Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Introduction: Mixed Messages for the Interdisciplinary Research Community

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Being an Interdisciplinary Academic

  • 644 Accesses

Abstract

Interdisciplinary research has been widely regarded as risky within the context of academic careers but is this changing with the increasing popularity of this style of working within our universities? Interdisciplinarity is encouraged by research funders but academic researchers, and especially those at the start of their careers, actually receive very mixed messages about how, when and indeed whether to follow this route. This chapter details the objectives and structure of the book, setting out some of the terminology and research methods used in the study in simple terms. It explains the author’s role and personal interest in this study and introduces some of the key misalignments apparent within the current university research system.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 69.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Interdisciplinary teaching is also much less prevalent in the UK and Europe than it is in the US although this situation is gradually beginning to change (Lyall et al. 2015).

  2. 2.

    This is, of course, not a new term with the first use of “interdisciplinarity” often being traced back to the Social Sciences Research Council in the 1920s and then expanded upon by OECD (Apostel 1972).

  3. 3.

    I define key governance institutions in this context as the universities as employers, funding bodies as drivers of interdisciplinary research, and professional groups such as the British Academy as guardians of tradition and upholders of quality. See also Chap. 3, Footnote 1.

  4. 4.

    Evidenced, for example, by research using data from the Australian Research Council that demonstrated that the greater the degree of interdisciplinarity, the lower the probability of grant proposals receiving funding (Bromham et al. 2016).

  5. 5.

    Readers who want to take this back to first principles and ask “what is a discipline” may find Krishnan (2009) a useful entry point.

  6. 6.

    For Spanish readers, I also highly recommend the anthology edited by Vienni et al. (2015) prepared for the same purpose and described (in English and Spanish) in their blog https://i2insights.org/2016/10/25/interdisciplinarity-readings/ (accessed 7/1/19).

  7. 7.

    Broadly defined to include stakeholders from research funders and policy bodies as well as those employed by universities. Of course, not all of these stakeholders will themselves be interdisciplinary researchers.

  8. 8.

    See www.transdisciplinarity.ch/en/td-net/Publikationen/Publikationsradar.html (accessed 7/1/19) for a yearly analysis of publication activities in the field of inter- and transdisciplinarity.

  9. 9.

    See, for example, Nature supplement on interdisciplinarity (Nature 525, 305; 2015) and subsequent letters to Nature.

  10. 10.

    While acknowledging differences between university governance in Anglo-Saxon and European countries (van der Zwaan 2017, p. 41).

  11. 11.

    See Appendix B for a discussion of how I have used direct, anonymised quotations from my interviewees in this text.

  12. 12.

    Paradoxes, according to Granovetter (1973), are “a welcome antidote to theories which explain everything all too neatly”.

  13. 13.

    Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Medical Research Council (MRC) respectively.

  14. 14.

    The empirical data presented in this book derive from 32 qualitative interviews. A detailed account of the research design, an explanation of the anonymisation process and a summary of the demographic profiles of the 22 awardholder interviewees are included in Appendix B.

References

  • Abbott, A. 2001. Chaos of Disciplines. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Albert, M., E. Paradis, and A. Kuper. 2017. Interdisciplinary Fantasy. Social Scientists and Humanities Scholars Working in Faculties of Medicine. In Investigating Interdisciplinary Research: Theory and Practice Across Disciplines, ed. B. Prainsack, S. Frickel, and M. Albert. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aldrich, John. 2014. Interdisciplinarity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Apostel, Leo. 1972. Interdisciplinarity Problems of Teaching and Research in Universities. Paris: OECD.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bammer, Gabriele. 2013. Disciplining Interdisciplinarity. Integration and Implementation Sciences for Researching Complex Real-World Problems. Canberra: ANU E Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2016. Moving Interdisciplinary Research Forward: Top Down Organising Force Needed to Help Classify Diverse Practices. LSE Impact Blog, February 11. http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2016/02/11/moving-interdisciplinary-research-forward/. Accessed 24 January 2019.

  • Barry, Andrew, and Georgina Born. 2013. Interdisciplinarity. Reconfigurations of the Social and Natural Sciences. In Interdisciplinarity. Reconfigurations of the Social and Natural Sciences, ed. Andrew Barry and Georgina Born, 1–56. Abingdon: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bothwell, E. 2016. Multidisciplinary Research ‘Career Suicide’ for Junior Academics. Times Higher Education, May 3.

