Productivity Differences Among Scientists: Evidence for Accumulative Advantage

The highly skewed distributions of productivity among scientists can be partly explained by a process of accumulative advantage. Because offeedback through recognition and resources, highly productive scientists maintain or increase their productivity, while scientists who produce very little produce even less later on. A major implication of accumulative advantage is that the distribution of productivity becomes increasingly unequal as a cohort of scientists ages. Cross-sectional survey data support this hypothesis for chemists, physicists, and mathematicians, who show strong linear increases in inequality with increasing career age. This increase is highly associated with a changing distribution of time spent on research. Another implication of accumulative advantage is also corroborated: the association among productivity, resources and esteem increases as career age increases.