| Abstract: |
This study investigates how research group characteristics relate to the early
career success of PhD candidates who are trained in the group. In particular,
we study how the citation impact of early-career PhDs is related to the staff
composition and the funding of the group. Using data on a cohort of Swedish
doctoral graduates in science, engineering, mathematics and medicine, two sets
of findings are obtained. First, students who were trained in groups with a
lower number of PhD students perform better in terms of academic productivity.
From the perspective of research policy, this finding suggests a decreasing
return to funding additional PhD student positions allocated to professors
already maintaining larger research groups. Second, PhD students trained in
groups whose funding for PhD research is conditioned by funder influence over
the topic of thesis research are more likely to stay in academia. Controlling
for career destination, however, PhDs from such groups have lower than average
scientific productivity and citation impact. These results suggest that
funders of PhD studies face a trade-off between the two different funding
objectives of “getting what they want” in terms of research content and
fostering successful scholars. |