1. R. D. Shelton and Hassan B. Ali WTEC
Scientometric Secrets of Efficient Countries: Turkey, Greece, Poland, and Slovakia
R. D. Shelton and Hassan B. Ali
WTEC
Sponsored by NSF cooperative agreement ENG

2. Outline of Presentation
Why are Turkey and some other countries gaining in science publication so rapidly?
Turkish insight from S&T policy analysis
Our insight from allocations of R&D investment
Interpretations of ki as an efficiency indicator
Comparison of several nations using efficiency indicators
Role of government funding and higher education spending in increasing efficiencies

3. Turkey is one of the fastest growing countries in scientific publication. Why?
Both China and Turkey doubled their share from 2000 to Shelton & Foland (2008) raised this question, but reasons were not known at that time.

4. Others notingTurkish growth (EURAXESS Turkey, 2010)
Turkish world ranking growth rate between the years :
3rd rank in terms of growth rate in GERD, with a position improved from 26 to 21,
7th rank in terms of growth in GERD as a percentage of GDP, with a position from 50 to 42,
1st rank in terms of growth in FTE researchers, with a position from 25 to 16,
3rd rank in terms of the growth in scientific publications, with a position from 22 to 18,
2nd rank in terms of the growth in PCT patent application, with a position from 33 to 27.

5. Also noting Turkish growth (Erkan 2009)
“GERD intensity in Turkey exhibits a significant upward trend after 2002
GERD reached a historical peak in 2005: more than 40% of Turkish was financed by industry and 50% by government.
One of the most promising indicators for Turkey is scientific publications per million inhabitants. Although Turkey’s share is around 1.5% in the OECD area, in the last five years, with a growth rate of 141% Turkey reached the highest rate in the world.
We couldn’t find similar analysis for the other fast-growing countries.

6. Some explanations from Turkish researchers on increased scientific publications
Akpinar and Karçaaltıncaba (2010) radiology and medical imaging
“Driving force…appears to be the rapid adaptation to imaging technology and improved education and extensive investment in human resources and technology in university, government and private hospitals and clinics…”
Gokceoglu et. al (2008) Earth science
In the last decade the annual growth rate was 16%, with a concomitant increase in the number of citations.
Increase attributed to: changes in the rules of academic promotion and appointment, changes in academic attitudes towards publishing, increasing support for research, financial incentives for publishing, and expansion of higher education.

7. Our insights: some components of GERD are more efficient at producing papers
Gross numbers are not necessarily a good measure of the efficiency of a nation in producing scientific papers
One can divide publications by population, GDP, or GERD (Gross Expenditure for R&D)
One useful indicator is to divide publication share by GERD share
For the larger economies this “relative efficiency” ki, has been fairly constant, which permits forecasts
However, some smaller countries have high and increasing relative efficiencies, because some components of GERD are more effective than others.

8. A Simple Model for Country i
mi = k iwi
mi is share of papers published (fractional basis)
wi is the share of GERD for the OECD Group
k i is a "constant" of proportionality; it differs by country
k i is also the efficiency of country i in producing papers per $1 million in GERD, normalized by the OECD overall efficiency. ki = mi/wi = (pi/P)/(gi/G) = (pi/gi)/(P/G)
For data in a single year the equation is an identity, but it is most useful over a range of years when k i is approximately constant

9. Review of Shelton Model
National Publication Systems (The Black Box)
Resources In
Papers Out
Multiple Linear Regression Is Used to Identify Which Inputs are Most Important

10. More Detailed Model of Publication System (Inside the Black Box)
$ Inputs
Papers
Published p1 g1 US EU
Journal
Editors AT
ROW
G (total)
P (total)
National Research Systems -- Fairly Independent
Highly Interdependent Paper Selection
mi = pi/P
Paper share
wi = gi/G
GERD share

11. Since 1998, ki Has Been Fairly Constant for BIG Countries

12. For some countries ki is not constant: countries with rapidly growing relative efficiency
Greece and Poland are both efficient and becoming more so.

13. Comparison of high ki countries with some larger ones
Values above 1.5 shown, plus some large countries. Greece, New Zealand, Poland, Slovakia, Portugal, and Turkey are the most efficient.

14. Government funding instead of industry
A: Turkey and the others increased paper share by sharpening focus on sectors that maximize papers
Government funding instead of industry
University instead of business R&D spending
Multiple regression shows these input components are more effective in producing paper outputs.

15. Regression analysis of which GERD components best account for paper outputs
Year = 1999, Constant $ PPP series used
Dependent Variable (DV) = papers in SEI, fractional counts
Independent Variables = two components of R&D funding (IV1, IV2)—several types
N = 39 countries in OECD Group, sometimes fewer
P is significance probability of IV; if p < 0.05, variable is important
R2 > 96% always – IVs are very good predictors

16. Government vs. Industrial funding of R&D
IV1 = government funded part of GERD
IV2 = industry likewise
Much smaller components omitted
IV1: P = (very significant)
IV2: P = (not significant) plus coefficient is smaller (and negative)
Regression equation:
Papers = 2.73 IV1 – IV

17. Scattergram of paper share vs. government funding share

18. Scatterplot of relative efficiency ki vs Gov%
The regression line is:ki = Gov%, the p < for
Gov%, and the R2 is 35.9%.

19. Scatterplot of relative efficiency ki vs HERD%
The regression line is: ki = HERD%, the p < for HERD%, and the R2 is 46.5%.

20. Part of GERD Funding from Government
Turkey and Greece focus on government R&D rather than industry, so they are more efficient than the US.

21. Part of GERD Spending at Universities
Likewise this focus on university R&D spending helps make Turkey and Greece more efficient than the US.

22. Conclusions
A useful indicator of the efficiency of a nation in producing scientific papers is the ratio of publication share to GERD share, ki
For the larger economies this “relative efficiency” ki, has been fairly constant, which permits forecasts
However, some smaller countries have high and increasing relative efficiencies
Government investments and higher education spending are much more important than those from industry, accounting for much of the superior efficiencies and fast-growing paper publication share in some smaller countries
Not surprising to bibliometricians, regression analysis quantifies these statements. Causality can’t be proven, but strong associations can be found

23. References-1
Shelton, RD, (2006), Relations between national research investment and publication output: Application to an American paradox. Scientometrics 74,
Shelton RD and Foland, P. (2008) National Efficiencies in Publishing Scientific Papers.  10th International Conference on S&T Indicators, Vienna, Sept  
Foland, P & Shelton RD (2010) Why is Europe so efficient at producing scientific papers, and does this explain the European Paradox? 11th International Conference on S&T Indicators, Leiden, Sept

24. References-2 Posted at itri2.org/s/
Shelton, RD. & Foland, P. (2010) The race for world leadership of science and technology: Status and forecasts.  Science Focus 5, pp. 1-9 (Feb. 2010) in Chinese.  Also, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, pp , Rio de Janeiro, July, 2009.  
Shelton, RD and Leydesdorff, L (2011a) Bibliometric evidence for an empirical trade-off in national funding strategies. Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, pp Durban, July, 2011.
Shelton, RD and Leydesdorff, L (2011b) Publish or Patent: Bibliometric evidence for an empirical trade-off in national funding strategies. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, in press.
Posted at itri2.org/s/