    Google Scholar 

  • British Academy. 2016. Crossing Paths: Interdisciplinary Institutions, Careers, Education and Applications. London: British Academy.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bromham, L., R. Dinnage, and X. Hua. 2016. Interdisciplinary Research Has Consistently Lower Funding Success. Nature 534 (7609): 684–687.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bromley, Patricia, and Walter W. Powell. 2012. From Smoke and Mirrors to Walking the Talk: Decoupling in the Contemporary World. The Academy of Management Annals 6 (1): 483–530.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bruce, A., C. Lyall, J. Tait, and R. Williams. 2004. Interdisciplinary Integration in the Fifth Framework Programme. Futures 36 (4): 457–470.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Callard, F., and D. Fitzgerald. 2015. Rethinking Interdisciplinarity Across the Social Sciences and Neurosciences. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Crow, M., and W. Dabars. 2015. Designing the New American University. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Donina, Davide, Marco Seeber, and Stefano Paleari. 2017. Inconsistencies in the Governance of Interdisciplinarity: The Case of the Italian Higher Education System. Science and Public Policy 44 (6): 865–875.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • European Commission. 2007. FP7 Taking European Research to the Forefront. Brussels: European Commission.

    Google Scholar 

  • Frodeman, Robert. 2014. Sustainable Knowledge. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2017. The Future of Interdisciplinarity. In The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity, ed. Robert Frodeman, Julie Thompson Klein, and Roberto C.S. Pacheco, 3–8. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Global Research Council. 2016. Statement of Principles on Interdisciplinarity. https://www.globalresearchcouncil.org/fileadmin/documents/GRC_Publications/Statement_of_Principles_on_Interdisciplinarity.pdf. Accessed 24 January 2019.

  • Golde, Chris M., and Hanna Alix Gallagher. 1999. The Challenges of Conducting Interdisciplinary Research in Traditional Doctoral Programs. Ecosystems 2: 281–285.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Granovetter, Mark S. 1973. The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology 78 (6): 1360–1380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Graybill, J.K., S. Dooling, V. Shandas, J. Withey, A. Greve, and G.L. Simon. 2006. A Rough Guide to Interdisciplinarity: Graduate Student Perspectives. BioScience 56 (9): 757–763.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Henry, Stuart. 2005. Disciplinary Hegemony Meets Interdisciplinary Ascendancy: Can Interdisciplinary/Integrative Studies Survive, and If So, How? Issues in Integrative Studies 23: 1–37.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hess, Andi. 2018. Two Types of Interdisciplinary Scholarship. Integration and Implementation Insights, February 6. https://i2insights.org/2018/02/06/two-types-of-interdisciplinarity/#andi-hess. Accessed 24 January 2019.

  • Jacobs, Jerry A., and Scott Frickel. 2009. Interdisciplinarity: A Critical Assessment. Annual Review of Sociology 35: 43–65. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-070308-115954.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Klein, Julie Thompson. 2010. Creating Interdisciplinary Campus Cultures. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krishnan, Armin. 2009. What Are Academic Disciplines? Some Observations on the Disciplinarity vs. Interdisciplinarity Debate. ESRC National Centre for Research Methods NCRM Working Paper Series 03/09.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kuhlmann, Stefan, and Arie Rip. 2018. Next-Generation Innovation Policy and Grand Challenges. Science and Public Policy 45 (4): 448–454.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lattuca, Lisa R. 2001. Creating Interdisciplinarity. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • League of European Research Universities. 2016. Interdisciplinarity and the 21st Century Research-Intensive University. Leuven: LERU.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leahey, E., C.M. Beckman, and T.L. Stanko. 2017. Prominent but Less Productive: The Impact of Interdisciplinarity on Scientists’ Research. Administrative Science Quarterly 62 (1): 105–139.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lindvig, Katrine. 2017. Creating Interdisciplinarity Within Monodisciplinary Structures. PhD Thesis, University of Copenhagen.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lofland, J., and L.H. Lofland. 1995. Starting Where You Are. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lowe, Philip, Jeremy Phillipson, and Katy Wilkinson. 2013. Why Social Scientists Should Engage with Natural Scientists. Contemporary Social Science: Journal of the Academy of Social Sciences 8 (3): 207–222.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • LWEC. 2012. Living with Environmental Change Short form Skills Framework. https://nerc.ukri.org/skills/postgrad/policy/skillsreview/2012/skills-framework/. Accessed 7 January 2019.

