Appropriate Use of Metrics in Research Assessment of Autonomous Academic Institutions

Policy highlights• This paper criticizes a “quick-and-dirty” desktop model for the use of metrics in the assessment of academic research performance, and proposes a series of alternatives.• It considers often used indicators: publication and citation counts, university rankings, journal impact factors, and social media-based metrics.• It is argued that research output and impact are multi-dimensional concepts; when used to assess individuals and...