Two research assessments with an impact on university funding have taken place in Italy, covering the periods 2004–2010 and 2011–2014. After correcting grading schemes in order to grant comparability across the two exercises, we show that university final scores exhibit some convergence. We find that convergence is largely due to changes in the relative productivity of researchers who participated to both exercises as well as to hiring and promotions occurred between the two exercises. Results are confirmed even when we equalise the number of products across the two exercises. When we consider departments within universities, we still find convergence, though the structure and composition of departments is not strictly comparable, because mapping researchers involves some arbitrariness. These results suggest that convergence reflect genuine changes in the behaviour of researchers and in the strategies of assessed institutions, induced by incentives created by the national research assessment exercises.

中文翻译：

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收敛还是极化？意大利案例中研究评估活动的影响

意大利进行了两项对大学资助有影响的研究评估，涵盖 2004-2010 年和 2011-2014 年。在修正评分方案以确保两个练习之间具有可比性后，我们表明大学最终分数表现出一些收敛性。我们发现收敛主要是由于参与这两个练习的研究人员的相对生产力发生了变化，以及两个练习之间发生的招聘和晋升。即使我们将两个练习中的产品数量相等，结果也得到了证实。当我们考虑大学内部的院系时，我们仍然会发现趋同，虽然院系的结构和组成没有严格的可比性，因为制图研究人员具有一定的随意性。