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Asked by Pirate scientist to Christie, Dan, David, Dawn, Sian on 15 Jun 2016.
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Christie Waddington answered on 15 Jun 2016:
Not a direct pay boost, as scientists are discovering something new all the time! If you discover something new and write good research articles about them which are in good journals, you are more likely to get awarded grants to continue your research. Our contracts are typically 3 years and normally we have to apply for our own funding (i.e. our own pay check, and money for chemicals and things!) each time our contract runs out. Sometimes we have to move country!
Research journals have different impact factors, the best ones being Nature or Science. Typically, the more papers you have published in high impact factor journals, the more grants you usually get.
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Dawn Lau answered on 15 Jun 2016:
No, I wish! 😛
It depends on what you mean by new. New discoveries are made all the time, but some are more important and have more impact on the field, and some discoveries are smaller. They are still new discoveries but the findings may not have as much significance or be as ground-breaking as some other discoveries. Super awesome discoveries that change the entire direction of a field, for instance, might get you nominated for the Nobel Prize, which does pay a large sum of money.
Most young scientists are paid through grants, which are awarded to people or groups based on how good the underlying science idea is. When scientists discover new things, they publish them as scientific articles in journals. The more articles you have, and the better-quality journals that they’re in (to use another writing medium as an example, a tabloid vs. a fact-based newspaper), the more likely it is that you will receive more grants. You won’t necessarily get paid a higher salary, but grants usually don’t last for more than a few years – so you have a higher chance of getting new, or renewing your old grant, if you have better articles published. Therefore more discoveries = more papers published = more grants awarded = the longer you get to be a scientist!
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Sian Thomas answered on 15 Jun 2016:
No, not explicitly. But I have had a number of promotions in my career – each on the back of delivering something (so not necessarily a discovery and sometimes a non-discovery is just as important).
But I do get a psychological boost every time 🙂
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David Robertson answered on 19 Jun 2016:
As the others have said, unfortunately it isn’t that simple!
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