Breaking Out of the Ivory Tower: A Large-scale Analysis of Patent Citations to HCI Research

TL;DR

This study analyzes 70,000 patent citations to HCI research over 30 years, revealing significant industry recognition but also a long, increasing lag in translating research into patented innovations.

Contribution

It provides the first large-scale quantitative analysis of patent citations to HCI research, highlighting impact and translational delays.

Findings

20.1% of HCI papers are cited by patents

Citation lag is 10.5 years and increasing

HCI research has higher patent citation rates than some scientific fields

Abstract

What is the impact of human-computer interaction research on industry? While it is impossible to track all research impact pathways, the growing literature on translational research impact measurement offers patent citations as one measure of how industry recognizes and draws on research in its inventions. In this paper, we perform a large-scale measurement study primarily of 70,000 patent citations to premier HCI research venues, tracing how HCI research are cited in United States patents over the last 30 years. We observe that 20.1% of papers from these venues, including 60--80% of papers at UIST and 13% of papers in a broader dataset of SIGCHI-sponsored venues overall, are cited by patents -- far greater than premier venues in science overall (9.7%) and NLP (11%). However, the time lag between a patent and its paper citations is long (10.5 years) and getting longer, suggesting that HCI research and practice may not be efficiently connected.