Improving our research culture: it starts with Working Well Together

By Professor Marcus Munafò

Marcus is Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor of Research Culture at the University of Bristol. He leads on research culture activity across the university, providing direction and vision, working across the institutional landscape, and identifying key challenges and opportunities. He is also institutional lead for theUK Reproducibility Network.

 

Last month we welcomed colleagues from across the University to the Bristol Beacon’s Lantern Hall to learn more about the Working Well Together resource, as part of this year’s Enhancing Research Culture event series.

So, what is Working Well Together?

Dr Sarah Campbell, part of the Working Well Together team, introduces the resource

The Working Well Together (WWT) resource is designed to support teams, and the people within them, who work effectively in an HE context and enhance their team culture. It helps to create an environment in which everyone can thrive, and which enables high quality, reproducible research. The approach is inquisitive, starting with where teams are, identifying approaches which are right for them, and continuing to ask questions along the way.

The resource is designed to help teams do more of what they are doing well, and to support them in areas that are more challenging. It focuses on identifying some quick wins, but offers no quick fixes. The aim of the resource is to offer groups the tools and expertise to develop a culture that can help its members respond to the evolving challenges of their work.

Professor Jack Mellor stands on stage to discuss his experience of using the Working Well Together resource
Professor Jack Mellor discusses his team’s experience of using the WWT resource

Groups that have used the resource have found it an enjoyable way to take stock of how things are going, and start some of the harder conversations they need to have. They say it’s given insights into challenges they weren’t aware of, and helped remind them of what is going well and how to do more of the things that have a positive impact. Others have found it has equipped them with the skills needed to work well together, and started the process of making time to reflect and review as a group.

Teams / groups are invited to pilot the resource until the end of January 2025. When we talk about teams / groups this can include anyone who is part of, and supports, research activity, so may include academic staff, technical staff, professional services staff and research students. If you are interested in learning more about a pilot, please complete this form.

The WWT resource is about building stronger, more supportive teams in order to work more effectively together and create a more inclusive working environment.

Event attendees discuss how their teams could use the WWT resource

From the Enhancing Research Culture allocated we receive from Research England, to the new People, Culture and Environment (PCE) assessment category in the next Research Excellence Framework (REF) assessment, it is clear that the organisations that shape the higher education system are emphasising the importance of a robust, equitable and inclusive research process from start to finish, rather than focusing solely the outputs of our research.

Panel discussion and Q+A: Looking ahead to REF 2029

To delve into this new REF category and what it means for the research landscape, I was joined by Dr Helen Young (Associate Director of Research Excellence, University of Bristol), Dr Caroline Jarrett (Faculty of Science and Engineering Technical Manager, University of Bristol) and Dr Faith Uwadiae (Research Culture and Communities Specialist, Wellcome Trust).

Our panel answer questions from the audience during the event

Over the course of an hour’s discussion we covered a lot, but some key points and highlights are summarised below;

  • There was recognition from both academic and technical colleagues in attendance that the culture within research is improving, but there is still a long way to go
  • Funders are already considering, and in some cases requiring, grant applications to consider people, the environment they work within, and the culture they create.
  • The REF measures research outputs, which are naturally downstream from the work involved in setting up research or project teams, and carrying out the work.
  • Positive changes to how we approach project setup and delivery therefore have an impact on our research outputs.
  • Investing time and energy in building strong groups and ways of working pays dividends down the line, but currently this time and focus is often not prioritised.

The move to include People, Culture and Environment in REF2029 highlights the importance of the work that we have been doing both at an institutional level and within our own professional circles and teams to improve our research culture, and I thank all of you who have been involved over the years.

I’m reminded of a quote from one of our first ever Research Culture events, the talk on The Joy of Failure with Annie Vernon, who won Olympic silver in the Women’s Quadruple Sculls at Beijing 2008. Success doesn’t mean we did everything right, and failure doesn’t mean we did everything wrong. Together, we can continue to build on our success whilst recognising there are still areas to improve.

GW4 Open Research Prize 2023: Theory of Change

By Christopher Warren, Assistant Research Support Librarian

Following straight on from January’s blog, Change is the word! In 2023, the GW4 Alliance hosted their Open Research Week at the end of November with the theme of The Theory of Change showcasing a broad range of open research practices which make research more visible, accessible, transparent and reproducible (or, Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable – FAIR). 

This year GW4 opted hold a competitive award event in that week to elevate, celebrate and promote best academic practice: the GW4 Open Research Prize 2023. 

Graphic promoting GW4's Open Research Prize 2023, including the logos from all 4 GW4 institutions: University of Bath, University of Bristol, Cardiff University, University of Exeter

Background

In 2021 the University of Bristol started our own institutional Open Research Prize, with a second event following in 2022. From the success of those, and working with our colleagues at Bath, Cardiff and Exeter as well as the GW4 team, the new GW4 Open Research Prize built on our past work and opened it out to researchers from all four institutions.

To our original two categories – Improving Quality and Widening Reach – GW4 added a prize specifically for Posters, and, with the Bristol University Press (BUP), an Early Career Publishing Prize category for ECRs writing monographs. The amounts of prize money for each category was raised as well, as well as the chance for the Publishing Prize winner to work with BUP explore publication of their doctoral thesis.

