Moving seminars to Zoom helps women show up, but it kills their professional clout and makes people cite their work less. It's a bad trade-off.
March 27, 2026
Original Paper
MORE ACCESS, BUT LESS INFLUENCE? COMMUNICATIVE INFRASTRUCTURE AND THE RETURNS TO SCIENTIFIC PARTICIPATION
SSRN · 6467490
The Takeaway
Digital formats lower the barrier to entry but lack the intense, high-stakes feedback and networking of in-person interactions that lead to real-world collaboration and citation growth. This suggests that 'digital inclusion' in professional settings might actually trade visibility for genuine influence.
From the abstract
Scientific knowledge production depends not only on publications and formal evaluation venues, but also on micro-institutions that shape how ideas are exposed, scrutinized, and incorporated into cumulative research trajectories. Among these institutions, research seminars are ubiquitous yet understudied. We examine how seminar format as a form of communicative infrastructure shapes the translation of participation into scientific influence. We distinguish between participation (who presents and