The influence of R&D intensity of countries on the impact of international collaborative research: evidence from Spain

A positive influence of international collaboration on the impact of research has been extensively described. This paper delves further into this issue and studies to what extent the type of collaborating country—high, medium or low R&D intensive country—and which country is the leader in the research may influence the impact of the final scientific output. Among 9,961 papers co-authored by scientists from Spain and from another country (bilateral collaboration) during 2008–2009, papers with high R&D intensive countries predominated (60 %) and received the highest number of citations. This holds true in eight out of nine fields, being Social Sciences the one which benefited the most from partnerships with high R&D intensive countries. Mathematics emerges as a special case where other factors such as the partner’s specialisation in the field may have a greater influence on research impact than the level of investment in R&D of the collaborating country. No significant influence of the type of country leading the research on the impact of the final papers is observed in most fields. Research policy implications are finally discussed.