DDRIE: Knowledge Access and Cumulative Innovation-Network Econometric Evidence from the Republic of Letters

这篇博士论文研究将使用研究人员收集的独特的历史数据来考察科学知识流动对创新的影响。发达经济体的经济增长主要是创新驱动的，这一过程依赖于以前的发现作为必要的投入。因此，有效获取新近产生的知识对经济增长很重要。由于缺乏适当的数据，测试这一理论是困难的。研究人员将利用九年战争(1688-1697)和西班牙王位继承战争(1701-1714)之间的几年间英国和欧洲大陆之间恢复的科学信息，开发一个引用索引，将早期的科学知识与早期的科学知识联系起来。然后，研究人员将使用这些数据来评估信息流如何影响后来的创新活动。此外，研究还将开发一种新的创新方法，使他们能够得出从知识交流到创新的因果关系。这项研究项目允许隔离由通信渠道变化引起的创新效应。研究结果可能会为设计高效的知识产权保护政策提供投入，从而保持美国在创新方面的全球领先地位。拟议的研究项目调查了在九年战争(1688-1697)和西班牙王位继承战争(1701-1714)之间的和平时期，多佛和加莱之间重新建立的邮包船服务如何影响了有影响力的学者网络中基于引文的联系的形成。最早的两种学术期刊的引文数据将决定网络的链接结构，并使链接指示累积创新：如果A引用B，则A使用B的现有知识创造新的东西。英吉利海峡与战争有关的动荡并没有阻碍所有学者之间的双边交流。把每一对可能的学者视为一个单独的横截面单位，就产生了一个准实验环境。控制组包含最初未受影响的配对，而治疗组配对那些直接受益于重新建立跨频道服务的配对。一种新的计量经济学方法利用网络诱导的差异来估计不可观察到的知识从治疗中的配对流向控制组中的配对的影响。通过比较两组患者治疗前后相关概率的变化，确定治疗对的平均治疗效果。实证分析需要大量的地理参考网络面板数据。数据集允许研究不同的研究问题和测试新方法。这一结果可以为设计有效的知识产权保护政策提供投入，从而保持美国在创新方面的全球领先地位。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This doctoral dissertation research will use a unique historical data collected by the researchers to investigate the effects of scientific knowledge flows on innovation. Economic growth in advanced economies is mainly innovation-driven, a processes that rely on previous discoveries as essential inputs. Efficient access to recently generated knowledge thus is important for economic growth. Testing this theory is difficult because of lack of appropriate data. The researcher will use the resumption of scientific information between the UK and continental Europe in the intervening years between Nine Years War (1688-1697) and the War of Spanish Succession (1701-1714) to develop a citation index linking scientific knowledge in the earlier period to scientific knowledge in the earlier period. The researchers will then use this data to assess how the information flow affected innovative activity afterwards. In addition to the research will develop a new and innovative methods that will allow them to draw a causal relationship from knowledge exchange to innovation. This research project permits the isolation of the innovation effects induced from changes in a communication channel. The results could provide inputs to design efficient intellectual property rights protection policies and thus maintain the US as the global leader in innovation. The proposed research project investigates how the re-establishment of the packet boat service between Dover and Calais in the period of peace intervening the Nine Years' War (1688-1697) and the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) affected the formation of citation-based links within a network of influential scholars. Citation data from the earliest two academic journals will determine the link structure of the network and make the links indicative of cumulative innovation: If A cited B, then A used the existing knowledge of B to create something new. War-related turmoil in the English Channel did not obstruct bilateral exchange between all scholars. Considering each possible pair of scholars as a separate cross-sectional unit gives rise to a quasi-experimental setting. The control group contains initially unaffected pairs and the treatment group pairs those who benefited directly from the re-establishment of the cross-channel service. A new econometric approach exploits network-induced variation to estimate the effect of unobservable knowledge flows from pairs in the treatment to pairs in the control group. The average treatment effect on the treated pairs is identified by comparing the two groups' pre- to post-period changes in the linking probability. The empirical analysis requires an extensive set of geo-referenced network panel data. The data set permits the study of different research questions and testing of new methods. The results could provide inputs to design efficient intellectual property rights protection policies and thus maintain the US as the global leader in innovation.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.