at CWTS. The variety of themes and the different forms of research make every project distinct. Integrating the variety of themes and research methods in some of the projects can sometimes be a challenge because everyone has its own expertise. However, I think the expertise we have available at CWTS is very relevant and is even more relevant when we combine the variety of internal expertise we have when collaborating with external partners. Hopefully, CWTS keeps on enjoying working in the so-called institute projects. If you are interested in collaborating in a project with CWTS or in writing a research proposal together, feel free to reach out to us.