Events and awards

After an initial submission period, we invited entries short-listed to attend an afternoon online conference through Zoom, where all entries sent in a short pre-recorded case study presentation video – so there would be a level playing-field for all. Q&As were taken after each between presenter and audience. At previous UOB events we had split judging between a panel of judges and a popular vote from those attending, but here the decision on choosing winning entries was made by the audience alone (other than for the monograph prize, see below).

GW4 Open Research Prize for Widening Reach

The winning entry for Widening Reach was Matt Lloyd Jones of University of Exeter (Penryn Campus): Exploring the potential of using simulation games for engaging with sheep farmers about sheep lameness

This study codesigned a videogame with farmers and vets to identify lameness in sheep. It showed an open, involved process, increasing uptake and impact among those it benefitted. Publications from it were preregistered and published as Open Access. The data itself was published as FAIR data, in an Open repository. It demonstrated excellent Open Research practice, while being honest about the limitations and costs involved in the project.

GW4 Open Research Prize for Improving Quality

The winning entry in the Improving Quality category was a team from the University of Exeter Katie Young, Pedro Cardoso, Laura Guedemann, Rhian Hopkins with their study: Improving reproducibility and transparency of diabetes research with electronic health care records

This study took electronic health data, messy at source, and applied Open Research practices to make it reproducible and transparent. They wrote code so it could be securely shared with clinicians for validation, creating safe, clean data all in one place, that would help reduce researchers’ workload, raising quality and facilitating protocol approval. This was excellent science, showing the benefits of applying Open Research practices in a key area.

GW4 Open Research Prize for Poster submission

The winner in the Poster Prize category was Eoin Cremen of University of Bath: “The influence of AI advice on decision-making strategies in a hypothesis testing task”

The winning poster (which can be viewed here: The influence of AI advice on decision-making strategies in a hypothesis testing task) focused on how people use AI to search for health results. Focusing on ‘aches’, this looked at running a feasibility study for checking the AI-advice provided to test the diagnosis and see whether this is accurate and relevant to the information given.

GW4 Early Career Publishing Prize

The winning Publishing Prize entry was judged ahead of the event by a cross-institution panel of judges working with the BUP. This was an entirely new prize category for us, not having worked on selecting or awarding a monograph prize before.

In first place was Bristol’s own Alison Oldfield, University of Bristol: Going to the farm: A sociomaterial ethnography of autistic young people in a natural environment.

Alison’s thesis, on which her winning submission was based, can be found through the UOB Research Portal here: Thesis: Going to the farm

**Details of all taking part is available from GW4 or the School of Education blog here: GW4 Open Research Prize 2023: Winners announced!

Wrapping up

The Open Research Prize was a great day, bringing together many strands from across the Open Research Week and a chance for colleagues to celebrate and recognise each other’s achievement.

The next prize will be in the spring of 2025. Bath University, which is another of the GW4 institutions, will be taking the reins on organising this prize, but watch out for events and updates via GW4’s website or on our own Open Research pages.

Contact

Christopher Warren – Assistant Research Support Librarian

Christopher Warren is an Assistant Research Support Librarian with the Research Data Service, a section of the Library Services’ Research Support Team that deals with all matters relating to Research Data Management. We’re based online and on the 1st floor of Augustine’s Courtyard. Please contact data-bris@bristol.ac.uk or lib-research-support@bristol.ac.uk for more information.

 

Bristol and the Africa Charter: Tackling power imbalances in research collaborations

By Susan Jim and Caroline McKinnon

What the Africa Charter for Transformative Research Collaborations means to the University, local communities and diaspora will be explored during the event, “Bristol and the Africa Charter”, co-hosted by Professor Marcus Munafò, Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research Culture, the Inclusive Research Collective (IRC) and the Perivoli Africa Research Centre (PARC), 12h30-17h00 on Tue 31 October 2013, MShed, Bristol. For more details and to book your ticket please see Eventbrite link

Research and the processes of producing knowledge are not free from power imbalances and inequities. All stages of research – from the development of ideas for inquiry and the conception of research projects, to data collection, analysis, publication, dissemination of and access to research outputs – involve relations among actors with different degrees of explicit and implicit power. African decolonial literatures show that the web of power relations between African and other actors involved in knowledge production is profoundly shaped by colonial experiences and legacies.  

To begin conversations on how to redress these imbalances, the Perivoli Africa Research Centre (PARC) and the Inclusive Research Collective (IRC) collaborated on the ‘Small Talks for Big Change‘ seminar series. This was a series of six virtual talks in which speakers from the African continent discussed post- and de-colonial perspectives on, and lived experiences of, the multiple layers of power imbalances present within Global North-Africa research collaborations.

An initial seminar introduced the work of PARC and the series aims, and the remaining events explored the major layers of power imbalances in research collaborations between the Global North and researchers in the African continent, including: 

  • the inequalities in practical collaboration arrangements – Dr Catherine Kyobutungi, African Population and Health Research Centre 
  • the dominance of western-centric epistemologies, languages, theories and concepts in the production of scientific knowledge – Dr Divine Fuh, University of Cape Town
  • the “development frame” which confines the majority of the research on the continent to an international development or aid agenda – Professor Puleng Segalo, University of South Africa
  • the vast disparities in institutional resourcing – Professor Alex Ezeh, Drexel University 

The final event with Professor Agnes Nairn, Pro Vice-Chancellor (Global Engagement) at the University of Bristol discussed the need to go beyond current models of equitable collaborative models and the development of an Africa-centred Charter and guiding framework for transforming research collaborations with Africa. 

