{"paper":{"title":"Adaptability and the Pivot Penalty in Science and Technology","license":"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/","headline":"","cross_cats":["cs.SI","physics.soc-ph"],"primary_cat":"cs.DL","authors_text":"Benjamin F. Jones, Carolyn Stein, Dashun Wang, Ryan Hill, Xizhao Wang, Yian Yin","submitted_at":"2021-07-14T03:58:22Z","abstract_excerpt":"Scientists and inventors set the direction of their work amidst an evolving landscape of questions, opportunities, and challenges. This paper introduces a measurement framework to quantify how far researchers move from their existing research when producing new works. We apply this framework to millions of scientific publications and patents and uncover a pervasive \"pivot penalty\", where the impact of new research steeply declines the further a researcher moves from their prior work. The pivot penalty applies nearly universally across scientific publishing and patenting and has been growing in"},"claims":{"count":0,"items":[],"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"source":{"id":"2107.06476","kind":"arxiv","version":2},"verdict":{"id":null,"model_set":{},"created_at":null,"strongest_claim":"","one_line_summary":"","pipeline_version":null,"weakest_assumption":"","pith_extraction_headline":""},"integrity":{"clean":true,"summary":{"advisory":0,"critical":0,"by_detector":{},"informational":0},"endpoint":"/pith/2107.06476/integrity.json","findings":[],"available":true,"detectors_run":[],"snapshot_sha256":"c28c3603d3b5d939e8dc4c7e95fa8dfce3d595e45f758748cecf8e644a296938"},"references":{"count":0,"sample":[],"resolved_work":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57","internal_anchors":0},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}