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A wider perspective; researchers’ assessments of their own projects and independent perceptions of benefits and values that were not identified by researchers themselves
Author(s) -
Dencker Sven J.,
May Philip R.A.
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
acta psychiatrica scandinavica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.849
H-Index - 146
eISSN - 1600-0447
pISSN - 0001-690X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1600-0447.1986.tb07729.x
Subject(s) - perspective (graphical) , psychology , perception , process (computing) , social psychology , applied psychology , social perception , computer science , neuroscience , artificial intelligence , operating system
An analysis of ratings by 270 raters of the potential social benefits from six different research projects shows that almost all independent raters identified some additional benefit from at least one project that had not been specifically pinpointed in the researchers’ descriptions or recognized in the researchers’ own ratings of these same projects. The researchers themselves were able to identify more items of benefit than were contained in their own descriptions, but independent raters recognized an even greater number of benefits. These findings run contrary to a common belief that outside persons are insensitive to the social values of research. They also suggest that the process of actually doing a rating of potential social benefits draws attention to items of benefit that have been overlooked in the description. This points to the importance of encouraging researchers to think more deeply and seriously about the potential social benefits fo their own research ‐and about non‐reseachers attitudes and preferences