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Impact

General measures to consider

  • Awards and prizes
  • Conference presentations, invited keynotes and expert panels
  • Published proceedings
  • Editorships
  • Library holdings of edited, authored or contributed to books
  • International engagement and collaboration
  • Influence on industry, government and public policy
  • Influence on community and cultural organisations
  • Membership of academic organisations
  • Membership of statutory committees
  • Partnerships with other institutions, research groups, or industry
  • Patents
  • Previous successful grant applications
  • Completed research projects
  • Registered designs
  • Research commercialisation income
  • Research fellowships

Measures for specific outputs

Artworks and designs

Evidence of impact for individual artworks often needs to be collected and managed personally. Evidence can include:

  • Commissions
  • Invitations to exhibit
  • Sales data
  • Collaborations
  • Inclusion in exhibition catalogues
  • Inclusion in collections eg. holdings of a state or national gallery or major private art collection
  • Artist-in-residence programs may indicate public and community engagement
  • The citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Artworks in any medium may be considered. Exhibitions of multiple artworks (as an artist and/or curator) should be treated separately

Audio and video (includes recordings and music composition)

Includes music, audio, film, TV, podcasts, and video art. The impact can be difficult to demonstrate, however you can show distribution and reach by using:

  • View/stream/download statistics from platforms like YouTube or Spotify
  • Social media shares and mentions
  • Reviews in online and print media
  • Inclusion in festivals or broader compilations
  • The citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Books and chapters

Metrics for books and chapters Books and book chapter metrics can assist in measuring the reach and impact of your scholarly publishing. They can be more difficult to find than article and journal metrics, since Scopus and Web of Science are not comprehensive in their coverage and don't consistently index book chapters.

Below is an example statement for a book or chapter

Sutherland, A. (2009). The Albatross in Music and Art. Melbourne: Bird Publications.

Monograph detailing novel approach to critical evaluation used in 7 major projects. 4 reviews in major publications. Held in 33 academic libraries worldwide.

Book reviews 

These can provide evidence of the esteem in which your publication is held by others in your discipline. These metrics may be useful for promotion, employment and grant applications. To find book reviews you can search for a book title using quotation marks in the University of South Australia Library Collection, and then filter under “Resource Type” to “Reviews”.



Library holdings

Library holdings can give an indication of the reach of your publication, and demonstrate that it is considered useful for teaching and research purposes. Below are some catalogues that you can search for your holdings. 

  • Trove - includes the holdings of Australian libraries and archives
  • WorldCat - holdings in libraries worldwide


Google Scholar

Search Google Scholar to find citation metrics for book or book chapters – see below. 

Other measures of impact that may be useful:

  • Listing on university or course reading lists
  • "Best seller" lists
  • Awards received
  • Prestige of the publisher
  • Number of editions
  • Translations
  • Publisher supplied information, for example: sales statistics, number of downloads from publisher's website etc.
  • the citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Conference papers

Evidence of impact can include:

  • Who organises and / or sponsors the conference? e.g. key peak bodies or government agencies
  • Is the conference held on a regular basis? e.g. yearly or biannually
  • What is the history of the conference? e.g. has is been running for many years or decades
  • How big is the conference and who attends? e.g. are there national and international experts within the field
  • Are papers published in formal proceedings or journals and are they peer reviewed?
  • Are proceedings indexed in databases which have citation metrics or downloads

Creative writing

Published creative writing could include fiction, poetry, screenplays, scripts, pieces of journalism, published speeches, reviews (art, books, performances) and exhibition catalogues. Evidence of the impact of these outputs can include:

  • Information from publishers (ie. sales or download figures)
  • Prestige of the publisher or publication
  • Inclusion on university or course reading lists
  • Award nominations or prizes
  • Best-seller lists
  • Editions or translations
  • Social media mentions or shares
  • Review of the work published
  • Library holdings
  • Information on any accompanying work (ie. performance of a play script, production of a screenplay)
  • The citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Exhibitions (as artist or curators)

Evidence of impact for the exhibitions of multiple artworks may need to be collected and managed personally. Some information may need to be sought from the venue or gallery. Impact might be demonstrated by:

  • prestige of the venue
  • commissions and invitations to exhibit
  • visitor numbers
  • electronic downloads and website visits
  • sales data
  • exhibition catalogues, sales and downloads
  • reviews
  • social media activity
  • the citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Individual artworks in any medium should be treated separately

Live performances

Live performances can include theatre, dance, music, spoken word performances, and performance art. Evidence of impact of performances may be demonstrated by:

  • Social media shares and mentions
  • Reviews in online and print media
  • Audience numbers or viewers
  • Invitations to perform at festivals
  • Public and community engagement and potential collaborations/
  • The citation and page count for discussion in critical texts eg. an art critical monograph that discusses the work of an artist

Reports

Evidence can include:

  • Was it commissioned by a government department or organisation?
  • Is it cited by policy documents or other outputs?
  • Are citation counts or downloads available? – e.g. Where is it indexed?
  • Is it authored with a prominent researcher in the field?
  • Does it have any Altmetrics? Outputs require a DOI to be tracked.

Make your outputs visible

The University's Research Outputs Repository aims to capture and make openly available all research outputs by staff and research students including traditional and non traditional research outputs (e.g. creative works, public exhibitions, reports etc).

Tracking non-traditional research outputs

To track engagement of non traditional research outputs it is important to add them to the repository and along with a DOI which you can request to have minted by the Library.

Any eligible for Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) will appear on your Staff Home Page and Academic Staff Activity Report if they:

  • Meet the ERA definitions of research
  • Have a research statement supplied

Example of creative work
 

This image show the record for the creative work Lilies for remembrance by Jonanne Mignore which is in the Research Outputs Repository.

Key links

Does your research have impact

Are there people benefiting from the outcome? The University would love to hear about it.

Acknowledgement

This content has been adapted from the Guide to Research Impact for your Creative Outputs with permission from the University of Melbourne.