Fame and eminence, as traditionally measured, limit the definition of impact to the publication world. We add two types of impact to the traditional measures of fame and eminence. Many of the traditional measures of fame or eminence are based on social-network connections, whereby individuals appoint other people to positions of eminence. Editorial boards are one specific example. Eminence is also limited to number of publications, for example, with little regard for the impact of those publications at the societal level. In addition to the dominant measures of eminence, societal impact broadens the definition of impact to reflect real-world changes. Two examples include mentoring, which is rarely mentioned as a criterion for eminence, and policy value, such as when research influences important public policy. These additions are discussed in reference to the general underrepresentation of researchers of color in academia.
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) was one of the most distinguished German scientists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His fame came chiefly from his extensive explorations in South America and his eminence as a plant naturalist. He attempted to climb the inactive volcano Chimborazo in Ecuador, which was thought to be the highest mountain in the world at the time, and he reached an altitude of about 5,543 m, which was a record height for humans.
The development of the field of sport expertise over the past 20 years has been remarkable, and our understanding of the varying factors affecting athlete development and motor skill acquisition has expanded considerably. Recently, there has been a push toward more sophisticated research designs to continue the advancement of our understanding of sport expertise. Even in a population of performers at the highest levels of performance and competition (e.
Fame and eminence, as traditionally measured, limit the definition of impact to the publication world. We add two types of impact to the traditional measures of fame and eminence. Many of the traditional measures of fame or eminence are based on social-network connections, whereby individuals appoint other people to positions of eminence.
Professional decisions about hiring, tenure, promotion, funding, and honors are informed by assessments of scholarly impact. As a measure of influence, citations are produced by experts but accessible to nonexperts. The h index is the largest number h such that an individual has published at least h works cited at least h times apiece.
Fame in psychology, as in all arenas, is a local phenomenon. Psychologists (and probably academics in all fields) often first become well known for studying a subfield of an area (say, the study of attention in cognitive psychology, or even certain tasks used to study attention). Later, the researcher may become famous within cognitive psychology.
