Determinants of institutional excellence in Asian communication research

Asia lags behind North America and Europe in communication research. This paper aims to investigate what factors determine the research excellence of communication schools in Asia. The study relies primarily on bibliometric data from the Web of Science database and uses a conceptual framework that integrates Bourdieu’s capital theory and institutional theory. The author found that social capital is most important and that economic capital is least important to research performance. In addition, cultural capital concerning human capital is crucial, but other forms of cultural capital (regional English proficiency and a school’s research history) lack relevance in explaining research excellence. Moreover, the strategies that stress the interdisciplinarity of the faculty and the formalized institutional form are critical to research performance.