Team Power Dynamics and Team Impact: New Perspectives on Scientific Collaboration using Career Age as a Proxy for Team Power

Power is an unavoidable yet unrecognized element of collaboration. Power dynamics influence every aspect of scientific collaboration. Team power dynamics can be measured by team power level and team power hierarchy. Team power level is conceptualized as the average level of the possession of resources, expertise, or decision-making authorities of a team. Team power hierarchy represents the vertical differences of the possessions of resources in a team. In Science of Science, few studies have looked at scientific collaboration from the perspective of team power dynamics. This research examines how team power dynamics affect team impact to fill the research gap. In this research, all co-authors of one publication are treated as one team. Team power level and team power hierarchy of one team are measured by the mean and Gini index of career age of co-authors in this team. Team impact is quantified by citations of a paper authored by this team. By analyzing over 7.7 million teams from Science (e.g., Computer Science, Physics), Social Sciences (e.g., Sociology, Library & Information Science), and Arts & Humanities (e.g., Art), we find that flat team structure is associated with higher team impact. When team power level increases, teams with low team power hierarchy get cited more than teams with high team power hierarchy. These findings have been repeated in all five disciplines except Art, and are consistent in various types of teams from Computer Science including teams from industry or academia, teams with different gender groups, teams with geographical contrast, and teams with distinct size.