CENTER FOR SCIENTIFIC INFORMATION ANALYSIS AND MONITORING

Developing an Armenian research evaluation system based on a bibliometric approach

The improvement of national research systems ranks at the top in the policy agenda of many countries. To pursue such improvements, many nations have adopted performance-based funding, recruitment and promotion systems based on research evaluation. Nowadays the research infrastructure of the RA is in a phase of dramatic changes to increase the research productivity of the state. While the changes for the research institutions are underway, the universities still wait for the changes. The quintessential indicator of research performance is productivity, i.e. the ratio of the value of research output to the cost of research expenditures. Among the various approaches, the one that better approximates the measurement of research productivity is the Fractional Scientific Strength (FSS) indicator developed by the Italian scholars Abramo and D’Angelo. This project aims to apply the FSS indicator to measure research productivity in Armenia at individual, field, discipline, department and institution levels; create the ranking of Armenian universities by their research productivity; identify weak and strong research fields at national level; verify the feasibility of applying the FSS indicator to assess the standing of higher education systems of countries other than Italy.