ECONOMIC IMPACT OF OPEN SCIENCE: initial insights from the PathOS Project

On 24 May 2023, CSIL participated in the 2nd Edition of the EIRO forum Economics of Big Science workshop. Organised by the European Space Agency (ESA) in collaboration with CERN and hosted by the ESA's headquarters in Paris, the workshop addressed the socio-economic impact of Big Science and discussed different approaches and experiences of conducting an Impact Assessment Exercise of Research Infrastructures.

During her presentation, Silvia Vignetti presented the research agenda of the PathOS project and emphasised the importance of tracing and measuring the impact pathways of science within the new Open Science paradigm. She highlighted some findings from the project's literature review regarding Open Science's academic, societal, and economic impacts:  

- It has been shown that Open and FAIR Data lead to data reuse and citation advantages for associated research papers.  

- Open Code and Software enhance software development efficiency and may increase citations.  

- Citizen Science improves data collection efficiency and scope, but data quality remains a consideration.  

- Open peer review shows neutral to positive effects on review quality.  

- Open Access has demonstrated societal benefits such as public engagement, policy-making support, and health-related outcomes.  

- More limited evidence is available for the economic impact of Open Science, with interesting examples in the biopharma industry.