European and US Research Collaboration and Mobility Patterns: Science Europe and Elsevier Release Comprehensive Study | Elsevier

European and US Research Collaboration and Mobility Patterns: Science Europe and Elsevier Release Comprehensive Study | Elsevier
 Brussels, September 12, 2013 Science Europe and Elsevier today released a new report that for the first time provides a comprehensive view of the European and US research mobility and collaboration landscapes: 'Comparative Benchmarking of European and US Research Collaboration and Researcher Mobility'.

Other studies have shown that research nations benefit from collaborative research, in particular international collaborations, as they typically result in higher citation impacts, a quality measure of research articles. The report, based on Scopus data, shows that both Europe and the US have experienced steady growth in their overall collaboration rates since 2003. Inter-country collaboration in Europe also showed an increase, from slightly over 11% in 2003 to 13% of articles in 2011, contrasting with the recently-decreasing levels seen in analogous inter-state collaboration in the US, at 16% of articles in 2011.  Since the percentage for Europe has steadily been rising since 2003, it seems that the national and European mechanisms to encourage cross-country collaboration in Europe are working, although with considerable variation by discipline.

The study found that US researchers are more likely to collaborate with their peers outside the US than European researchers are likely to collaborate with their colleagues outside Europe, although in fact the additional benefit of collaborating outside the region is proportionally greater for European researchers than for US researchers.