Affiliated institutions
A key challenge in the compilation of a university ranking is the handling of publications originating from research institutes
and hospitals affiliated with universities. Among academic systems, a wide variety exists in the types of relations maintained
by universities with these affiliated institutions. Usually, these relationships are shaped by local regulations and practices
affecting the comparability of universities on a global scale. As there is no easy solution for this issue, it is important that
producers of university rankings employ a transparent methodology in their treatment of affiliated institutions.
CWTS distinguishes three different types of affiliated institutions:
- Component
- Joint research facility or organization
- Associated organization
In the case of a
component
, the affiliated institution is actually part of or controlled by the university.
Universitaire Ziekenhuizen Leuven is an example of a component, since it is part of the legal entity of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.
A
joint research facility or organization
is identical to a component except that it is administered by more than
one organization. The Brighton & Sussex Medical School (the joint medical faculty of the University of Brighton and
the University of Sussex) and Charite (the medical school of both the Humboldt University and the Freie Universitat Berlin)
are examples of this type of affiliated institution.
The third type of affiliated institution is the
associated organization
, which is more loosely connected to a university.
This organization is an autonomous institution that collaborates with one or more universities based on a joint purpose but
at the same time has separate missions and tasks. In many countries, hospitals that operate as teaching or university hospitals
fall into this category. The Massachusetts General Hospital, one of the teaching hospitals of the Harvard Medical School, is
an example of an associated organization.
The Leiden Ranking 2023 counts a publication as output of a university if at least one of the affiliations in the publication explicitly
mentions either the university or one of its components or joint research facilities. In a limited number of cases, affiliations with
institutions that are not controlled or owned by the university are also treated as if they were mentioning the university itself.
The rationale for this is that in some cases institutions ? although formally being distinct legal entities ? are so tightly integrated
with the university that they are commonly perceived as being a component or extension of that university. Examples of this situation
include the university medical centers in the Netherlands and some of the academic health science systems in the United States and
other countries. In these cases, universities have actually delegated their medical research and teaching activities to the academic
hospitals and universities may even no longer act as the formal employer of the medical researchers involved. In other cases,
tight integration between a university and an academic hospital may manifest itself by an extensive overlap in staff.
In this situation, researchers may not always mention explicitly their affiliation with the university. An example of this
tight integration is the relation between the University Hospital Zurich and the University of Zurich.
The list of affiliated institutions for the 2023 edition is available
here
.
Our approach is discussed in more detail in a blog post and in this
paper
on academic hospitals.
Affiliated institutions that are not classified as a component or a joint research facility or treated as such are labeled as associated institutions.
In the case of publications with affiliations from associated organizations, a distinction is made between publications from associated organizations
that also mention the university and publications from associated organizations that do not include a university affiliation. In the latter case, a
publication is not considered to originate from the university. On the other hand, if a publication includes an affiliation from a particular university
as well as an affiliation from an associated organization, both affiliations are considered to represent that particular university. The effect of this
procedure depends on the
counting method
that is used in the calculation of bibliometric indicators.
The procedure influences results obtained using the fractional counting method, but it has no effect on results obtained using the full counting method.