  • Lyall, C. 2005. Concurrent Power. The Role of Policy Networks in the Multi-level Governance of Science and Innovation in Scotland. PhD, University of Edinburgh.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. The Institutional Challenges of Changing the Academic Landscape. In Disciplining Interdisciplinarity. Integration and Implementation Sciences for Researching Complex Real-World Problems, ed. G. Bammer. Canberra: ANU E Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lyall, Catherine, and I. Fletcher. 2013. Experiments in Interdisciplinary Capacity-Building: The Successes and Challenges of Large-Scale Interdisciplinary Investments. Science and Public Policy 40: 1–7.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lyall, C., and L. Meagher. 2012. A Masterclass in Interdisciplinarity: Research into Practice in Training the Next Generation of Interdisciplinary Researchers. Futures 44 (6): 608–617.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lyall, C., A. Bruce, J. Tait, and L. Meagher. 2011. Interdisciplinary Research Journeys. Practical Strategies for Capturing Creativity. London: Bloomsbury Academic.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lyall, Catherine, Ann Bruce, Wendy Marsden, and Laura Meagher. 2013. The Role of Funding Agencies in Creating Interdisciplinary Knowledge. Science and Public Policy 40: 62–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lyall, C., L. Meagher, J. Bandola, and A. Kettle. 2015. Interdisciplinary Provision in Higher Education: Current and Future Challenges. Report to Higher Education Academy.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin, Paula J.S., and Stephanie Pfirman. 2017. Facilitating Interdisciplinary Scholars. In The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity, ed. Robert Frodeman, Julie Thompson Klein, and C.S. Robert Pacheco, 586–600. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Meagher, Laura, and Catherine Lyall. 2005. Evaluation of the ESRC/NERC Interdisciplinary Research Studentship Scheme. Report to ESRC.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2009. Evaluation of ESRC/MRC Interdisciplinary Research Studentship and Post-Doctoral Fellowship Scheme. Report to ESRC.

    Google Scholar 

  • Millar, M.M. 2013. Interdisciplinary Research and the Early Career: The Effect of Interdisciplinary Dissertation Research on Career Placement and Publication Productivity of Doctoral Graduates in the Sciences. Research Policy 42 (5): 1152–1164.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • National Academy of Sciences. 2005. Facilitating Interdisciplinary Research. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • National Science Foundation. 2006. Investing in America’s Future Strategic Plan FY 2006–2011. Washington, DC: National Science Foundation.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pfirman, Stephanie, and Melissa Begg. 2012. Troubled by Interdisciplinarity? Science, April 6.

    Google Scholar 

  • Platt, J. 1981. On Interviewing One’s Peers. British Journal of Sociology 32 (1): 75–91.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rhoten, Diana. 2004. Interdisciplinary Research: Trend or Transition. Items and Issues 5 (1–2): 6–11.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rylance, Rick. 2015. Global Funders to Focus on Interdisciplinarity. Nature 525: 313–315.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sá, Creso M. 2008. ‘Interdisciplinary Strategies’ in U.S. Research Universities. Higher Education 55: 537–552.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schön, Donald. 1983. The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. London: Maurice Temple Smith.

    Google Scholar 

  • Slow Science Academy. 2010. The Slow Science Manifesto. http://slow-science.org. Accessed 24 January 2019.

  • Sperber, D. 2003. Why Rethink Interdisciplinarity?. Presentation for the Virtual Seminar, Rethinking Interdisciplinarity (2004, February), www.dan.sperber.fr/?p=101. Accessed 24/1/19.

  • Szostak, R. 2015. Interdisciplinarity: Resources Abound (Letter to Nature). Nature 526: 506.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • UKRI. 2018. Strategic Prospectus: Building the UKRI Strategy. www.ukri.org/files/about/ukri-strategy-document-pdf/?pdf=Strategic-Prospectus. Accessed 24/1/19.

  • van der Zwaan, Bert. 2017. Higher Education in 2040. A Global Approach. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Vienni, B., P. Cruz, L. Repetto, C. von Sanden, A. Lorieto, and V. Fernández, eds. 2015. Encuentros sobre Interdisciplina. Montevideo: Espacio Interdisciplinario de la Universidad de la Republica.

    Google Scholar 

  • Weingart, Peter. 2000. Interdisciplinarity: The Paradoxical Discourse. In Practising Interdisciplinarity, ed. Peter Weingart and Nico Stehr, 25–41. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Weingart, P. 2014. Interdisciplinarity and the New Governance of Universities. In University Experiments in Interdisciplinarity: Obstacles and Opportunities, ed. P. Weingart and B. Padberg. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Woelert, Peter. 2015. Governing Knowledge: The Formalization Dilemma in the Governance of the Public Sciences. Minerva 53 (1): 1–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woelert, Peter, and Victoria Millar. 2013. The ‘Paradox of Interdisciplinarity’ in Australian Research Governance. Higher Education 66: 755–767.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Social and Political Science, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

    Catherine Lyall

Authors
  1. Catherine Lyall
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Catherine Lyall .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Lyall, C. (2019). Introduction: Mixed Messages for the Interdisciplinary Research Community. In: Being an Interdisciplinary Academic. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18659-3_1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18659-3_1

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Pivot, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-18658-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-18659-3

  • eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation