METHODOLOGICAL DEBATE ON THE ‘REGIONAL INNOVATION SCOREBOARD’.
METHODOLOGICAL DEBATE ON THE ‘REGIONAL INNOVATION SCOREBOARD’.
Some methodo- logical discussions about synthetic indices
A first point of discussion with regards to calculating synthetic indices is the relevance of the choice of indicator weights vector (Grupp and Schubert, 2010; Becker et al. , 2017; Hauser et al. , 2018). A key characteristic of synthetic indices is that the sum of the relative weights to be given to all indicators in the analysis must be equal to 1. In other words, a relative weight must be assigned to each of the indicators, such that the sum of all of them equals 100%. Choosing the weights vector assigned to each indicator is critical in constructing synthetic indices (Cooper et al. , 2011). This is because each set of weights defines a particular func - tion or aggregation model under which per- formance is measured differently, therefore producing alternative results and unequal interpretations In the case of innovation analysis and meas- urement, this is a debate that is difficult to resolve. Is private R&D more important than public R&D? Do technological innovations represent innovation performance better than non-technological innovations? And in any of these options, how much more important is one variable than the other? Furthermore, the relevance of each factor depends on its terri- torial context, as what may be important in a specific territory may not be so in another. For example, public R&D expenditure tends to have
Scientific research on synthetic indi- ces identifies a set of debates (Salt- elli, 2007); Nar- do et al. , 2008; Lane, 2010; Greco et al. , 2019), some of which are dealt with in this docu- ment.
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