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Specifically, we present a Research Strategy Q model, which untangles the coupling effect of scientists\u2019 research ability (Q\u03b1) and research strategy ability (E\u03b1\u03c0) on research performance. Q\u03b1 indicates scientists\u2019 fundamental ability to publish high-quality papers, while E\u03b1\u03c0 indicates scientists\u2019 proficiency in terms of exploration and exploitation strategies. Five research strategies proposed by our previous study are employed. We generate synthetic data and collect empirical data as our experimental data set. We show that these research strategies present different benefit and risk characteristics. Adopting some exploitation strategies tends to stifle research performance, while exploration strategies are high risk and high yield. Q\u03b1 and E\u03b1\u03c0 have predictive power for research performance. Moreover, we find that, first, scholars who prefer to execute a research strategy, \u03c0, may not necessarily be better at executing \u03c0. Second, some scholars have differences in their abilities towards different strategies, while other scholars have differences in their abilities towards the same strategy. Third, exploration and exploitation are not contradictory but complementary from the perspective of proficiency, while they are mutually exclusive from the perspective of selection preference.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1162\/qss_a_00342","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2024,12,18]],"date-time":"2024-12-18T13:41:51Z","timestamp":1734529311000},"page":"131-153","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1162\/mitpressjournals.corrections.policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Exploration and exploitation: Which research strategy are you better at?"],"prefix":"10.1162","volume":"6","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-7035-4627","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Shengzhi","family":"Huang","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"},{"name":"Information Retrieval and Knowledge Mining Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0929-7416","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Wei","family":"Lu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"},{"name":"Information Retrieval and Knowledge Mining Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-3904-8901","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Qikai","family":"Cheng","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"},{"name":"Information Retrieval and Knowledge Mining Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2104-0194","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Li","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"},{"name":"Information Retrieval and Knowledge Mining Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5953-6908","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Yong","family":"Huang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"},{"name":"Information Retrieval and Knowledge Mining Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"281","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,3,2]]},"reference":[{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"187","DOI":"10.1007\/s11192-019-03009-y","article-title":"Evaluation of h-index and its citation intensity based variants in the field of mathematics","volume":"119","author":"Ain","year":"2019","journal-title":"Scientometrics"},{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"391","DOI":"10.1007\/s11192-009-0047-5","article-title":"hg-index: A new index to characterize the scientific output of researchers based on the h- and g-indices","volume":"82","author":"Alonso","year":"2010","journal-title":"Scientometrics"},{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib3","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"85","DOI":"10.1007\/s11192-010-0306-5","article-title":"Detecting h-index manipulation through self-citation analysis","volume":"87","author":"Bartneck","year":"2011","journal-title":"Scientometrics"},{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib4","first-page":"993","article-title":"Latent Dirichlet allocation","volume":"3","author":"Blei","year":"2003","journal-title":"Journal of Machine Learning Research"},{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib5","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"262","DOI":"10.3152\/095820209X477520","article-title":"Reviewer and editor biases in journal peer review: An investigation of manuscript refereeing at Angewandte Chemie International Edition","volume":"18","author":"Bornmann","year":"2009","journal-title":"Research Evaluation"},{"key":"2025030615254767200_bib6","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"2","DOI":"10.1038\/embor.2008.233","article-title":"The state of h index research. 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