Effective Factors and Strategies to Deal with Scientific Stagnation from the Perspective of Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences Faculty Members: a Qualitative Study

In universities, the issue of attracting and retaining faculty members is of great importance. If this is not possible for any reason, it can lead to the academic stagnation of academic staff members the loss of motivation in their career path, and interruption in the implementation of their seven duties. Considering the importance of the advancement of academic staff members as educational and research elites of the country and their significant role in training skilled human resources, especially the role of academic staff members of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education in training graduates of medical sciences that are related to the general health of the society, are related, this study was carried out to identify, diagnosing the factors and ways to prevent their scientific stagnation.

This study was conducted with a qualitative method from January to December 2023. In this research, according to the nature of qualitative research, to explain the perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors of the participants, the purposeful sampling method with maximum diversity was used, as well as the snowball sampling method because the goal was to select participants, Which was a rich source of information and helped the researcher to better understand the concept of scientific stagnation. The participants were faculty members who had been faculty members for at least 10 years. In addition to conducting in-depth and semi-structured interviews, upstream documents and the results of similar studies were also examined.

In total, 3 themes, 18 categories, and 118 codes were extracted as follows: The main themes of this study are the causes of scientific stagnation, the challenges of the advancement path, and the strategies to prevent scientific stagnation. The theme of scientific stagnation includes 47 codes and 6 categories (individual, organizational, psychological, skill, job, and research factors). The content of the challenges of the promotion path, including 33 codes and 6 categories (the challenges of the path of the promotion regulations, challenges in cultural, educational, research, executive activities, and challenges of examining cases for promotion of scientific rank). The content of the solutions to prevent scientific stagnation includes 38 codes and 6 categories (the solution to prevent scientific stagnation in connection with the regulation of promotion, cultural, educational, research, executive activities, and the review of files for the promotion of scientific rank.)

Based on the results of the present study, the researchers identified the causes of scientific stagnation; also, they believe that revising the promotion regulations is the most important way to prevent scientific stagnation. They stated that in the revision of the bylaws, in addition to the quantitative indicators, in each of the scoring factors, their quality can also be addressed. In terms of education, the quality and innovation of education should be considered. In the research section, pay attention to the applicability of the research. They believed that scientific stagnation is preventable and can be countered through broader scientific productivity measures and reward systems that encourage innovative and exploratory projects. In the executive department, the quality of work and useful changes and developments during the executive activity should be the criteria. In cultural activities, pay attention to social and quality activities; also, they brought up the faster process of promotion cases and the existence of elite human resources to handle possible problems. They stated that with the approach of delegating authority to the country's medical sciences universities and revising the promotion and promotion bylaws, it is possible to deal with the factors causing scientific stagnation and take a step towards a responsive university.