Alberto Baccini

Università degli Studi di Siena | UNISI · Department of Economics and Statistics

It is several years since national research evaluation systems around the globe started making use of quantitative indicators to measure the performance of researchers. Nevertheless, the effects on these systems on the behavior of the evaluated researchers are still largely unknown. For investigating this topic, we propose a new inwardness indicato...

This paper explores, by using suitable quantitative techniques, to what extent the intellectual proximity among scholarly journals is also proximity in terms of social communities gathered around the journals. Three fields are considered: statistics, economics and information and library sciences. Co-citation networks represent intellectual proximi...

This paper explores intellectual and social proximity among scholarly journals by using network fusion techniques. Similarities among journals are initially represented by means of a three-layer network based on co-citations, common authors and common editors. The information contained in the three layers is combined by implementing a fused similar...

This paper analyzes the concordance between bibliometrics and peer review. It draws evidence from the data of two experiments of the Italian governmental agency for research evaluation. The experiments were performed by the agency for validating the adoption in the Italian research assessment exercises of a dual system of evaluation, where some out...

Self-citations are a key topic in evaluative bibliometrics because they can artificially inflate citation-related performance indicators. Recently, self-citations defined at the largest scale, i.e., country self-citations, have started to attract the attention of researchers and policymakers. According to a recent research, in fact, the anomalous t...

This paper compares Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) and Macro Agent-Based Models (MABMs) by adopting mainly a distant reading perspective. A set of 2,299 papers is retrieved from Scopus by using keywords related to MABM and DSGE domains. The interactions between the two streams of DSGE and MABM literature are explored by considerin...

This paper explores intellectual and social proximity among scholarly journals by using network fusion techniques. Similarities among journals are initially represented by means of a three-layer network based on co-citations, common authors and common editors. The information contained in the three layers is then combined by building a fused simila...

During the Italian research assessment exercise (2004–2010), the governmental agency (ANVUR) in charge of its realization performed an experiment on the concordance between peer review and bibliometrics at an individual article level. The computed concordances were at most weak for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. The only exceptio...

Two alternative accounts can be given of the information contained in the acknowledgments of academic publications. According to the mainstream normative account the acknowledgments serve to repay debts towards formal or informal collaborators. According to the strategic account, by contrast, the acknowledgments serve to increase the perceived qual...

Two alternative accounts can be given of the information contained in the acknowledgments of academic publications. According to the mainstream normative account, the acknowledgments serve to repay debts towards informal collaborators. According to the strategic account, by contrast, the acknowledgments serve to increase the perceived quality of pa...

This chapter is an attempt to apply bibliometrics for describing the ways in which scholars do their work in the history of economic thought (HET) field. The field is operationally defined as limited to the research articles published in the six professional journals indexed in the Web of Science database, namely History of Political Economy, The E...

Two experiments for evaluating the agreement between bibliometrics and informed peer review-based on on two large samples of journal articles-were performed by ANVUR, the Italian governmental agency for research evaluation. They were presented as successful and warranting the combined use of bibliometrics and peer review in research assessment exer...

This paper explores, by using suitable quantitative techniques, to what extent the intellectual proximity among scholarly journals is also a proximity in terms of social communities gathered around the journals. Three fields are considered: statistics, economics and information and library sciences. Co-citation networks (CC) represent the intellect...

It is several years since national research evaluation systems around the globe started making use of quantitative indicators to measure the performance of researchers. Nevertheless, the effects on these systems on the behavior of the evaluated researchers are still largely unknown. We attempt to shed light on this topic by investigating how Italia...

Two experiments for evaluating the agreement between bibliometrics and informed peer review - depending on two large samples of journal articles - were performed by the Italian governmental agency for research evaluation. They were presented as successful and as warranting the combined use of peer review and bibliometrics in research assessment exe...

Italy adopted a performance-based system for funding universities that is centered on the results of a national research assessment exercise, realized by a governmental agency (ANVUR). ANVUR evaluated papers by using 'a dual system of evaluation', that is by informed peer review or by bibliometrics. In view of validating that system, ANVUR performe...

This letter documents some problems in Ancaiani et al. (2015). Namely the evaluation of concordance, based on Cohen's kappa, reported by Ancaiani et al. was not computed on the whole random sample of 9,199 articles, but on a subset of 7,597 articles. The kappas relative to the whole random sample were in the range 0.07–0.15, indicating an unaccepta...

Nell'intervento ricordo i lavori svolti sotto la guida di Marcello de Cecco sul tema del finanziamento della piccola e media impresa italiana.

Uncertainty and information are ideas that have a central role in contemporary economics in the domain of decision theory. The expected utility hypothesis is a powerful instrument widely used in theoretical and empirical analysis. However, the leading role in this story is not played by utility, as is usual in the traditional reconstructions of his...

The aim of this note is to reply to Bertocchi et al.’s comment to our paper “Do they agree? Bibliometric evaluation versus informed peer review in the Italian research assessment exercise”. Our paper analyzed results of the experiment conducted by the Italian governmental agency ANVUR during the research assessment exercise about the agreement betw...

This short paper is a comment to Bonaccorsi et al. (2015). The aim of Bonaccorsi et al. is to “to understand whether the probability of receiving positive peer reviews is influenced by having published in an independently assessed high-ranking journal”. The central tenet of their paper is that they are using “two independent evaluations” conducted...

After providing a systematic outline of the stochastic genesis of the Poisson–Tweedie distribution, some computational issues are considered. More specifically, we introduce a closed form for the probability function, as well as its corresponding integral representation which may be useful for large argument values. Several algorithms for generatin...

A systematic guide to the growing jungle of citation indices and other bibliometric indicators. Written with the aim of providing a complete and unbiased overview of all available statistical measures for scientific productivity, the core of this reference is an alphabetical dictionary of indices and other algorithms used to evaluate the importance...

This chapter presents a list of terms regarding statistical measures for scientific productivity, commencing with the Greek Letters such as µ, π, ϕ, and ρ. Scientific outputs, references, and citations represent the observable features or the raw facts on which bibliometric indicators are built. Bibliometric indicators were originally developed for...

UK academics who dislike the research excellence framework often suggest boycotting it. But could it ever really happen? And what would the consequences be? Italy provides some evidence.

During the Italian research assessment exercise, the national agency ANVUR performed an experiment to assess agreement between grades attributed to journal articles by informed peer review (IR) and by bibliometrics. A sample of articles was evaluated by using both methods and agreement was analyzed by weighted Cohen’s kappas. ANVUR presented result...

The academic reforms in Italy have introduced innovations in a Napoleonic administrative apparatus unfit to receive them, thus generating a completely unbalanced institutional system. The system’s center of gravity has moved from the administration by the ministry to the National Agency for the Evaluation of University and Research (ANVUR), assigni...

The academic reforms in Italy have introduced innovations in a Napoleonic administrative apparatus unfit to receive them, thus generating a completely unbalanced institutional system. The system’s center of gravity has moved from the administration by the ministry to the National Agency for the Evaluation of University and Research (ANVUR), assigni...

Versione rivista dell'intervento tenuto al Convegno Evoluzione e valutazione della ricerca giuridica, Firenze, 18 ottobre 2013. Definire un possibile scenario “oltre la VQR”, significa provare a ragionare su interventi che modifichino il sistema di valutazione della ricerca come si è realizzato nell’esercizio di valutazione appena concluso. Si illu...

University rankings represent a controversial issue in the debate about higher education policy. One of the best known university ranking is the Quacquarelli Symonds World University Rankings (QS), published annually since 2004 by Quacquarelli Symonds ltd, a company founded in 1990 and headquartered in London. QS provides a ranking based on a score...

Network analysis techniques are used for investigating the probable effects of a change in the regulation that aims to prevent the anticompetitive effects of the crossed presence of the same administrators in the boards of directors of competing firms, known as interlocking directorates (ID). The case study considered is a recent Italian law (Secti...

L’esercizio di Valutazione della Qualità della Ricerca 2004-2010 (VQR) condotto dall’Agenzia Nazionale di Valutazione dell’Università e della Ricerca (ANVUR) è stato accolto da critiche che ne hanno sottolineato l’inadeguatezza rispetto agli standard con cui analoghi esercizi sono stati condotti in altri paesi. Nel lavoro si mostra che l’Area 13 è...

