**5. Conclusions**

The objective of this chapter was to analyze patterns of SC along different notions of proximity in the period 2001–2010. For this purpose, we use data on 152,140 collaborations in publications in Science and Engineering (excluding social sciences) indexed in the Science Citation Index (SCI) provided by the ISI Web of Science (WoS) and co-authored among academics from different universities. Our analysis includes 175 public universities from peripheral countries in Southern Europe: Spain, Greece, Italy, and Portugal. The methodology relies on a descriptive analysis of collaborations in 12 scientific fields in which publications in science and engineering can be classified. In addition, we also provide descriptives for *Chemistry & Chemical*, *Life Sciences* and *Physics & Astronomy*, which are among the disciplines with the highest rate of collaboration over publications.

on collaboration and different notions of proximity. Third, we do not control for scientific quality of universities that may be a factor affecting scientific collaboration patterns (see Hoekman et al. [18]). Fourth, our results must be taken with caution because we do not consider all countries in EU, but only peripheral countries in Southern Europe: Spain, Greece, Italy, and Portugal. Thus, future research may aim at providing evidence on collaboration across all EU countries, which may serve to extract policy implications on a

Patterns of Academic Scientific Collaboration at a Distance: Evidence from Southern European…

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.77370

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Department of Economics, Facultad de CC. EE. y Empresariales de Cádiz, University of

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wider framework.

**Author details**

Cadiz, Spain

**References**

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Ana Fernández, Esther Ferrándiz\* and M. Dolores León \*Address all correspondence to: esther.ferrandiz@uca.es

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Our results for the whole sample and also for each country and discipline show that there is a clear trend toward collaboration along the greater geographical distance in peripheral countries. This result is in line with the finding obtained by Hoekman et al. [18] for 33 European Countries. There is also a trend toward increasing collaboration across cognitive and institutional distances. We cannot obtain clear conclusions for the evolution of organizational distance since we obtain controversial results for each of the indicators that measure this notion. Besides, our data reveals a trend toward collaboration among convergence regions, an increase in collaboration across larger economic distance in terms of GDP differences, but the opposite result is obtained in terms of R&D differences.

From a policy viewpoint, we can make some contributions. First, despite we find some heterogeneity in the results by scientific fields and countries, general patterns described in this chapter suggest a decrease in the importance of distance as a barrier to scientific collaboration in peripheral countries. Therefore, this evidence for peripheral countries suggests that there has been an advance in the construction of a European Research Area, as pursued by the EU policy. However, differences across countries and disciplines in the evolution of distance in collaborations suggest the convenience of elaborating tailor-made EU research policies adapted to their specific needs<sup>3</sup> . For example, for the model for all disciplines (**Table 2**), it is clear that although Portugal is collaborating across larger geographical distance (2.74%), it is lagging behind the rest of countries in our sample (Spain 7.57%, Greece 6.59%, and Italy 9.53%). Then, Portugal might benefit from policies oriented toward promoting the creation and diffusion of knowledge in collaboration across universities located at a distance. By doing so, it could catch up with the rest of peripheral countries. A similar analysis for the evolution of the rest of proximity notions could serve as a guide to elaborate EU policies for peripheral countries.

This study has four main limitations. First, we cannot provide evidence on trends in social distance since we did not have data on previous collaborations for the period 2001–2005. Second, we formatted our data as a cross-sectional series and measured variables at a unique time reference for the two periods, so we are not able to provide yearly statistics

<sup>3</sup> As pointed out by Hoekman et al. [18] it may be that each scientific discipline has different requirements due to their research topics or needed infrastructures.

on collaboration and different notions of proximity. Third, we do not control for scientific quality of universities that may be a factor affecting scientific collaboration patterns (see Hoekman et al. [18]). Fourth, our results must be taken with caution because we do not consider all countries in EU, but only peripheral countries in Southern Europe: Spain, Greece, Italy, and Portugal. Thus, future research may aim at providing evidence on collaboration across all EU countries, which may serve to extract policy implications on a wider framework.
