Research Productivity

[Justanothergrad]

I'm curious about what types of research productivity faculty positions will entail as I enter the job market later this year. In general, I'm just trying to get a sense of what evaluations are like for research at different settings despite hoping to land a TT position.

What kind of institution are you at (AMC, TT R1, etc)?
how many pubs a year do you shoot for / how many do you typically get?
how does the institution differentiate between authorship order in terms of points/credit awarded?
what counts/what doesn't (metas, lit reviews, empirical articles, encyclopedias,etc.)?
Any other metrics that are considered in institutional review of publications?

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[Ollie123]

I'm curious about what types of research productivity faculty positions will entail as I enter the job market later this year. In general, I'm just trying to get a sense of what evaluations are like for research at different settings despite hoping to land a TT position.

What kind of institution are you at (AMC, TT R1, etc)?
how many pubs a year do you shoot for / how many do you typically get?
how does the institution differentiate between authorship order in terms of points/credit awarded?
what counts/what doesn't (metas, lit reviews, empirical articles, encyclopedias,etc.)?
Any other metrics that are considered in institutional review of publications?

AMC
~3-4/year to be eligible for tenure. Though realistically it won't happen at that level of productivity.
First and senior count equally. 10 as first or senior to be eligible, 25 total. Again though, that is the minimum and realistically it won't happen with that level of productivity.
Any peer-reviewed article counts.
Where you publish matters a great deal as does cumulative impact


You didn't mention funding, which is the big one. R01 or equivalent is needed for promotion to Associate Prof here and that does not necessarily equate with tenure. 30 papers/year with no funding and I probably wouldn't even keep my job let alone get tenured (though could cover it with clinical work - though that would obviously negatively impact my productivity).

Needless to say, I'm at a pretty research-intensive place.

 

[Pragma]

I am at an R2 institution.
I shoot for at least 1-3 pubs
You get more credit for being first author usually, unless you have students/underlings that you are mentoring in which case last author looks good too.
They all count - IF of journal, quality of journal, overall impact matter. But not as hard-core as an R1.
They like to see a trajectory - and as Ollie mentioned, a funding trajectory makes your argument stronger. You should be able to conceptualize your research from the standpoint of how you see your funding progression (pilot grant to larger grant, etc). The emphasis on this varies by institution, but all institutions like getting indirect cost money.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

Institution: AMC @ R1 University
Rank: Assistant Professor, Clinical. Research buy out time typically ranging 0%-20%.
Pub Goals: 1-2/yr. Some years I have 0-1, while other I have 3-4. I try and have at least a couple of active manuscripts at a time. Due to my limited research time, most of my work is collaborative. I average 2 pubs a year in top half of journals within my speciality/related specialities.

Non-TT:
Pubs: At least 15 pubs for associate & at least 25 pubs for full professor.
Funding: PI on at least 1 large grant for associate, multiple for full professor.
Presentations: Multiple national presentations, invited talks to national conferences, etc…all for associate level. More of them for full professor.
Teaching/Mentoring/Other: Score well on reviews. Participation in national orgs. Leadership positions. Outcome research related to clinical work. Program development. Program improvement.

TT-Associate:
Pubs: 25 since appointment (25-50 total) or at least 12 in top half of journals within certain categories; at least 10 first/senior author (or middle authorship if it is a large multi-center projects).
Funding: History of grant funding and PI on multi-yr nationally competitive grant
Presentations: 2 national/international mtgs since last promotion
Teaching/Mentoring/Other: Need to score well on teaching/mentoring reviews. Program directorship or similar responsibility. Participation in national orgs w. leadership position(s). Journal reviewer. Grant reviewer.

TT-Full Professor:
Pubs: 25 since appointment (50-75 total); at least 10 first/senior author (or middle authorship if it is a large multi-center projects).
Funding: History of funding and multiple PI, Co-PI, etc.
Presentations: 5 national/international mtgs since last promotion
Teaching/Mentoring/Other: Need to score well on teaching/mentoring reviews. Program directorship or similar responsibility. National leadership position. Journal editor.

I'm at a highly competitive research institution, so take these numbers with a grain of salt. I just reviewed this info because I wanted to see how far off I am for going up for promotion. Fun stuff. Not.

 

[Justanothergrad]

Thanks for the info.

