Which Discoveries Are Paradigm Shifting?

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new measure for identifying paradigm-shifting discoveries by combining impact, novelty, and disruptiveness, and demonstrates its application using patent data.

Contribution

It proposes a novel, integrated measure for paradigm-shifting discoveries and calibrates it with inventor data, revealing relationships among impact, novelty, and disruptiveness.

Findings

Impact, novelty, and disruptiveness are strict complements.

The measure is calibrated using USPTO patent data from 1982 to 2015.

Greater impact cannot substitute for moderate novelty.

Abstract

To better align theories of paradigm shifting discoveries and empirics identifying them, we pro-pose a novel measure that incorporates a discovery impact, novelty, and tendency to break with the past into a single, coherent measure. Calibration using the National Inventor Hall of Fame data reveals that impact, novelty, and disruptiveness are strict complements meaning, for example, that greater impact cannot substitute for moderate novelty. We illustrate the workings of the measure using data on USPTO patents from 1982 to 2015.