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Brazilian scientific production, financial support, established investigators and doctoral graduates

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Abstract

In the near future, Brazil is expected to face a number of challenges with regards to economic and social development, and scientific production is a critical aspect of this development process. Over the past 30 years, there has been an almost 18-fold increase in the number of brazilian papers published, up from about 2,000 in 1980 to more than 35,000 in 2009. In this study we analyze the evolution of scientific production in terms of input (resources and permanent investigators) and output (scientific papers and doctorate graduates). We evaluate whether structural investments and the number of investigators at universities are both able to explain the increase in the number of papers, by investigating the relationships among growth rates in investments and the quantity of the papers published, as well as the number of doctorate graduates and active permanent investigators. As an indication of the fluctuations in investments pertaining to academic research, we consider the budget history of the largest Brazilian federal agencies charged with providing academic grants. We observe that the burgeoning number of papers has occurred independently of investments and the number of established investigators, thus suggesting an increase in the efficiency of Brazilian scientific output. Moreover, this increase in efficiency has occurred in conjunction with an increased number of Doctoral graduates per year. In this context, we propose that an evaluation of the academic structure is necessary in order to ascertain the risks of this increased “efficiency”. Moreover, the recent cut of over US$ 1 billion announced by the Brazilian government may jeopardize the quality of scientific output in the future.

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Notes

  1. In order to understand the real meaning of the increase in the number of articles in the WoS database, it is important to ascertain whether there has been a real increase in scientific productivity or whether it is merely a reflection of the boost in the number of Brazilian journals listed in the WoS (more than 300% between 2001 and 2009). Is important to consider that the total number of papers published in Brazilian journals amounted to 1429 in 2001, or 10% of total number of papers published by Brazilian authors (assuming the hypothesis that all those papers were published by Brazilian authors). Assuming this same hypothesis, in 2009 we will find that in the most extreme case, 23% (8297 papers) of the total number of Brazilian papers were published in Brazilian journals. Despite the fact that the proportionality is growing, the total number of papers published by Brazilian authors in non-Brazilian journals has grown dramatically (at least 117%), although less than the 154% when considering Brazilian and non-Brazilian journals. This shows that the growth of Brazilian journals in the WoS database plays a minor role in the Brazilian scientific output, validating our considerations about the growth of Brazilian scientific production published in international journals indexed in the WoS database.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Fisiologia, Instituto de Biociências, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil

    André Frazão Helene & Pedro Leite Ribeiro

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  1. André Frazão Helene
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  2. Pedro Leite Ribeiro
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Correspondence to André Frazão Helene.

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Helene, A.F., Ribeiro, P.L. Brazilian scientific production, financial support, established investigators and doctoral graduates. Scientometrics 89, 677–686 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-011-0470-2

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