Exploring the Impact of the IPCC Assessment Reports on Science

Environmental Science and Policy, Vol. 14, No. 8, pp. 1052-1061, 2011

19 Pages Posted: 7 Jul 2011 Last revised: 9 Jan 2012

See all articles by Eleftheria Vasileiadou

Eleftheria Vasileiadou

School of Innovation Sciences, Eindhoven University of Technology

Gaston Heimeriks

Utrecht University

Arthur Petersen

VU University Amsterdam

Date Written: July 5, 2011

Abstract

Even though critique to IPCC is certainly not new, the climate controversies of 2009 and 2010 brought this critique again to the fore in public media. The paper contributes to this ongoing debate, and investigates empirically the impact of the four Assessment Reports of the IPCC on scientific publications and science, through scientometric analyses of cited references to IPCC reports. The results indicate, among other things, that the aggregate impact of IPCC reports on scientific publications has increased through each consecutive assessment report, independently from the increase of the climate change field, showing a pattern which suggests that the references are quite generic. Both disciplinary distribution and geographical distribution of the impact of the reports are skewed, the former towards geophysical sciences, the latter towards western/developed countries. However, this skewness is decreasing over time. Given the increasing impact further away from the climate change field, it is important that the IPCC becomes more transparent about its internal processes and main conclusions.

Keywords: IPCC,climate change, geographical bias, developing countries, scientometrics

Suggested Citation

Vasileiadou, Eleftheria and Heimeriks, Gaston and Petersen, Arthur, Exploring the Impact of the IPCC Assessment Reports on Science (July 5, 2011). Environmental Science and Policy, Vol. 14, No. 8, pp. 1052-1061, 2011, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1878980

Eleftheria Vasileiadou (Contact Author)

School of Innovation Sciences, Eindhoven University of Technology ( email )

Eindhoven
Netherlands

HOME PAGE: http://https://sites.google.com/site/eleftheriavasileiadou/

Gaston Heimeriks

Utrecht University ( email )

Vredenburg 138
Utrecht, 3511 BG
Netherlands

HOME PAGE: http://heimeriks.net

Arthur Petersen

VU University Amsterdam ( email )

De Boelelaan 1105
Amsterdam, ND North Holland 1081 HV
Netherlands

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
70
Abstract Views
993
Rank
594,428
PlumX Metrics