Pros and cons of the new financial support policy for Turkish researchers

Abstract

In 2015, a new ex-post incentive policy was introduced in Turkey to increase the academic productivity of researchers. This convergent parallel design study aims to find an answer to the following research questions: (1) What are the downsides of ex-post funding system (EPFS) in academic publishing among Turkish researchers? (2) What are the contributions of the EPFS to academic publishing in Turkey? The results indicated that the EPFS was a motivating factor that enabled researchers to spare more time for academic studies. Besides, the EPFS created a more competitive environment; therefore, some researchers were influenced by this competitive environment and tended towards academic studies. It was concluded that the EPFS increased the number of articles in national journals, articles in international journals (indexed in indices other than SSCI/SCI/AHCI), papers presented in the congresses and projects. The data revealed that besides its positive contribution to academic prolificacy, the EPFS had undesirable and expected effects as well. Especially, the number of publications in potentially fake journals and questionable conferences increased after EPFS. Another apparent downside of the EPFS was that researchers with no contribution to the article were included as an author for academic work.