Shows
RMZ Science WorksBerna Devezer: Claims about scientific rigour require rigourProtzko et al. describe a project in which internal tests of pilot-tested hypotheses and independent replications embraced “rigour-enhancing practices” such as confirmatory tests, large sample sizes, preregistration and methodological transparency. The authors report a high estimate of replicability, which, in their appraisal, “justifies confidence in rigour-enhancing methods to increase the replicability of new discoveries”. However, replicability was not the original outcome of interest in the project, and analyses associated with replicability were not preregistered as claimed. Instead of replicability, the originally planned study set out to examine whether the mere act of scientifically investigating a phenomenon (data collection or analysis...2025-07-1653 minRMZ Science WorksAmelia Acker: Platform Power and Data Integration Services in Scientific InfrastructureThis talk examines how commercial cloud services and data integration platforms are shaping scientific knowledge infrastructure and institutional approaches to digital preservation and archival access. Drawing on findings from two collaborative research projects—a decadal analysis of data management plans from NSF funded scientists and the Palantir Files, a public interest archive documenting the firm's data integration services—I explore how platforms are transforming traditional roles of information institutions in providing access to data. The presentation investigates three key developments: the increasing adoption of commercial cloud services (Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud) for storage in scientific data...2025-07-0239 minRMZ Science WorksMartin Reinhart & Felicitas Hesselmann: From scandal to reform: approaches to research integrity at a turning pointThis talk explores the historical evolution of scandals related to academic integrity and their implications for the relationship between science and politics. We argue that there are three distinctive waves of scandalization since the postwar era: The first wave, starting in the 1970s, led to governance measures addressing public trust issues in science funding. The 1980s and 1990s witnessed a second wave centered on research misconduct, prompting the establishment of boundary organizations such as the Office of Research Integrity. Since the 2010s, the third wave shifted focus to concerns such as Open Science and reproducibility, giving rise to a...2025-06-181h 01RMZ Science WorksBjörn Hammarfelt & Gustaf Nelhans: Styles of valuation: Disciplinary differences in assessing researchAcademic disciplines have distinctive ways of valuing research. These differences exist not only across fields but also between collegial and organisational evaluations. This presentation draws on recent empirical studies of assessment processes in Swedish academia. By analysing guidelines and peer review reports across four domains: humanities, social sciences, medicine, and natural sciences, we identify five key dimensions of publication assessment: (1) Work attribution, (2) Content quality, (3) Publication channel, (4) Impact, and (5) Volume. Our findings reveal contrasting evaluation styles at different organisational levels, which we call ‘disharmonic styles of valuation.’ Rather than focusing on the origins of these quality standards, we emphasise how they...2025-06-0437 minRMZ Science WorksCatalina Quiroz-Niño, Ana María Villafuerte & Margaret Meredith: Hermeneutical Justice in International ProjectsInternational research collaborations can base their research focus, questions and interpretations of the issue on Western assumptions of knowledge. This can delegitimise the potential contributions of some project partners, such as those located in the global South, and silence their interpretations of the issue. International projects can therefore be spaces of what Fricker calls "hermeneutical injustice". This presentation is based on Quijano´s work on Coloniality to identify enduring patterns of power that inform and shape frames of reference, culture and knowledge production in the colonised regions of the world. The presenters argue that research collaborations should be based u...2025-05-2132 minRMZ Science WorksJusto Serrano Zamora: Liberal Epistemologies, Participatory Initiatives, and the Current Existential Crisis of DemocracyIn my talk, I explore two main responses to democracy’s current existential crisis and their mutual relation. On the one hand, many argue that we should address the phenomenon of post-truth and its negative effects on democratic politics by cultivating citizens’ capacity to build their own, autonomous, judgements. On the other