I'm (ideally) looking for an R1 TT position right out of internship (or R2 depending on location, support, personality fit, etc. since I'm all about having a good life). Most of the programs be counseling psychology although I've been encouraged to apply to clinical as well since my two focus areas overlap both. I'm at about 10 pubs (80% FA), mostly in 1.5-3.0 IF journals averaging 1-2 a year (only one year has been a goose egg and that was because of those silly lead times to press..ugh) on projects I have initiated on my own during my time as a grad student. No big R01 grants or anything like that, but I've gotten a small dollar grant (~10k) from external funding source and I'm going after another small dollar one now (<5k) to support a project I'm part of. Based on in prep and in review manuscripts I suspect I'll jump to around 15 pubs by around this time next year. Just trying to figure out where I might fit in from the productivity standpoint.

 

[Ollie123]

Sounds like you would be in the ballpark of competitive at R1s. Its certainly worth applying. No one has big grants as a grad student - at that level any funding at all is fairly significant. Your rate of publication would likely increase as faculty if you set yourself up appropriately. IFs are fairly low for the upper tier R1s, but that is dependent on your research area. I'm somewhat biased since in my area our dumpy journals still have impacts around 3 and ~8-10 is usually the goal. Counseling topics tend to be in somewhat lower impact journals (that's not a knock on it - there are just field differences) so that might be quite solid at the right program. As with everything in this field, a lot really just depends on what the individual department looks for and the ever-elusive concept of "fit."

 

[Justanothergrad]

That is a good point about field differences and specialties. The journals I am publishing in are considered between good and top tier for my area. I wish I knew journals with 8 to 10 impact that would fit my line of research. LOL.

Sometimes it is hard to get a grip on what expectations are like and how different ability to publish it once faculty positions are obtained.

 

[Ollie123]

Do everything you are doing anyways except have them do it in an MRI scanner or with an EEG cap on their head and produce pretty colored images of their brains. Not necessarily meaningful images. Just colorful ones. The IF of journals you get into will immediately double.

I say this tongue-in-cheek obviously. I hate research like that. There is more than a little bit of truth to the above though.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

I'm somewhat biased since in my area our dumpy journals still have impacts around 3 and ~8-10 is usually the goal.

I wish! Anything 5-8 would be a solid get for my area and 10+ would be baller. Neuroscience is cool, but IF's aren't huge, typically 2-10ish from what I've seen in applied areas.

 

[MCParent]

I'm curious about what types of research productivity faculty positions will entail as I enter the job market later this year. In general, I'm just trying to get a sense of what evaluations are like for research at different settings despite hoping to land a TT position.

What kind of institution are you at (AMC, TT R1, etc)?
how many pubs a year do you shoot for / how many do you typically get?
how does the institution differentiate between authorship order in terms of points/credit awarded?
what counts/what doesn't (metas, lit reviews, empirical articles, encyclopedias,etc.)?
Any other metrics that are considered in institutional review of publications?

Because you said you're counseling, I felt like sharing, but it's a bit anticlimactic as I'm not anonymous and you can just look up my CV

More places are moving toward counting student author pubs the same as, or nearly the same as, your own stuff, which I think is totally appropriate. Similarly, more places have left the antiquated short-author-list ideal, or special valuing of sole author papers, in favor of work on collaborative projects.

You can look up tenure requirements, btw, in the operation procedure manuals of places you're interested in. You should also be given that info during interviews.

You can also so to the psych job wiki page for last year, and then look up faculty pages at places you know there was a hire, to look at the CVs of folks who got jobs last year (and this year, in a few months).

 

[Justanothergrad]

Because you said you're counseling, I felt like sharing, but it's a bit anticlimactic as I'm not anonymous and you can just look up my CV

More places are moving toward counting student author pubs the same as, or nearly the same as, your own stuff, which I think is totally appropriate. Similarly, more places have left the antiquated short-author-list ideal, or special valuing of sole author papers, in favor of work on collaborative projects.

You can look up tenure requirements, btw, in the operation procedure manuals of places you're interested in. You should also be given that info during interviews.

You can also so to the psych job wiki page for last year, and then look up faculty pages at places you know there was a hire, to look at the CVs of folks who got jobs last year (and this year, in a few months).

Doh. I didn't even think of reading about tenure requirements through the actual policy manuals.. although I imagine what is required and what happens may differ. I'm going through the manuals and I'm having a hard time finding any sort of specific numbers- it just tends to say things like 'appropriate amount of publications in peer reviewed...blah blah blah'. Any hints on making the search easier?

 

[Ollie123]

Google combinations of the words "Appointment promotion tenure." Most places will have a university-wide committee with written guidelines. Not all will be publicly available, but many certainly will be.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

Also searching "promotion and tenure" University of XXX + psychology should produce some good results.