An original cross-sectional dataset referring to a medium-sized Italian university is implemented in order to analyze the determinants of scientific research production at individual level. The dataset includes 942 permanent researchers of various scientific sectors for a 3-year time-span (2008–2010). Three different indicators—based on the number...

Research evaluation and research policy are key activities for scientists: they dramatically shape the contemporary landscape of science. Governments and funding bodies need evaluation to inform their decisions. Research institutions and universities plan recruitment and research activities in order to gain scientific reputation, more and more ofte...

Despite the huge amount of literature on h-index, few papers have been devoted to the statistical analysis of h-index when a probabilistic distribution is assumed for citation counts. The present contribution relies on showing the available inferential techniques, by providing the details for proper point and set estimation of the theoretical h-ind...

The structural properties of the network generated by the editorial activities of the members of the boards of “Information Science & Library Science” journals are explored through network analysis techniques. The crossed presence of scholars on editorial boards, the phenomenon called interlocking editorship, is considered a proxy of the similarity...

The Hirsch index (commonly referred to as h-index) is a bibliometric indicator which is widely recognized as effective for measuring the scientific production of a scholar since it summarizes size and impact of the research output. In a formal setting, the h-index is actually an empirical functional of the distribution of the citation counts receiv...

The exploratory analysis developed in this paper relies on the hypothesis that each editor possesses some power in the definition of the editorial policy of her journal. Consequently if the same scholar sits on the board of editors of two journals, those journals could have some common elements in their editorial policies. The proximity of the edit...

This paper investigates the effects of the introduction of information and communication technologies (ICT) on the skills of a workforce. Using micro-data collected from workers in the textile sector, we analyse whether the introduction of ICT has modified workers' tasks, so that higher skills and longer training periods than before are necessary....

In Italia, fra i temi ricorrenti nell'odierna discussione pubblica su università e ricerca, grande rilievo assume quello della valutazione del merito, a sua volta strettamente connesso a quello della scarsità delle risorse. Ma come si valuta la ricerca scientifica? Sulla base del presupposto che tale valutazione può essere condotta attraverso indic...

An exploratory analysis of the crossed presence (interlocking editorship) of the same scholars in the editorial boards of Italian and international economic journals is developed. The position and the degree of integration of Italian journals in the worldwide network of economic journals is studied with network analysis techniques and a ranking of...

Probability theory has a central role in Edgeworth's thought; this paper examines the philosophical foundation of the theory. Starting from a frequentist position, Edgeworth introduced some innovations on the definition of primitive probabilities. He distinguished between primitive probabilities based on experience of statistical evidence, and prim...

In this paper we examine the Doctorate programs in economics in Italy, also through the lenses of a questionnaire sent to the 44 Directors in charge of them at die time (2008). We asked 10 questions related to the organization, the teaching and the job prospective of their program. Our data, covering the 97% of the doctorates awarded between 2001-2...

In this paper we examine the Doctorate programs in economics in Italy, also through the lenses of a questionnaire sent to the 44 Directors in charge of them at the time (2008). We asked 10 questions related to the organization, the teaching and the job prospective of their program. Our data, covering the 97% of the doctorates awarded between 2001-2...

The exploratory analysis developed in this paper relies on the hypothesis that each editor possesses some power in the definition of the editorial policy of her journal. Consequently if the same scholar sits on the board of editors of two journals, those journals could have some common elements in their editorial policies. The proximity of the edit...

The discrete stable family constitutes an interesting two-parameter model of distributions on the non-negative integers with a Paretian tail. The practical use of the discrete stable distribution is inhibited by the lack of an explicit expression for its probability function. Moreover, the distribution does not possess moments of any order. Therefo...

The exploratory analysis developed in this paper relies on the hypothesis that each editor possesses some power in the definition of the editorial policy of her journal. Consequently if the same scholar sits on the board of two journals, those journals could have some common elements in their editorial policies. The proximity of the editorial polic...