hand, many defend the need of participatory initiatives as a way of bringing citizens to identify with their political institutions. I argue that participatory initiatives are often jeopardized by the epistemological assumptions that draw from the current liberal struggle against post-truth. Instead of promoting liberal epistemological orientations amon...2025-05-0741 minRMZ Science WorksSarah Schönbauer: Meeresforschung zwischen Wissenschaft und AktivismusDer Klimawandel führt zu vielschichtigen und komplexen Veränderungen. Diese Veränderungen bringen unter anderem soziale, epistemische, ökonomische und politische Auswirkungen mit sich. In diesem Vortrag konzentriere ich mich insbesondere auf die Auswirkungen des Klimawandels auf die Wissenschaftswelt und die Positionierungsarbeit von Wissenschaftler*innen. Ich frage: wie nehmen Wissenschaftler*innen Umweltveränderungen wahr und was sind die sozialen und erkenntnistheoretischen Dimensionen dieser Wahrnehmung? In meiner Fallstudie, finanziert durch ein Erwin-Schrödinger Postdoc Stipendium (FWF Austria), beschäftige ich mich mit Meeresforscher*innen und ihren Umgang mit auf den Klimawandel zurückzuführenden Umweltveränderungen in Meeres- und Polarregionen.Das M...2025-04-3033 minRMZ Science WorksStefan Skupien: Defining science for and in ‘Eastern Germany’ in right-wing populismDefining Science for and in ‘Eastern Germany’ in right-wing populism “Eastern Germany”, as a socio-political and geographical region, hosts significant scientific infrastructure and innovation funding, yet it has also seen a marked rise in populist voting patterns. Parties such as the Alternative for Germany (AfD) and emerging movements like Bündnis Sarah Wagenknecht (BSW) position themselves as challengers to established societal frameworks. Within populist rhetoric, a recurring theme is the critique of scientific fields, framed within a broader opposition between “the virtuous people” and “the experts.” (u.a. Bellilo 2022, Mede et.al. 2020, Eslen-Ziya and Giorgi, Ed. 2022).This study undertakes an...2025-04-2327 minRMZ Science WorksMalte Jansen/ Aishvarya Aravindan Rajagopal: The Reproducibility and Robustness of Secondary Analyses in Educational Research: The Role of Publication Bias and Researcher Degrees of FreedomMany educational researchers conduct secondary data analysis using large-scale school assessment studies that usually include various variables based on representative samples. To access such data, researchers must often apply by submitting a research proposal. Our project aims to examine the reproducibility and robustness of secondary data analyses from a research data center that offers over 70 educational studies for secondary analyses. This approach provides us with a unique database of data usage applications. In these applications, researchers describe their central questions, hypotheses, and planned analytic approach. Between 2008 and 2020, around 600 data applications from over 900 researchers resulted in around 180 publications. Based on...2025-04-0951 minRMZ Science WorksStefanie Haustein: Challenges of closed vs opportunities of open: A data feminist reflection on the bibliometrics community’s shift to open infrastructureFor decades, research assessment infrastructure has been shaped by closed, centralized systems that prioritize selectivity, reinforce hierarchies, and define what counts as scholarly impact. This talk traces the historical evolution of bibliometrics, from the first citation analysis in the early 20th century via the revolutionary development of the Science Citation Index to the dominance of commercial data analytics companies like Clarivate and Elsevier today. The talk will highlight how these infrastructures have perpetuated power imbalances—determining who gets to define impact, what types of knowledge are valued, and whose labor is made visible.Currently research assessment and the...2025-03-2649 minRMZ Science WorksCornelia Schendzielorz/Martin Reinhart: The role of research collaborations in the governance of science (Vortrag auf Deutsch)Our contribution is dedicated to the topic of large research collaborations. We frame the issue of large research collaborations in the context of their long history in the study of science, which is closely related to the notion of Big Science (De Solla Price 1963). Beyond the quantitative growth of science in various aspects such as publications, journals, personnel, funding, etc., we focus our attention on the fact that considering the big picture of science implies taking into account the social order of science (Merton 1938, Barber 1953). From the beginnings of the sociology of science (Bernal 1939, Merton 1942, Polanyi, 1962, Pielke 2014, Wray 2023) to...2025-03-1941 