The Impacts of Federal Investments in Research on Vimeo.

Visualization techniques combined with extensive data infrastructure and advanced analytics hold the potential to make visible the too often hidden long-term impacts of research on technology. Interest in substantiating research impacts in a quantitative, reliable, systemic way is strong. Although discussion of the topic is extensive, large scale examples of success are few. This video aims to fill that gap. This presentation illustrates the potential of narrative visualization to help people understand complex connections between research funding and technology outcomes.

Diana Hicks is Professor and Chair of the School of Public Policy, Georgia Tech. Hicks specializes in science and technology policy as well as in innovative use of large databases of patents and papers to address questions of broad interest at the intersection of science and technology. Her recent work focuses on the challenges of bibliometric analysis in the social sciences and humanities as well as on patterns of concentration of research resources. She has published extensively on issues at the interface between science and technology, examining quantitative evidence of the evolving character of the research system and its relationship to innovation in the US; establishing that high quality scientific research has a high impact on technology; examining why companies undertake basic research; and being the first to argue that the accepted view of Japanese university-industry links as weak is not entirely accurate. She has also published critiques and reflections on the methodology of bibliometric analysis. Her work has appeared in such journals as: Policy Sciences, Social Studies of Science, Nature, Research Policy, Science and Public Policy, Research Evaluation, Research Technology Management, R&D Management, Scientometrics, Revue Economique Industrielle, Science Technology and Human Values, Industrial and Corporate Change, Japan Journal for Science, Technology and Society.

For almost 10 years Hicks was on the faculty of SPRU, University of Sussex in the U.K. At SPRU she taught graduate level courses in science and technology policy, science studies as it relates to policy, and research methods. She also administered the masters degree.

Her work has been supported by and has informed policy makers on three continents. She was previously the Senior Policy Analyst at CHI Research, Inc. She has conducted quantitative assessments and served as a consultant for the European Science Foundation, Advanced Technology Program of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the American Cancer Society, the Council for Chemical Research, the Department of Energy, the heads of the UK Research Councils, the Japanese National Institute for Science and Technology Policy, the National Science Foundation, the Small Business Administration, and The Royal Society in the UK. Prof. Hicks has taught at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley and worked at the National Institute of Science and Technology Policy (NISTEP) in Tokyo. She is an honorary fellow of the Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex, UK and on the Academic Advisory Board for Center for Science, Policy and Outcomes, Washington D.C.