The layers of power imbalances within research collaborations

The Africa Charter for Transformative Research Collaborations 

In a joint endeavour, Africa’s major higher education bodies including the Association of African Universities (AAU), the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA), the Inter-University Council for Eastern Africa (IUCEA), the Association of West African Universities (AWAU), the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), and the African Academy of Sciences (AAS), have co-created the Africa Charter for Transformative Research Collaborations; a framework for advancing a transformative mode of academic research collaborations with Africa that will serve to advance and uphold the continent’s contribution to global knowledge production.  The initiative is facilitated by PARC together with the Chief Albert Luthuli Research Chair, University of South Africa and the Institute for Humanities in Africa (HUMA) at the University of Cape Town. 

Going beyond existing equitable partnership frames, the Charter captures institutional commitment to, and shared principles, goals and approaches for, change in institutional and wider HE sector policies and standards in order to embed a mode of partnership working that redresses the multiple layers of power imbalances in Global North-Africa relations. Drawing on African intellectual thought, analyses of extant global scientific and equitable partnerships efforts, and dialogue with key HE and research actors in Europe, North America and others across the globe, the Charter:

1. articulates basic principles on how research collaborations need to be configured to redress the multi-layered power imbalances in Global North-Africa knowledge dynamics; and

2. sets out goals and guiding frameworks for institutional and HE-sector policy change to embed such a transformative collaboration mode.  

COREViP Conference 2023

 The Charter was launched in July 2013 at the AAU’s Biennial Conference of Rectors, Vice-Chancellors and Presidents of African Universities (COREVIP) in Windhoek, Namibia. This was followed by discussions in September 2013 at the Times Higher Education World Academic Summit in Sydney, Australia.

Updates on the Charter can be found here. 

 

The Future of Universities: Event recap

By Marcus Munafò

At the start of the summer, we held the second and third events in our Future of Universities series. The higher education landscape has seen significant changes over the past decade, influenced by  factors such as increasing tuition fees, rising costs of living and the COVID-19 pandemic. Our events delved into what teaching and the role of universities will look like in 2033.

Read on for a summary of the discussions from each event and watch our recordings to hear the full discussions!

The Future of Teaching

Chaired by Tansy Jessop (Pro Vice-Chancellor for Education, University of Bristol), this event featured experts from across the teaching system in higher education. We were delighted to be joined by Nicola Dandridge (Professor of Practice in Higher Education Policy, previously Chief Executive, Office for Students, 2017-22), who gave an excellent talk on how our approach to teaching should be molded around the students of the future rather than expecting students  to mold themselves around a predetermined model.

She considered external factors that will  influence the world over the next ten years, including a need for higher level skills,  economic and social pressures , and climate emergency that will affect what students choose to study and how we deliver teaching. With a recent UCAS report predicting huge increases in university applicants over the next decade, this is a particularly pertinent time to  have these discussions!

We then opened up the discussion to our panel for an interactive Q+A session with our audience. As you can expect from over an hour of expert discussions, we covered a lot! Some of the key points highlighted by our panel included;

  • The need for universities to give students the skills, knowledge and orientation to deal with the complexity and uncertainty of the modern world, and actively involving them in the learning experience rather than creating a system where they are passively receiving content.
  • The role of higher education institutions as diverse learning environments, whether the “jack of all trades” approach works in an increasingly competitive environment and if gaining a degree  is more than a box ticking exercise on the employability conveyor belt.
  • Conceptualising university education as a lifelong set of activities rather than a coming-of-age process for 18–21-year-olds
  • Recognising the challenges and pressures faced by teachers at universities and balancing the student and teacher requirements to ensure as positive an outcome possible for all involved including students, graduate teachers and technical staff

Watch Nicola’s talk and the full discussion here;

The Future Role of Universities in Society

The final event in our series focused on higher education’s role as a policy influencer and an enabler of the implementation of future technologies. We were joined by experts at the key decision-making points of higher education policy including Matt Western (Labour MP for Warwick and Leamington, Shadow Minister for Education) and Vivienne Stern (Chief Executive, Universities UK) alongside colleagues from across the university landscape.

This event naturally resulted in a broader discussion than our previous two events – it would be impossible to talk about the role of universities without discussing research and teaching, after all!  Therefore, we aimed to debate how the challenges and opportunities of the framework that higher education institutions operate in affect (and will affect in the future) our ability to both pioneer research and deliver a positive student experience.

Key discussion points raised by our panel and audience members included;

  • The loss of public trust in higher education institutions and how we regain that trust and sustainably grow the sector.
  • The increasing need to support PhD students and early career researchers as society faces further complex challenges which will require continued innovativation
  • A need for universities to push ourselves to further help employees and students develop skillsets for the changing world. Currently, too much of the onus to do this is on the individual.
  • As institutions, our responsibility is to champion the higher education sector and safeguard its future amidst public and government pressures while reconciling this with maintaining positive relations and recognising where the majority of university funding comes from – we can do this better.

