The Power of Peer Evaluation on Scientific Exploration: The Shaping of Boundaries around Premature Birth

• In Event: 472 - Regular Session. Technology

Abstract

This study draws on longitudinal ethnographic research conducted to understand the formation of a new interdisciplinary research center. The Center seeks to solve the problem of premature birth and initially, it consisted of four interdisciplinary research areas that relied on different methodologies and proposed different hypotheses for explaining the complex and unexplained health problem. Since its formation three years ago, the Center’s research efforts and notion of the problem focus have transformed due to yearly peer evaluations. This study examines how the interactions between external peer reviewers and members of the Center shape the boundaries around what is seen as relevant and worth studying in relation to premature birth. By drawing on multiple data sources—observations, meeting recordings, interviews, and documents—this study tracks the development of a particular research area, the Placental Genetics team. The team proposed to study preeclampsia—a placental disease that leads to induced early delivery—but the peer reviewers argued the Center should focus on spontaneous, rather than medically induced, preterm birth. The Center directors supported the differing views of the scientists and sought to resist the peer reviewers’ critique. With this longitudinal in-depth case study, I am able to show the extent of peer evaluation’s influence on science and how the boundaries around scientific exploration manifest themselves at the intersection of progress reports and peer evaluation.

Author

• Elina Mäkinen, Stanford University