minRMZ Science WorksHolger Straßheim: Politische EpistemologieDer Beitrag setzt sich mit Perspektiven der politischen Epistemologie auseinander, die sich mittlerweile zu einem soziologischen, politikwissenschaftlichen, philosophischen und historischen Brückenkonzept entwickelt hat. Trotz unterschiedlicher disziplinärer Zugänge lassen sich gemeinsame Kernelemente und ähnliche Theoriestrategien ausmachen: Immer geht es dabei um die Identifikation jener Mechanismen, die Erkenntnis und Ordnung, Expertise und Entscheiden miteinander vermitteln. Politische Epistemologien fragen nach den Praktiken bzw. Diskursen der Ko-Konstruktion von politischer und epistemischer Autorität. Sie vergleichen jene kulturellen und institutionellen Arrangements, in denen Expertise an Legitimität und Geltungsmacht gewinnt (oder verliert). Während ‚objektivistische Epistemologien' auf eine Rationalisierung der Politik durch die...2025-03-0539 minRMZ Science WorksJulia Baumann: Cultures of no-feeling? Ethnografische Gefühlswelten im deutschen akademischen ArbeitsalltagDie akademische Kultur ist eine Kultur, in der Gefühle abwesend sind - eine Kultur des 'Nicht-Gefühls'. [...], aber Gefühle sind in der Wissenschaft reichlich vorhanden" (Bloch, 2012: 140, übersetzt aus dem Englischen von JB), schließt Charlotte Bloch ihre ethnografische Studie Passion and Paranoia zu akademischen Emotionskulturen in Dänemark.Auf der Grundlage meiner ethnographischen Feldforschung (2019-2022) werde ich darlegen, wie eben diese „academic cultures of no-feeling“ den Alltag von Forscher*innen beeinflussen und die Wissensproduktion auch hier in Deutschland prägen. Historisch gewachsen zu einem emotionsgebundenen Wertesystem, das Gefühle als das Gegenteil von Rationalität und Wissensch...2025-02-2636 minRMZ Science WorksMarianne Noel & Lucile Ottolini: Opening up science as a work: An international comparison of openness to society and openness of publicationThe last twenty years of open science advocacy and the more recent proliferation of programs and funding have shown that open science has become a veritable mantra. In this communication we deliberately adopt a perspective of the sociology of work and of professions: rather than examining discourses on openness, we focus on the missions, experiences and profiles, as well as the practices, of professionals whose daily work is devoted to ‘opening up’ science. We propose to analyse the opening up of science as a vector of contemporary scientific credibility, implemented by professional communities which are invisible in their daily envi...2025-02-1929 minRMZ Science WorksHenning Laux: Dummheit – eine soziologische KartographieDer Vortrag stellt erste Überlegungen zu einer Soziologie der Dummheit vor. Dummheit wird dabei als systematisch vernachlässigte, aber konstitutive Außenseite der Wissensgesellschaft interpretiert. Im Vortrag sollen daher die Akteure, Arenen, Mechanismen und Funktionen bei der sozialen Zuschreibung von Dummheit genauer beleuchtet werden.2025-02-1235 minRMZ Science WorksAnna Ahlers: China als neue Wissenschaftsmacht - soziologische AnnäherungenZu den interessantesten Entwicklungen im gegenwärtigen globalen Wissenschaftsystem gehört der rasante Aufstieg der Volksrepublik China. Als kollektiver Akteur hat es das Land innerhalb von drei Jahrzehnten geschafft, in allen gängigen wissenschaftlichen Leistungs- und Reputations-Rankings Spitzenplätze einzunehmen. Internationale Reaktionen auf diese Entwicklung sind geprägt von Faszination und - zunehmend - Sorge und Ablehnung. Nicht zuletzt fordert das autoritäre Wissenschaftsmodel der VR China offensichtlich viele landläufige Annahmen und Normen in der OECD-Welt heraus. Auch aus wissenschaftlich-analytischer Perspektive ist der chinesische Fall deshalb äußerst spannend, aber dies hat sich bisher weder in der Sinologie noch in d...2025-02-0547 minRMZ Science WorksOlof Hallonsten: Stop evaluating science – a historical-sociological argumentAlthough science has been a formidably successful force of social and technological development in the modern era, and a main reason for the wealth and well-being of current societies compared to previous times, a fundamental distrust characterizes its current status in society. According to prevalent discourse, science is insufficiently productive and in need of stricter governance and bureaucratic management, with performance evaluation by the means of quantitative metrics as a key tool to increase efficiency. The basis of this notion appears to be a belief that the key or only purpose of science is to drive economic growth, or...2025-01-2245 minRMZ Science WorksDimity Stephen & Meta Cramer: Predatory publishing practices: Paper tigers or actual threats from