Watch the full discussion here;

I’d like to take a moment to thank all our attendees over the course of these events, our panelists and chairs, and the Research Culture team for facilitating such in-depth discussions. We’re currently hard at work on allocating our 2024 Research Culture funding and organising the 2023-24 academic year’s events, and we look forward to sharing more information in due course!

Celebrating Technicians – a look at the past, present and future of technical roles in higher education and academia

Research culture can mean a lot of different things to different people. From improving diversity across the University to enabling better work through infrastructure improvements, much of our work focuses on making things better. However, celebrating the fantastic people and the work being carried out across our institution is also vital to research culture.

In June, we held an event to celebrate our technical staff at Bristol and further afield. Technical staff facilitate and support research and enterprise while also playing a significant role in implementing our education programmes for undergraduates and postgraduates.

As Andy Connelly, one of our guest speakers, noted, we were inspired by Dickens’ A Christmas Carol at this event, hearing three excellent and informative talks on Technicians of the Past, Present and Future. Read on to hear more about each speaker’s background, what we learned, and some of the key takeaways from our interactive panel discussion.

Nik Okgyzko – UKRI People and Teams Action Plan

Nik is part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), which was launched in 2018 and is the largest public research funder in the UK, bringing together seven disciplinary research councils, Research England and Innovate UK, and funding £7 billion per year into the research system.

Technicians are a vital part of our national research community: they underpin and support our investment in research; they design, build and maintain a significant portion of our infrastructure; and they support our research outputs by offering expertise and often carrying out research itself.

Technical roles are incredibly diverse, from operating across the arts and humanities to supporting some of the most complicated scientific endeavours. UKRI supports technicians in four key ways:

  1. Ensuring technicians are recognised and rewarded fairly and effectively by employers
  2. Assessing what is rewarded and invested in within the technical career pathway
  3. Creating clear expectations and assurances concerning where their investments go
  4. Providing clear engagement as to how they support the research sector

Andy Connelly – Technicians of the Past

Andy’s research into the history of technicians was inspired by his career as a technician, where he didn’t necessarily feel valued compared to the work he was carrying out.

For most of the history of science, technicians have been invisible because they tended to be servants. During the 17th-century era of the scientific revolution, technicians were referred to as lab rats, assistants or servants. Part of these roles involved giving up autonomy and credit for their work, operating instead as extensions of their masters’ wills.

This started to change during the 19th century, as a number of large scientific institutions created a career pathway for technicians, recognising them as employees and offering some promotion opportunities. Michael Faraday, today a household name, started his scientific career as a technician. He attended and assisted in lectures supporting instrument and apparatus setup, and was responsible for cleaning, maintenance and repair. He also took on the role of valet when his master’s valet was unwell, further emphasizing the role of technicians as servants.

In the 20th century, there was a significant uptick in technical staff. Freda Collier, for example, developed photographs that became a key piece of evidence on the structure of DNA. Her role was recognised in the BBC’s 1987 Horizon documentary.

Catrin Harris – Technicians of the Present

The Midlands Innovation TALENT programme aims to advance both status and opportunity for technical skills, roles and careers in UK higher education and research. As the Research Fellow for TALENT, Catrin researches the technical community, the environments they work in and the challenges they face.

In September 2022, building on the work of Wellcome and ARMA on research culture, MI TALENT published Research Culture: A Technician Lens, which explores research culture from technicians’ perspectives. Some interesting statistics and takeaways from this work include the following.

  • Only 30% of technicians felt included in the research community and only 37% of technicians felt valued as a member of the research community.
  • 63% of technicians and 52% of non-technical staff and students do not think technicians are appropriately credited for their contributions to research.
  • There still exists an “us and them” culture between academic researchers and technical staff. Technical staff reported a number of issues such as negative attitudes, communication issues, bullying and poor treatment, and scapegoating when projects are unsuccessful or hit roadblocks.

Career progression is often highlighted as a challenge for technical staff.  A lack of clear career pathways means that technicians often have to move to management positions, resulting in a loss of technical knowledge and skills.

The full report makes for fascinating reading and highlights how we can improve the quality of our technical staff’s professional lives and career opportunities, and the sectoral shifts that need to happen in order to facilitate this.

Kelly Vere – Technicians of the Future

Kelly has been a technician for several years and is trying to shift the culture around considering technical colleagues and the skills they offer. The aim is to ensure our technical community is respected and valued and can work within a supportive and inclusive research environment. One of the first key pieces of work is a pledge to support the technical profession – the Technician Commitment – which so far has attracted sign-ups from over 115 organisations and institutions.

An understanding of the strategic position of our technical workforce is vital. To that end, the TALENT Board of Commissioners is made up of technical staff, academic staff, VCs and PVCs, directors and CEOs, ensuring broad representation. The TALENT Commission report looks at a vision of the future in which technical careers are respected, admired and aspired to. The key principles include:

  • strategic planning for sustainable technical skills and investing in technical career pipelines;
  • recognising the diversity of technical roles and reporting accurately and transparently on the demographic information of technicians;
  • creating a diverse and inclusive technical community which reflects the richness of society;
  • making technical careers and development visible, reducing the reliance on dropping technical careers to move into management;
  • giving technicians collaborative opportunities to influence decision-making, empowering technical staff to influence the future for themselves;
  • inclusive policy-making and representation, recognising the significance of technical expertise.