This paper proposes a general interpretation of Edgworth’s thought based on the recognition of a unitary philosophical project in his contributions to ethics, economics, probability and statistics. This project consists in the search for a common epistemological foundation for the social sciences. The point is illustrated in reference to the coexis...

Probability theory has a central role in Edgeworth’s thought; this paper examines the philosophical foundation of the theory. Starting from a frequentist position, Edgeworth introduced some innovations on the definition of primitive probabilities. He distinguished between primitive probabilities based on experience of statistical evidence, and prim...

The paper analyses the foundation of utilitarian ethics and theory of probability in the works of Francis Y. Edgeworth. It is argued that he pursued a unitary philosophical project: the search for a common epistemological foundation for the social sciences. Their common root is the idea of 'hereditary experience' derived from Herbert Spencer's work...

A caccia di informazioni accurate sui «fantasmi». Una proposta per l’analisi del fabbisogno professionale e formativo - In the debate on unemployment in European countries virtually all observers and policy makers agree on the utility of active labour policies, even if a clear proof of their effectiveness is still missing. This general agreement co...

This paper investigates the effects of the introduction of information and communication technologies (ICTs) on the skills of a workforce. Using micro-data collected from workers in the textile sector, we analyse whether the introduction of ICTs has modified workers’ tasks, so that higher skills and longer training periods than before are necessary...

This paper analyses the foundation of utilitarian ethics and theory of probability in the works of Francis Y. Edgeworth. We argue that he pursued an unitary philosophical project, the search for a common epistemological foundation for the social sciences. The common root of the disciplines is the notion of "hereditary experience" derived from Herbe...

The thesis of this paper is that Keynes wrote A Treatise on Probability in opposition to the frequentist theory of probability, systematised by John Venn, which denied any role for probability in decision theory. Keynes was interested in finding an alternative conception of probability that could be utilised as a guide of life. To analyse this poin...

The aim of this paper is to explore the use of administrative data to study the choices of firms relating to the utilization of regular and irregular workers. The data are collected by the INPS (National Social Security Administration) during inspection activity aimed to catch irregular workers and underground firms. Starting from INPS data we cons...

Tecnologia, salari e capitale umano: i risultati di una indagine sul campo (di Alberto Baccini e Michelangelo Vasta) - ABSTRACT: This paper documents how plant-level wages, occupational mix, and workforce education vary with the adoption of new factory automation technologies, such as programmable controllers and numerically-controlled machines, in...

History of Political Economy 33.4 (2001) 743-772 Decision theory in conditions of uncertainty is now a regular part of microeconomics, at least when it comes to models of expected-utility maximization. Expected utility is the instrument that makes it possible to choose between actions whose consequences are uncertain. Rational choice selects from a...

Caratteristiche industriali e occupazionali del terzo settore: il caso della Toscana (di Alberto Baccini, Nicola Sciclone e Michelangelo Vasta) - ABSTRACT: This study arises out of the need to deepen - with a special regard to Tuscany - the many analysis cues that the nonprofit sector offers both in a theoretic and in an operating way (i.e., its pu...

Il paper analizza ruolo e funzioni svolte dal commercialista nei processi di finanziamento delle piccole e medie imprese italiane.

The paper describes the functioning of a network sub-system, here represented by the sub-contracting system of the Italian plant of a US-based company. The system is characterized by a plurality of maximising behaviours by firms, different not only between MagneTek ad its sub-contractors, but also between sub-contractors belonging to different hier...

Dinamica strutturale e potenziale di crescita dell’economia toscana alla luce dell’andamento del mercato del lavoro e dei mutamenti istituzionali e normativi (di Alberto Baccini, Mauro Lombardi, Sergio Pacini) - ABSTRACT: In this paper the results of lines of research, developed by a group of scholars at the ORML (Regional Observatory of the Labor...

Premessa Il tema dell'economia sommersa è uno dei punti critici del dibattito at-tuale sulle politiche economiche e di welfare in Italia, e più in generale in tutti i paesi industrializzati. Tra le ragioni di questo interesse vi so-no in primo luogo le conseguenze che l'espansione dell'economia sommersa ha a livello di erosione della base imponibil...