Chapter 6
Exploring Factors Impacting on Research
Efficiency in “211 Project”Universities
Based on evaluation results of 211Us’research efficiency, it is found that there is
much more room for 211Us to improve their efficiency in research activities.
Meanwhile, a considerable group of 211Us are operating in the stage of decreasing
return to scale. Thus, it’s urgent for all 211Us to improve their research efficiency
and move towards connotative development in the future. Therefore, based on the
NEAM and HSS efficiency scores (2006–2010) of 211Us in Chap. 4 , this chapter
will conduct the second stage analysis of research efficiency evaluation, which
analyzing the influencing factors to research efficiency. Based on the research
results, we can provide information and references for related policymakers, then
they can further understand what factors are the key factors determining the
research efficiency of universities. This chapter is mainly consisted of two parts: the
first part is to review the recent studies related to impact factor analysis of university
research efficiency, and then propose afit-for-purpose theoretical framework for
analyzing the impact factors; the second part is to use Tobit model to conduct
econometric analysis on factors impacting on the university research efficiency.
6.1 Analytic Framework of Factors Impacting
on University Research Efficiency
and Literature Review
Through retrieving literature related to impact factor analysis of university research
efficiency, it’s found that volumes of studies have been done in thisfield by
researchers worldwide. The impact factors in these studies can be summarized into
three major aspects:first, environmental factors at macro level, such as regional
economy, regional research environment and so on; second, sectoral and institu-
tional factors, such as university prestige, allocation settings of research resources,
incentive mechanism of university research; third, internal factors at micro level,
©Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2017
Y. Hu et al.,Evaluating Research Efficiency of Chinese Universities,
New Frontiers of Educational Research, DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-4030-6_6