Panel discussion

Following this fascinating journey through the past, present and future of technical staff, we welcomed our panel to the stage to take audience questions. In addition to our speakers, we were joined by Jiteen Ahmed (Head of Technical Services, Aston University) and Ian Brewis (Chair, GW4 Technical Infrastructure and Knowledge Working Group).

With a panel covering such a broad range of the technical landscape, there was plenty to discuss and lots of questions from our audience. Watch the video below to hear the full range of discussions, but here are some of my key takeaways.

  • There has been a positive shift towards making technicians more visible and better supported, although there is work still needed in this space. This is a vital part of our wider research culture, ensuring that different communities within higher education have a voice and moving away from a hierarchical structure.
  • There’s plenty we can do to make technical careers more attractive. Pay is naturally at the top of the list, but training, development and support are vital, in addition to more concrete methods of acknowledging the work carried out, such as inclusion in research articles.
  • Developing technical staff networks and staff joining these networks helps with visibility, particularly further afield of your own institution. This is the same for institutions too – some of the greatest changes noted over the past few years have been when institutions have worked together, such as through the Technician Commitment.

What’s next for research culture at Bristol?

After a packed spring and summer of events, the University has received further funding from Research England to be spent on research culture activity, building on awards in 2021 and 2022. This is part of ongoing sectoral efforts to enhance research culture. The latest round of the Research Culture open call is now open for applicants, with a closing date of Monday, 19 September 2023. Read the full guidance on SharePoint and apply online (please note, this link will only work for University of Bristol colleagues). If you have any questions, please contact Gurjeet Kaur, Project Officer at researchculture-projects@bristol.ac.uk.

Histories of Tobacco

Earlier this month, we had the privilege of welcoming pre-eminent academics from a range of disciplines in the field of tobacco and nicotine research for our Histories of Tobacco event. At first glance, this might not seem like a Research Culture event like our others, but research culture is about more than supporting our students, staff and academics and celebrating the fantastic work already being done. Research culture also encompasses finding ways to foster innovative, multidisciplinary research by working with each other, rather than being siloed by our School, Faculty, discipline or research group.  

Tobacco and the research associated with it (both historical and present) is by its very nature a multidisciplinary field. The social history of tobacco can encompass subjects from the colonialisation of the tobacco plant from indigenous tribes in North America to the National Socialist German Workers’ Party’s ideological attacks on tobacco and alcohol. Different countries have approached tobacco legislation in vastly different ways, both currently and historically, and the roles of researchers, policy groups, government organisations and the tobacco industry have influenced our understanding of health issues and subsequent education (and re-education) campaigns and policies.

As Richard Stone outlined at our event, tobacco is also inherently linked to our institution and city. The Wills family, who contributed over £150,000 of the initial £200,000 required to raise a University Charter for Bristol, made their money through the tobacco trade. The legacy of their contribution, both positive and negative, still lives on in Bristol – as one example, people who live around the old tobacco factories that until relatively recently used to produce cigarettes use tobacco products more than the Bristol average, even though the factories are now closed.

Read on to hear from our four keynote speakers on their research across the field of tobacco, and do take a look at their published work – it makes for fascinating reading.

Patricia Nez Henderson – Vice-President, Black Hills Center for American Indian Health
Decolonizing tobacco: an indigenous perspective

Before tobacco was a globe-spanning product generating an estimated $35bn in profit per year, it was (and still is) a sacred plant for many Native American tribes. Used in healing and spiritual ceremonies, and one of the Navajo (Patricia’s own tribe) tribe’s four sacred foods, the US Government passed laws banning ceremonies and prohibiting ceremonial use of tobacco, whilst granting farming rights to colonisers to produce tobacco products and commercialise the plant.

This oppression of the indigenous culture coincided with the tobacco industry’s use of Native American imagery and wording to promote their tobacco products, and it wasn’t until 1978 that the American Indian Religious Freedom Act permitted indigenous people to practice their ceremonial ways again.

Patricia’s work is centred around decolonizing tobacco, reframing the way indigenous communities use tobacco and educating on the difference between ceremonial and commercial tobacco. After 15 years of advocacy, the Air is Life Act 2021 creates a safe space for Navajo people – prohibiting the use of commercial tobacco products on Navajo land to return to a culture of honouring tobacco as a sacred product. Much of the discourse around tobacco doesn’t speak to the culture of tobacco, focusing on commercial and health aspects. The Air is Life Act represents a positive step towards indigenous people reclaiming an aspect of Navajo culture stolen by colonial powers.

Ian Tyrrell – Emeritus Professor of History, University of New South Wales
Before the “Cigarette Century” and after: tobacco, smoking and colonialism

There is no real tradition of historiography on the study of tobacco in Australia. Studies have become fixated with cigarettes, and with the major tobacco corporations, especially chewing tobacco and roll-ups. In recent years, the focus has shifted to smokeless tobacco, and these focus areas don’t reflect the broad swathe of consumption options and varied histories of these products. Until the post-1900 rise of cigarettes, only 3.4% of tobacco products were for leaf; snuff, smoking of pipes, and chewing plug and twist tobacco were all more popular forms of consumption.

