The REF’s environment rebrand is no climbdown

Research, development and innovation are crucial for the health of the public and the health of the economy, in the UK and globally. 

When the pause to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) was announced in September, I argued that investing in research culture was a sure bet. At the Wellcome Trust, we champion the people behind research and recognise their contributions underpin the UK’s entire R&D ecosystem.  

In 2020, we surveyed 4,000 researchers around the world. The findings were stark. Three in four felt their creativity was stifled, only three in 10 felt secure pursuing a research career, and as much as half had sought, or wanted to seek, professional help for mental health.

This is not the foundation for great research. How can we expect to make new discoveries, or have a meaningful impact on health, when the research environment hinders researchers? 

That’s why the changes to the REF announced today are so important. 

The REF has gone through many cycles – developing, changing and balancing the various elements of it is quite the challenge. This update to the REF gets the balance right.  

The most obvious change following the pause is a new name for the People, Culture and Environment (PCE) portion. Reframing this as Strategy, People and Research Environment (SPRE) rightly still places people at the centre.  

The switch to SPRE is a pragmatic response and ensures that the momentum from the grassroots movement to improve research culture is not lost. The use of the word “culture” itself was clearly becoming a distraction and was at risk of being misunderstood or politicised, but the new framing should by no means be interpreted as a climbdown on the importance of research culture – and this is clear in the detail of the guidance.

You’ll continue to see Wellcome use the phrase research culture to describe this work, and I imagine that many in the community will choose to do so too. 

Ultimately, research is done by people. Measuring how we support people, in combination with a clear research strategy in a good research environment, are the correct things to assess to promote and reward excellence – and the SPRE guidance recognises this. 

The criticisms that it would be impossible to measure research culture, and that trying to measure it would undermine scientific quality, have been proven wrong. The PCE pilot programmes have shown that excellent research environments can be defined and assessed robustly, with the panels involved confident that the evidence provided was sufficient to reach a judgement.

To keep shifting the dial, we need to incentivise behaviour by recognising the institutions across the sector that have made meaningful efforts to support a positive research environment. That is why I wholeheartedly welcome the decision to change the weighting for SPRE, despite its not being as high as previously proposed. Increasing it from 15 per cent in 2021 to 20 per cent is a significant step forward for REF 2029, rightly rewarding investment in future excellence. 

At Wellcome, emphasising the importance of researchers is central to our vision of a healthier future for everyone. After all, supporting people, developing talent and fostering bold thinking drives quality, builds integrity and sustains an excellent research environment. In doing so, it strengthens the entire research ecosystem – and science itself.  

I recognise that Wellcome also has a role to play in creating positive research environments. After all, we’re part of the system that we’re trying to improve. That’s why we have made significant investments in research culture. For instance, the Institutional Funding for Research Culture (IFRC), introduced in 2023, has enabled organisations to move beyond their current practice and explore ways to improve their research cultures. We’re in the stages of evaluating the scheme, but its success is clear, and we look forward to developing our plans as we head into 2026.  

When impact measures were introduced to the REF in 2014, they were controversial. Today, it is hard to imagine a REF without them. In years to come, the same will be said about assessing a strong research environment. 

SPRE will be seen as a crucial indicator: one that does not rely solely on measuring the excellence that has been achieved in the past but measures what is in place to support excellence in the future. 

John-Arne Røttingen is CEO of Wellcome.