Impact of academic title structure of university research teams on research output: evidence from 30 Chinese universities

Despite widespread agreement in the scholarly community about the significance of academic title structure on research output, research on the underlying mechanisms remains insufficient. Social contribution and research resources were selected as mediating variables, panel data of the materials science and engineering discipline of 30 Chinese universities from 2016 to 2020 were chosen as the research samples, and a fixed-effects model was subsequently applied to conduct a chain mediating effect test. The results showed: (1) Both the proportion of national-level talents and that of senior titles can promote research output, with the former having a much greater effect, while the proportion of associate senior titles has an indistinctive negative correlation with research output. (2) Both the proportion of national-level talents and that of senior titles can significantly enhance research output through the chain mediating effect of social contribution and research resources, with national-level talents having a stronger ability to make social contributions and obtain research resources. (3) Social contribution is more effective than research resources in enhancing research output. Based on the findings, it is recommended to improve policies for introducing high-end talents and to increase support for researchers with associate senior titles. Furthermore, it is advisable to establish a research evaluation system based on social influence, guiding researchers to obtain research resources and enhance research output through social contributions.