The rise of cigarettes in Australia cannot be discussed without mentioning Big Tobacco’s marketing war on chewing tobacco, a calculated move to increase their market share which rapidly increased cigarette usage. The variances in national market preferences, patterns of class differences and patterns of urbanization make for fascinating study, and hopefully research in this area continues.

George Davey Smith – Professor of Clinical Epidemiology, University of Bristol
Cigarettes and death: a long and winding road

It is easy to assume that awareness of the dangers of smoking cigarettes is a relatively recent phenomenon due to improvements in health research, technology and statistical approaches, the discovery of tobacco’s health implications and subsequent policy decisions. In reality, we should consider this a re-discovery.

In late 19th-century discourse, cigarettes were referred to as coffin nails. There was recognition that smoking had a number of health implications. At a governmental level, perhaps the most famous example of anti-tobacco policy was the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, who waged an ideological war on tobacco and alcohol consumption which included both policy and health campaigns. Military personnel were prohibited from smoking in uniforms, and the general population were prohibited from smoking in cars, indoors, and on university grounds. Tobacco capitalism is quite resistant, however! The German tobacco industry began rebranding their cigarettes for the stormtroopers of the Nazi war machine. Smoking also became a form of resistance and the counterculture in Germany, most famously in the Edelweiss Pirates, an anti-Nazi movement of working-class youth who fought the regime.

Raymond Pearl demonstrated major differences in life expectancy due to smoking, but his work did not significantly influence policy and discourse. This could be due to a myriad of factors. As a well-recognised public intellectual, he polarised views. The tobacco industry also opposed his work (and the work of others), running marketing campaigns countering Pearl’s arguments. Pearl’s controversial work on links between tuberculosis and cancer, and his findings on moderate alcohol consumption being better for life expectancy, all contributed to his work not gaining traction in social and policy discourse.

Virginia Berridge – Professor of History and Health Policy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
E-cigarettes and the politics of harm reduction: history, evidence and policy

The initial intended aim of e-cigarettes was to remove the part of cigarettes that was harmful – providing nicotine without the tar and carcinogens found in cigarettes. Owing to how embedded cigarettes had become in British culture in the 1950s, outright bans were impossible. “Healthier” cigarettes entered the market, but compensatory smoking (requiring more cigarettes for the same nicotine hit) meant that these made a negligible difference. The policy discourse has now shifted towards harm reduction rather than outright bans, in part due to the response to HIV/AIDS and the health benefits of preventative drugs.

The arrival of e-cigarettes as a nicotine replacement to enable long-term use rather than tapering off represented the UK’s changing stance from prevention to harm reduction. Nicotine itself is not especially hazardous, and if it could be provided effectively as a cigarette substitute, millions of lives could be saved. Initially seen as an oddity, they gradually fitted into the UK regulatory system and saw increasing uptake. The nature of the UK’s political system also allowed implementation of policy at a national level compared to federalised states like the United States; with both major political parties very supportive of nicotine harm reduction, it is easier to pass policies and produce education campaigns on non-tobacco options for those dealing with nicotine addictions.

What’s next for Research Culture?

We have three more events left in our 2023 series of research culture events.

The Future of Teaching, part of our Future of Universities series, looks at the challenges and opportunities facing teaching at universities in the near future. This includes focusing equally on students and staff, the role of universities in equipping the next generation to succeed, and the nature of students as customers given the implementation and subsequent rises in tuition fees over the past 20 years.

Our final Future of Universities event, The Future Role of Universities in Society (Thursday 13 July), brings together a panel of experts across the key decision-making points of higher education policy. We’ll be discussing the role of universities in shaping the future of society and the public and political expectations of universities.

We then have our Festival of Research Culture (Wednesday 19 July), our flagship annual event, which celebrates the work across the University to improve our research culture, particularly showcasing projects that have received funding through our Enhancing Research Culture Fund. The event will give you an opportunity to discover interdisciplinary opportunities from outside your area or field of work and feed into ongoing work in this area. Hear from our Vice-Chancellor and President, Professor Evelyn Welch, about the future of our research culture, and be part of discussions on how we can continue striving to make the University of Bristol an innovative, inclusive and collaborative research environment.

 

Future of Universities: The Future of Research

Last month I had the privilege of kicking off our Future of Universities event series. These events bring experts together from across the academic spectrum to discuss what universities could and should be like in 2033. The Future of Research delved into some of the challenges and opportunities facing research universities and those conducting research at our institutions.

Nigel Thrift, Emeritus Professor and University of Bristol alumnus, kicked off proceedings with a fascinating talk based on his new book, The Pursuit of Possibility: Redesigning Research Universities. He talked through some of the areas that require attention to ensure research universities can survive and thrive, including the University funding crisis and current regulation, and commented on how research universities are one of the few actors across the world who have the capacity to arrest the downward spiral towards irreversible damage to the planet that we currently find ourselves trapped in.

We then heard from a fantastic panel chaired by (as she put it) my “professional sibling”, Professor Michele Barbour, the Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor for Enterprise and Innovation. Michele was joined by a panel of experts from across the higher education environment who immediately got to work delving into how we can safeguard the future of research universities and equip our academics and prospective researchers with the tools, time and support needed to succeed.

