Canadian Council on Learning | Conseil Canadien sur l'Apprentissage

Faculty Participation in Research at Canadian Colleges: A National Survey

April 2008

Prepared by: Roger Fisher, Fanshawe College

About the Survey

The traditional mandate of Canadian colleges (to provide career-related education in support of regional economic development) is undergoing a remarkable metamorphosis in the first decade of the 21st century. In order to strengthen the capacity of post-secondary institutions to contribute to innovation and discovery, colleges on a national scale are engaged in developing research capacity and cultures. Several recent studies have described this rapid growth of research infrastructure at Canadian colleges in terms of administrative positions, research offices, updated mission statements, seed grant funds, etc. However, these studies were based almost exclusively on data collected from college administrators. By contrast, the purpose of this study is to give voice to college faculty on whom the success of the enterprise ultimately depends. The following questions guided this study: What are the attitudes toward research reported by faculty? What are the areas of research interest reported by faculty? What are the barriers and incentives to participation reported by faculty?

Faculty reported very positive attitudes toward research at Canadian colleges

In order to gauge faculty attitudes toward research, respondents were asked to rate their level of agreement/disagreement with statements representing various aspects of college research. The majority of faculty consistently agreed or strongly agreed with most statements related to the development of research cultures at their respective colleges.
The overwhelming majority agreed or strongly agreed that research would have a positive effect on their college (86%) and on their current duties and responsibilities as faculty (77%). The majority also agreed or strongly agreed that research should be a high priority at their college (78%), and that release time should be provided for faculty to participate (87%). Most respondents also agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in participating in research (78%) and were confident in their abilities (66%). These faculty responses represent very positive attitudes toward, interest in, and support for research activities at their colleges.

Faculty reported interest in three areas of research

When asked about their areas of research interest, the majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in participating in activities which could be categorized (see Composite Indices section) into three areas of research:

1. curiosity-driven research (85%);
2. research related to teaching and learning (80%); and
3. to a lesser degree, applied research (55%).

This rank order of interest areas remained constant across all seven demographic variables employed in this study.

1.  Curiosity-driven research

Curiosity-driven research is used in this report as an umbrella term representing research initiated by faculty to advance knowledge in areas of personal interest and/or within their disciplines. In this study the majority of college faculty (85%) agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in curiosity-driven research (see Composite Indices). This finding was based on responses to a number of internally consistent items reflecting this category of research; a majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research activities related to their own subject area (92%), to personal pursuits (80%), to topics of personal interest (77%), and to research that advanced their discipline (89%).

2.  Research related to teaching and learning

Since teaching represents the central mission of colleges, it is not surprising that the majority (80%) of college faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research related to teaching and learning (see Composite Indices). This finding was based on responses to a number of internally consistent items reflecting this area of research; a majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research related to improving their teaching skills (87%), research that involved students (83%), research related to student success (82%), and research related to curriculum development (78%). When asked directly, the majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research related specifically to teaching and learning (82%).

3.  Applied Research

“Applied research” is an umbrella term referring to a variety of research activities related to the application of knowledge, and is often associated with terms like innovation, research and development, commercialization, and technology transfer. In this study, more than half (57%) of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in applied research (see Composite Indices). This finding was based on responses to a number of internally consistent items reflecting this area of research; a majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research that involved working with business and community partners (74%), research related to technological advances and processes (66%), and research involving problem-solving for industry (52%).

Only a minority of respondents, however, expressed a positive interest in research related to “commercialization” (34%). The fact that almost half (44%) of respondents selected the “Neutral” option for the “commercialization” item suggests that their lack of positive responses may be related more to uncertainty surrounding the terminology than to negative attitudes. Uncertainty about terminology associated with “applied research” in general appears to be an issue requiring further study and clarification. Nevertheless, more than half of the respondents indicated interest in applied research, representing strong receptor capacity for further growth in this area.

Composite Indices

In this study, responses were obtained using 5-point Likert Scale ratings ranging from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (5). Mean scores were calculated for all responses. Composite indices were subsequently constructed in order to facilitate comparison of means between and among the response variables (faculty attitudes and areas of interest) and the seven demographic variables (gender, age, years of teaching experience, employment status, credentials, subject, and province). Using SPSS 14.0 analytical software, clusters of response items with high internal consistency reliability (as measured by Cronbach’s coefficient alpha) were consolidated into four composite indices.

A general Attitude Index consolidated six response items reflecting faculty attitudes toward research activities at their colleges. Three additional composite indices were constructed to represent the areas of research interest most reported by respondents: a Curiosity Index consolidated faculty responses to four statements related to various aspects of curiosity-driven research; a Teaching and Learning Index consolidated faculty responses to five statements related to various aspects of teaching and learning; an Applied Research Index consolidated faculty responses to four statements representing various aspects of applied research.

A majority of faculty (79%) reported positive or strongly positive attitudes as measured by the composite Attitude Index; a majority (85%) agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in curiosity-driven research as measured by the composite Curiosity Index; a majority (80%) also agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in research as measured by the composite Teaching and Learning Index; over half of faculty (57%) agreed or strongly agreed that they were interested in applied research as measured by the composite Applied Research Index. When these composite indices were subsequently used to compare means across demographic variables, the relative ranking of the three areas of interest was found to be constant across all seven variables.

Barriers and Incentives

One of the purposes of this study was to identify faculty-reported barriers and incentives to participation in research activities at Canadian colleges. The majority of faculty (81%) agreed or strongly agreed that lack of funding for release time was the primary barrier to their participation. This finding corroborated previous research indicating lack of funding for release time as the primary barrier to faculty participation in research at Canadian colleges. In addition, almost half of faculty also reported lack of administrative support (49%), lack of experience (48%) and lack of training (48%) as additional barriers to participation.

Regarding incentives to participation, the majority of faculty agreed or strongly agreed that administrative support (84%), personal interest (81%), and release time (78%) were the primary incentives to their participation in research activities at Canadian colleges. Other incentives included furthering their careers (64%) and furthering their education (59%).

Conclusions (What We Learned):

The majority of faculty at Canadian colleges have positive attitudes toward research at their colleges, and are interested in participating in research activities. The majority of faculty are interested in three areas of research:

1. curiosity-driven research;
2. research related to teaching and learning; and
3. applied research.

Interest in applied research may have been under-represented due to a lack of clarity regarding terminology associated with applied research. The rank order of faculty interest areas remained constant across all seven demographic variables (age, gender, employment status, credentials, years of teaching, subject area, province). Lack of release time is the primary barrier to increasing faculty participation in research at Canadian colleges.