Researchers' participation in standardisation: a case study from a public research institute in Germany

In this paper we examine public sector researchers' participation in standardisation bodies. Whereas previous research emphasized on patents and publications as outputs of research activities, we also consider standardisation as another activity of researchers. The latter has not been adequately taken into account. Assuming that publishing and patenting activities have an influence on researchers' involvement in standardisation we seek evidence based on objective publishing, patenting and standardisation data. Based on individual data of more than 600 researchers from the BAM Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing in Germany, we perform multivariate regression analyses to determine the characteristics that influence researchers' participation in standardisation at different levels. The estimation results show a negative relationship between high quality scientific publications productivity and participation in standardisation committees and a positive relationship between technical and industry-oriented publications productivity and standardisation activities. Patenting and standardisation activities appear to be contradictory only in a few model specifications. Academic qualifications of the researchers have a positive and statistically significant impact on the probability of participating in standardisation committees. Our findings reveal important insights for analysing researchers' activities in the future, but also for the management of research institutes and for policy makers.