With almost an hour of discussion and some thought-provoking questions from the audience, there were a lot of talking points! You can watch the full discussion on the recording below.

Thanks to our panel, whose various experiences cut across the higher education landscape, we heard a range of perspectives on what the future of research means. We considered topics from postgraduate researchers and the support (both in infrastructure and more holistic guidance) required to excel, to the synergistic links between universities and how we can leverage these to continue making an impact through research and help solve some of society’s most pressing challenges. Watch the full recording to find out what else we discussed.

The discussion was closed by Professor Evelyn Welch, the University’s Vice-Chancellor, who remarked on the higher education landscape as a community equipped to scope out solutions for these challenges and begin the work on putting this into place. My own work on research culture springs to mind, and the funding from Research England positions us to respond both proactively and reactively to some of the challenges in our research environment.

Next month promises to be a bumper month for Research Culture events and celebrates the diversity of what Research Culture can mean!

First, we have Histories of Tobacco, which looks at tobacco’s initial sacred purposes and its subsequent colonialisation and commodification. The history of this plant offers a fascinating case study of how research and attitudes of the past can help inform our future.

We then have our Celebrating Technicians event, which will focus on the vital role technicians play in the research process. Speakers from across the higher education system will highlight the excellent facilitation and vital research support carried out by technicians at universities across the country.

Finally, our next Future of Universities event, The Future of Teaching, examines the changes in the university landscape and how we, as institutions, need to adapt to safeguard higher education and best equip future researchers to change the world.

I hope to see you at one of these events in June!

 

Using Data Hazards labels to promote better research culture

By Nina Di Cara and Natalie Zelenka

A still from the Data Hazards explainer animation
A still from the Data Hazards explainer animation, funded by the Research England Enhancing Research Culture allocation to the University of Bristol

Earlier this month we held a launch event for Version 1.0 of the Data Hazards project, as part of a series of Research Culture themed events. The project has been in development for two years, and for the past year has been supported by funding from Research England’s Enhancing Research Culture initiative.

Here we’d like to tell you more about the project and what we have been able to achieve with support from the Research Culture initiative.

About the Data Hazards project

The Data Hazard labels, illustrated by Yasmin Dwiputri
The Data Hazard labels, illustrated by Yasmin Dwiputri

Data Hazards are similar to chemical hazards, but applied to the area of data science, statistics and artificial intelligence. They communicate potential risks with a Hazard ‘label’ that can be used alongside research presentations, papers and proposals to communicate ethical risks.

For example, using datasets that are known to be biased in some way may need the ‘Reinforces Existing Bias’ label. A project that uses a very energy-hungry method could have the ‘High Environmental Cost’ label applied.

We can also use these labels to generate more meaningful conversations between different disciplines – and between researchers and the public – about the potential risks of data science research.

The Hazard labels themselves have been developed over the past two years as part of a collaborative process where we have tested out a workshop format that allows researchers to get feedback about the potential ethical risks of their research from others.

The project is based online on the GitHub platform that allows anyone to contribute ideas. So far, we estimate that we have had contributions from 100 people up to Version 1.0, and we hope to keep receiving ideas and feedback so that we can continue to develop it.

Training workshop facilitators

By helping more people to consider the risks of data science projects, we have a chance to positively influence our wider research culture. We can do this by making data scientists more mindful of their impact on the world and by making it easier for people outside of our usual research environments to ‘step in’ to data science work and raise their concerns about the future impacts of it.

Thanks to Research Culture funding in 2022, we were able to hire AI ethics expert Ismael Kherrobi Garcia to help design learning resources about the Data Hazards project. We then used these resources to deliver two sets of training – one online, one in person – to new Data Hazards project facilitators so that we have more people able to teach others about the project and run workshops.

In-person facilitator training – July 2022
In-person facilitator training – July 2022

 

Data Hazards facilitators at AI UK 2023 – March 2023
Data Hazards facilitators at AI UK 2023 – March 2023

We had around 30 attendees at our facilitator training workshops, which were a great success. So far, our trained facilitators have gone on to run a Data Hazards and Reproducibility Symposium at the Alan Turing Institute, present the Data Hazards project ACM’s Computer Human Interaction Conference 2023 and support conversations about the project at AI UK this year. Some have also used the Data Hazards in their teaching and in their own research.

We were also very lucky to be able to work with Bristol PhD student Vanessa Hanschke and artist and animator Yasmin Dwiputri to create new labels for the Data Hazards project (as shown above), and to animate three explainer videos about the project to help us to share the project with new people. You can watch these below.

Launching Version 1.0

On 29 March, the Wills Memorial Building hosted an event to celebrate the launch of Version 1.0 of the Hazard labels.

The event kicked off with talks by project leads Natalie Zelenka and Nina Di Cara, who explained the project and how it has been used in teaching and data-intensive research as a tool for identifying risks and mitigations.

The project’s explainer animations were showcased for the first time, and their animator and producer (Yasmin and Vanessa respectively) were on hand to describe the process behind creating them.