evaluation systems?The recent shift in evaluation systems to more diverse quality criteria has increased the visibility of lower quality research, incurring a moral panic about the effects of predatory publishing practices (PPP) on the science system. However, this concern currently lacks empirical substantiation and ignores the complex geopolitical relations, researchers’ motivations, and centre-periphery narrative inherent in the predatory publishing debate. Thus, we propose a mixed-methods approach to answering three questions: i) how have (P)PP in different national settings emerged, ii) how do academic communities define and react to PPPs, and iii) how do evaluation systems influence (P)PPs? Our ai...2025-01-1547 minRMZ Science WorksMarta Wróblewska: From centre to (semi)periphery: policy-making in the area of research impact evaluation in UK, Poland and NorwayThe talk will offer a comparative review of policy-making in the area of research impact evaluation in UK (REF), Poland (EJDD) and Norway (Humeval and Sameval). Poland and Norway have used an ex-post, expert-review system modeled on the British REF. There are several analogies between the studied impact evaluation systems, including similar definitions of impact, the use of case studies as the basis for evaluation, the structuring of the impact template and English as the language of evaluation. There are also several differences: the mode of introduction of the exercise (gradual vs. shift), whether the exercise is tied to...2025-01-0837 minRMZ Science WorksGeorgia Samaras: What’s it got to do with the brain? Challenges in doing clinical relevance in epigenetic research on mental healthThe talk explores the epistemic dynamics catalysed by researchers advocating for the clinical relevance of environmental epigenetics in psychiatry. I do so based on an in-depth literature analysis of peer-reviewed research articles and interviews with researchers who conduct epigenetic research in psychiatry. In demonstrating how relevance builds a crucial yet ambivalent bridge between basic research and clinical application, I explore tensions arising in relation to the acceptable level of uncertainty for epigenetic knowledge to be considered relevant. I further trace how epigeneticists aim to counteract emerging problems to their claims about the clinical relevance of epigenetics through performing interdisciplinary...2024-12-1837 minRMZ Science WorksNicole Nelson: Reproducibility reforms in American biomedicine and the diffusion of the “regulatory ethos”Recent scholarship has described the “reproducibility crisis” and its associated reform movement as a social movement or a scientific-intellectual movement. This talk will argue for an alternative framing of these events which de-emphasizes high-status intellectual actors and their agendas for change, and emphasizes instead structural aspects and how they shape which reforms come to be seen as possible and desirable.
Taking this alternative lens, we could see the reproducibility movement not as a successful network of methodologists stitched together by Twitter and investment from private foundations, but as one instantiation of a broader diffusion of a “regulatory ethos”...2024-12-1147 minRMZ Science WorksSven Arend Ulpts: From the Researcher to the Integrity of Knowledge ProductionResearch guidelines and the scientific literature in general are full of ideas and recommendations of how proper science should look like. However, it remains an open question how the actual reality of research in the sciences relates to notions of proper or responsible science in, for instance, European research integrity guidelines? To answer this question, I conducted an ethnography of cognitive sciences in five cognitive science labs in Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. The aim is to understand how and under what conditions knowledge is produced and whether ideas of proper conduct that can be found in guidelines...2024-12-0428 minRMZ Science WorksThomas Wahl: Re-imagining humanness. Popular science narratives of AI futuresIn the case of artificial intelligence, hyperbolic predictions of the emergence of intelligent machines, even ‘super intelligences’, consist of both dystopian fears of human suppression and extinction, and utopian hopes of human flourishing through freedom from labor and illness as well as unparalleled economic growth and prosperity. At the heart of the controversies between these two, we argue, are emergent and conflicting assumptions about what it means to be human, or rather, what defines humanness.
To address this topic, of how the understanding of humaness is constructed in relation to AI and how the (future) agency of AI an...2024-11-2627 min