The University Research Practice Lead supports engagement with ideas, processes and platforms which help research be more reliable, robust, rigorous and transparent. They are also the institutional contact with the UKRN

The current Research Practice Lead is Tom Stafford, Professor of Cognitive Science in the School of Psychology.

t.stafford@sheffield.ac.uk

Research Practice Events (2024)

23 April: Preparing for the UKRI Metascience call - discussion

UKRI is due to announce a call for metascience research grants:

"The Metascience Grants Programme will support projects using scientific methods to deepen our understanding of how different structures, incentives, and funding practices within the Research and Development (R&D) system shape scientific research outputs and career outcomes. Projects must have potential to inform science policy, R&D funding practices, or practice within research-performing organisations."

The first call is expected to be worth £3 million and is part of a larger investment in Metascience, which included the establishment of the first government Metascience Unit, as part of DSIT.

This discussion is for researchers who are interested to apply, as well as those who just want to find out more about what metascience actually is. There will be a chance to hear from TUOS researchers who attended a UKRI roundtable to inform the call, to share ideas and to discuss exactly what kind of topic and project are in scope.

23rd April., 1500 - 1630, in person only ICOSS, room A16

Sign-up via this form: 

23 May: TUOS Journal editors

A networking event on the theme of "getting the most out of being an editor". All journal editors at the University are welcome, as well as the editorially-curious who would like a chance to hear from established academics on the benefits and perils of journal editing.

23 May 2024, 1200 - 1330

In person, lunch included

Alfred Deny Conference Room, 

Register and submit questions for the panel via this form: 

https://forms.gle/QYnEcKjYoUQTeAGE7

Agenda
1200 - 1245 panel discussion:  

Your questions about the editor role answered by experienced editors from all faculties of the University

Panel 

Professor Sarah Baker, School of Clinical Dentistry, Editor-in-Chief, Community Dentistry and Oral Epidemiology

Professor Rob Freckleton, School of Biosciences, Founding Editor in Chief, Methods in Ecology & Evolution

Professor Renee Timmers, Department of Music, Co-editor of Empirical Musicology Review; Associate editor of Psychomusicology: Music, Mind & Brain; editorial board Psychology of Music and Journal of New Music Research

Dr Michaela Rogers, Department of Sociological Studies, Co-editor of Practice: Social Work in Action

Dr Prosanta Gope, Department of Computer Science, Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Services Computing, IEEE Systems Journal, and the Journal of Information Security and Applications (Elsevier).

1245 - 1330 lunch + networking

17 June: AI Replication Game

• We are pleased to announce that the Institute for Replication (I4R) and the University of Sheffield will be organising the AI Replication Game @ Sheffield on June 17th, 2024. For more information and to register for the AI Replication Game, please see the information below. Virtual participation is possible and coauthorship to a meta paper is granted.

• The AI Replication Game @ Sheffield University is a one-day event on June 17th, 2024 that brings researchers together to collaborate on reproducing quantitative results published in high-ranking social science journals. Replication is a crucial aspect of scientific research, ensuring that results are reliable and reproducible. By participating in the Replication Game, you will not only contribute to the integrity of research in your field, but also have the opportunity to network with fellow researchers and develop your coding and AI skills. The Replication Game is open to all researchers: academics, post-docs, and graduate students. Knowledge of Python,R or Stata is essential.

• Participation: Researchers participating in the AI Replication Game @ University of Sheffield will be randomly assigned to one of three teams: Machine, Cyborg or Human. Machine and Cyborg teams will have access to (commercially available) LLM models to conduct their work; Human teams of course rely only on unaugmented human skills. Each team consists of 3 members with similar research interests and varying skill levels. Teams will be asked to check for coding errors and conduct a robustness reproduction, which is the ability to duplicate the results of a prior study using the same data but different procedures as were used by the original investigator.
  
  During the event, participants are expected to read the paper and familiarise themselves with the code and data shared alongside the paper. Teams then will work together in groups of ~3 to check for coding errors and conduct sensitivity analysis. No work is conducted before/after the event other than answering a short survey.

• Coauthorship: all participants will get coauthorship on a metaresearch journal paper which combines the work of all teams.

• Schedule: The AI Replication Game @ University of Sheffield will start at 9:15 AM local time, and end at 4PM local time. Virtual participation is possible.

• Please register here: before June 1st, 2024.

July 9th: Changing Research Culture

• In person and online, University of Sheffield, 9th of July 2024

• In anticipation of REF2029’s heightened emphasis on People, Culture and Environment, ‘research culture’ is increasingly coming into scope as a focus of attention for UK institutions. But critical and reflective work is needed to avoid the term becoming, like ‘excellence’ itself, a floating signifier that obscures the genuine conditions, processes and limitations of academic practice. 

• This one-day workshop will address this task with a particular focus on practices around openness and transparency. With reference to UKRIO’s component principles of research integrity, we will examine the degree to which open practices present a necessary condition of a culture of research integrity and inclusion and explore the extent to which embedding and facilitating open practices offers a significant mechanism of culture change. 

• Registration: forthcoming.