Does diversity of team members affect scientific success of a team? A preliminary study

Abstract

<p>This study investigates how the diversity of team members influences the scientific success of a team. The diversity of a team is measured by the entropy of team members' scientific ages when conducting the collaboration, their citation numbers, and their publication numbers, as well as the similarity of their research topics. A team's scientific success is quantified by the average number of citations per year the collaborative publication has received. We find that the diversity on team members' productivity (publication numbers) and the diversity on members' career statuses (scientific ages) will increase the team performance. On the contrary, the diversity on the team members' research topics and their personal impact (citation numbers) will decrease the team performance. These findings help understand the essential characteristics of team diversity and provide guidance on building successful research teams.</p>