Impact of COVID-19 pandemics on advanced neuroscientific R &D activities: a focus on job age

Abstract

Notwithstanding the implementation of strategic responses to recover habitual levels of performance and productivity, global data points out that the outbreak and diffusion of COVID-19 have imposed a high cost on research activities. Starting from a national survey investigating the impact of pandemics on Italian research in neuroscience, we here specifically aims at exploring its effects on scientific productivity across junior-to-senior professionals. Data highlighted that, given a generalized decrease of objective markers of scientific productivity (i.e. submitted projects or papers), the extent of such decrease was most notable in junior, mid-level and early senior researchers. Also, subjective measures of impact of the pandemics on professional life and work efficiency revealed a coherent profile, with junior and mid-level research professionals referring the highest perceived impact, while the impact of pandemics at psychological and socio-relational levels was rated almost similarly by researchers with different levels of seniority.