Relations with the Environment
The Role of Learned Societies in the Dissemination of Research: Switzerland in an International Comparison
Michael Ochsner (FORS), Elina Late (University of Tampere), Janne Pölönen (Federation of Finnish Learned Societies), Raf Guns (University of Antwerpen), Jadranka Stojanovski, (University of Zadar), Liutauras Kraniauskas, (University of Klaipeda), Mimi Urbanc (University of Ljubljana) & Marlène Iseli (Switzerland)
Abstract:
Societal Impact has become an important topic in higher education and also in research evaluation. Given the needs of the knowledge society, universities but also projects and even scholars are expected to provide evidence for the societal relevance or even impact of their research. In this presentation, we argue that research is a collective endeavor, and that societal relevance or impact does not result from individual efforts or single actors but rather from research practice in its entirety. We therefore follow the research question whether the learned societies should become more active and take the lead in demonstrating and communicating the relevance of the research of its members, using a survey among learned societies in the SSH in Belgium, Finland, Croatia, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia and Switzerland.
The presentation will focus on some Swiss results showing the situation of learned societies in Switzerland and compare the situation with the other countries before diving deeper into how learned societies interact with the wider public.
The results show that many learned societies see it as their role to consolidate research results and communicate them to different stakeholders, including the wider public. However, there are interesting differences regarding how learned societies approach this task. We have identified four types of interaction with the public: 1) science-oriented; 2) conformity; 3) information und learning; 4) consulting and interaction.
The results suggest that universities should increase their interactions with learned societies to demonstrate and make visible the societal relevance of their research.
User Engagement with Social Media Posts of Swiss Higher Education Institutions: A Comparative Analysis of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter
Isabel Sörensen, Daniel Vogler, Silke Fürst & Mike S. Schäfer (UZH)
Abstract:
Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) increasingly have to legitimize themselves and their societal impact in public, leading many HEIs to professionalize their external communication. In this regard social media communication has become important for HEIs, as it allows for direct, visible and networked interactions with stakeholders. However, we know little about the characteristics and success of this communication, as scholarship is scarce and dominated by single-platform studies and small data sets. It is therefore the aim of this study to analyze user engagement with and impact of all Swiss HEIs across the most used platforms Facebook, Instagram and Twitter for the entire year 2019.
The study first identifies organizational, account- and content-related factors potentially triggering user engagement. Such factors are e.g., topics, mentioned stakeholders and linguistic features such as posing questions. It then describes how Swiss HEIs use social media, how much engagement the various factors trigger and how these dynamics compare across the platforms. We apply a quantitative content analysis and regressions analysis to achieve these aims. The study includes data for all Swiss HEIs (n=42) and their respective social media accounts (n=213), encompassing universities of applied sciences, colleges of higher education, the renowned Swiss Institutes of Technology (ETHs) as well as full universities.
The study contributes to filling the gap in research on the features and affordances driving engagement with users on social media platforms and critically discusses the impact for HEIs and their communication strategies online. This makes the study relevant for scholars and practitioners in higher education.