Guests also heard from Tania Duarte from We and AI about how stills from the animation are already being used as part of the Better Images of AI project, which provides free descriptive images of AI to journalists and editors as an alternative to the inaccurate imagery we sometimes see representing AI: blue glowing brains or robot women assistants.

After the talks, there was time for networking, canapés, drinks, and some hands-on activities. Attendees had the chance to apply the Data Hazard labels to real data-intensive projects (pictured below on the posterboard), and to make suggestions to improve the labels for the future.

What’s next for Data Hazards?

The project will continue to grow and evolve as the Data Hazards team works towards version 2 and beyond. If you’d like to get involved, we invite you to contribute or collaborate via the email address below or GitHub. You can also read about and cite the Data Hazards preprint on the Open Science Framework.

Finally, the project is looking for collaborators who can help them to work towards their goals developing a more comprehensive set of labels and trialing the use of Data Hazards in new contexts (such as outreach, industry, and more academic disciplines). Please email data-hazards-project@bristol.ac.uk.

 

Winning a silver medal, or losing a gold?

Annie Vernon discusses the joy of failing, how to respond, and tips for those in academic careers.

Annie Vernon

Last month we welcomed Olympic silver medalist and award-winning author Annie Vernon to the University as part of our first Research Culture event in the 2023 series.

Annie has spent the past 15 years – following her race in the Women’s Quadruple Sculls final at the Beijing Olympics – thinking: Did we win a silver medal, or lose a gold medal?

Their quad won the World Championships in the three years before the Olympic Games, spent the majority of their race in the lead, and were set to make history as the first Team GB women’s boat to win rowing gold at the Olympics. The Chinese quad beat them on the line, and left the GB women reflecting on coming up just short.

Annie uses her experience of the extreme highs and lows of a career in sport to cast a spotlight on the way a lot of us view our professional careers. For her, failure was an equalizer. In order to improve, her more experienced colleagues in the quad had to go back to the drawing board too.

She reflected on the similarities between this situation and her partner’s career in academia. When research hits a wall, or an experiment produces an unexpected result, everyone is in the same boat – PGRs, early-career researchers, and researchers with decades of experience. It’s a vital part of our research culture as schools, faculties and an institution as a whole to respond to these situations as opportunities, not setbacks.

Annie also reflected on her time at Cambridge University and her participation in the annual Women’s Boat Race. You would expect that in a two-horse race, on the same course, the two universities would be swapping victory frequently. In fact, there tend to be five to 10 years of dominance from one team, before it swings back the other way. The reason why is simple: that’s how long it takes to acknowledge there are areas that can be improved, begin the process of fixing it, and embed these changes.

There is a striking parallel here between the Boat Race and our own efforts to enhance research culture, and part of the reason why this work is so important to the University. We want to create and sustain a research culture that values and celebrates the diversity of research and supports faculty, staff and students to achieve their goals. We have funded a fantastic mix of projects and look forward to sharing more details about them with you soon. For now, check out the upcoming Research Culture events below and register for your free tickets!

Research Culture 2023 events

Data Hazards Launch
29 March, Reception Room, Wills Memorial Building
Learn more about Data Hazards (such as High Environmental Cost or Danger of Misuse) and how to use them in your own research, and join interdisciplinary discussions around research data ethics. Data Hazards Launch – get tickets

Future of Universities: The Future of Research
20 April, Reception Room, Wills Memorial Building
What could future universities look like? What should their role in wider society be? Join us to hear a range of perspectives on how universities can evolve to remain a positive and rewarding place to work and study. This first event of three will focus on the future of research within institutions considering perspectives from researchers, funders and students. The Future of Research – get tickets

Histories of Tobacco
7 June, Watershed
The use and trade of tobacco has a long and complex history entwined with a number of global social issues, and Bristol’s role as a major colonial port during the slave trade must be remembered for the lessons we can learn. Join us to hear from experts on tobacco’s changing role through history, and how we can learn from the past to inform our future. Histories of Tobacco – get tickets

Celebrating Technicians
19 June, Reception Room, Wills Memorial Building
Technicians are a vital part of the research process, supporting and furthering the innovative and groundbreaking research endeavours at the University. Join us to explore the history of the role in academia, hear from experts on the importance of technical support, and forge new links across the University. Celebrating Technicians – get tickets

Future of Universities: The Future of Teaching
29 June, Reception Room, Wills Memorial Building
What could future universities look like? What should their role in wider society be? Join us to hear a range of perspectives on how universities can evolve to remain a positive and rewarding place to work and study. This second event of three will focus on the future of teaching within institutions considering perspectives from staff, students, and beyond. The Future of Teaching – get tickets

Future of Universities: The Role of Universities in Society
13 July, Reception Room, Wills Memorial Building
What could future universities look like? What should their role in wider society be? Join us to hear a range of perspectives on how universities can evolve to remain a positive and rewarding place to work and study. This final event in the series will focus on the role institutions play in society considering perspectives from government and other external stakeholders. The Role of Universities in Society – get tickets

Festival of Research Culture
19 July, M Shed
Thanks to two years of dedicated funding from Research England, we have supported academic, technical and Professional Services staff through a range of research culture activities. Join us for our annual celebration of these activities taken place to date, and a look forward to the future of research culture at the University of Bristol. Festival of Research Culture – get tickets