 

[EmotRegulation]

I'm TT at a "baby" R1 (my terminology, which means technically an R1 but who knows how long we'll actually retain R1 status), clinical psychologist in a psychology department. The tenure requirements for my institution aren't published, but it seems like people in my department who've received tenure got 2-5 publications per year, depending on area (it takes longer to do development research, and top social journals require a ridiculous number of studies). I don't really do enclyopedia entries and I haven't worked on a chapter in a few years, so it's been journal articles for me. Review papers are often valuable because they are at high IF journals. Any kind of authorship counts, though of course first/senior author counts the most, and stuff with mentored students also looks good. I think when I was on the job market I had maybe 12 publications, with only 2 or 3 first author, and I was pretty successful at getting both interviews and offers.

 

[Justanothergrad]

Thanks for the info all around. After searching around, I've run into the problem of not having a lot of "hard numbers" for expected contributions. A few places will mention a total number/pubs a year they are looking for, but most seem to leave it fairly ambiguous (to the benefit of the candidate I assume) with "more emphasis placed on quality than quantity"- a phrase I keep seeing.

 

[MCParent]

"more emphasis placed on quality than quantity"- a phrase I keep seeing.

It might depend where you end up. "Deans can't read, but they can count" is something I've heard people at some institutions say (not mine!).

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

To quote poet rapper Wyclef Jean…"dolla dolla bills ya'll".

Being able to secure funding plays a significant roll in regard to promotion for faculty in TT track positions, at least at larger research institutions. R2 and Liberal Arts colleges are most likely quite different.

 

[Pragma]

To quote poet rapper Wyclef Jean…"dolla dolla bills ya'll".

Being able to secure funding plays a significant roll in regard to promotion for faculty in TT track positions, at least at larger research institutions. R2 and Liberal Arts colleges are most likely quite different.

It will vary a lot. Some R2s and SLACs have hard requirements. Some R1s are very easy on clinical faculty if they aren't funded through research.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

It will vary a lot. Some R2s and SLACs have hard requirements. Some R1s are very easy on clinical faculty if they aren't funded through research.

This is my golden unicorn with wings. I've been eye-balling the ratio of assistant v. associate v. full professors at various "peer" institutions, and they all seem to stink. The best answer is to look outside of peer institutions, but I"m not quite there yet. It's nice to hear that there may be some viable options out there for those of us who don't chase grant $'s like its our job, literally.

 

[Pragma]

This is my golden unicorn with wings. I've been eye-balling the ratio of assistant v. associate v. full professors at various "peer" institutions, and they all seem to stink. The best answer is to look outside of peer institutions, but I"m not quite there yet. It's nice to hear that there may be some viable options out there for those of us who don't chase grant $'s like its our job, literally.

I should qualify that where I see this there isn't tenure involved, just mostly clinical positions without tenure

 

[Justanothergrad]

Also, what type of support for research is typically available for startup for a new hire?

 

[EmotRegulation]

Depends on the institution, what you can get with startup. Generally the policy is to ask for everything you think you need to be productive. Startup packages vary widely by department and by university, and even within department (e.g., people who use psychophysiology or eye tracking will need bigger packages than someone who does survey studies with undergraduates). Someone else recommended that you go to the Psych Jobs Wiki, and I echo that--you'll get better and wider information there about startup and job related stuff.

 

[Justanothergrad]

I've been reading there as well. I figure that asking more places is better.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

I should qualify that where I see this there isn't tenure involved, just mostly clinical positions without tenure

I figured. I'm actually not looking for TT, as I don't plan on staying in academia long-term.

 

[Ollie123]

I've been reading there as well. I figure that asking more places is better.

I've heard anything from fairly negligible sums of money (10k + summer support for 1-2 years) to 7 figures (Ivy league). AMCs can be weird...you'll usually get one for an outside hire, but not necessarily for someone coming up within the system on a K grant.

T4C - Regarding promotion, I really think the key is "Associate Prof" as that is often the sticking point. Many institutions (including mine) are bottom AND top heavy with almost no one in the middle. Much of the top reflects outside hires, so it doesn't speak to the ability to grow within the system. Also worth noting (though I'm sure you have thought about this) is that even the benefits of promotion depend on the compensation model. Our clinical folks largely operated on an eat-what-you-kill model and are just now transitioning into a salaried model. Under the former, I don't think many clinical faculty cared about promotion since it didn't really provide them any tangible benefits besides a new title.