[论文解读] The selective use of physics knowledge in policy: how interdisciplinary physics bridges subfields and shapes policy influence

Jeongmin Lee, Jisung Yoon|arXiv (Cornell University)|Feb 11, 2026

Climate Change Communication and Perception被引用 0

一句话总结

本文将 Overton 的政策文献与 APS 物理学出版物联系起来，研究物理知识如何进入政策。研究结果显示，跨学科物理在政策需求中占主导并充当经纪人，但并不保证下游政策影响。

ABSTRACT

Scientific knowledge has become central to policymaking as societies face challenges related to technological change, climate risk, and public health. Despite the growing emphasis on evidence-based policy, a systematic understanding of how science is selectively used in policy, specifically which forms of knowledge are preferred and which scientific citations translate into influence, remains limited. We address these questions by constructing a novel dataset that links policy documents from the Overton database with publications from the American Physical Society, enabling an analysis of how physics knowledge enters and circulates in policy discourse. Using subfield classifications, we provide quantitative evidence for a gap between scientific communities and policymakers. First, we find that policy documents draw on broad and interdisciplinary areas of physics, such as General Physics and Interdisciplinary Physics, rather than mirroring the structure of physics research production. Second, we identify substantial institutional heterogeneity with systematic differences in subfield preferences across policy producing organizations and topics. Third, network analysis reveals that interdisciplinary areas of physics act as a central bridge connecting specialized subfields. Finally, regression analysis reveals a clear separation between policy visibility and policy influence. While interdisciplinary areas facilitate entry into policy discourse, it does not necessarily increase downstream policy influence. Conversely, documents citing geophysics are associated with approximately 24 percent higher policy influence, likely driven by the political salience of climate change policy. Our findings underscore the distinction between scientific visibility and policy influence, contributing to a deeper understanding of the complex relationship between scientific communities and policy system.

研究动机与目标

• 量化物理子领域在政策文献中的代表性相对于科学出版结构的情况。
• 识别政策需求中对物理知识在制度与主题上的异质性。
• 考察跨学科物理是否在政策话语中扮演经纪人枢纽的角色。
• 区分政策可见性（吸引度）与政策影响力（下游影响）在物理知识中的差异。

提出的方法

• 通过 DOIs 将 Overton 的政策文献与 APS 出版物建立链接。
• 通过 PACS 代码（共十类）对物理内容进行分类并聚合到子领域。
• 当论文具有多种 PACS 代码或政策文献引用多篇论文时，应用分数权重来归一化贡献。
• 对政策元数据应用潜在狄利克雷分配（LDA）以提取主题。
• 构建一个带权重的 PACS 代码共引网络并用 disparity 过滤器提取骨架。
• 使用 Louvain 算法检测社区以识别子领域的结构分组。
• 进行 OLS 回归以分离可见性（对论文的政策引用）与影响力（对政策文献的引用），并将二者与子领域及论文特征相关联。

Figure 1: Schematic of the data linkage and classification pipeline. Policy documents from the Overton database (left) are linked to scientific articles in the American Physical Society corpus (center) via Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs). This linkage captures the structure of policy demand, where

实验结果

研究问题

• RQ1 政策文献对跨学科和广义物理领域的引用是否相对于其在物理研究产出中的份额存在不成比例？
• RQ2 机构类型（政府机构、IGOs、智库）如何影响对政策需求中子领域的偏好？
• RQ3 跨学科物理在政策话语中作为经纪人连接专业子领域的作用有多大？
• RQ4 物理子领域在政策中的可见性与实际下游政策影响之间是否存在错配？
• RQ5 论文的哪些因素（颠覆性、先前引用、作者知名度）与政策可见性及随之而来的影响相关？

主要发现

• 政策文献呈现结构性分歧：跨学科物理与通用物理学在政策引用中占主导，而像 Condensed Matter（如类别 7）等专业领域在政策需求中的代表性相对较低。
• 智库的引用偏好高度偏向跨学科领域（类别 0 与 8 的总和约占 77%），而政府机构和国际政府组织（IGOs）呈现更偏向专业子领域的需求。
• 跨学科领域在政策共引网络中充当结构性经纪人，连接专业子领域并在骨架图上占据核心位置。
• 政策可见性对跨学科物理较高，但并未转化为更高的下游政策影响；例如引用地球物理学与政策影响力提升约 24%（很大程度由气候政策的关注驱动）。
• 政策需求网络呈现枢纽-辐射型拓扑结构，跨学科领域（类别 0 与 8）在核心位置的程度高于典型学术共引网络。
• 跨学科物理在政策可见性与政策影响之间存在明显分离。

Figure 2: Distribution of scientific supply versus policy demand. The blue bars represent the full APS corpus (scientific supply), while the red bars denote the subset of papers cited in policy documents (policy demand). Frequencies are fractionally weighted to account for papers assigned to multipl