A mediating effect of knowledge creation on the relationship between social capital and research and development performance in Malaysian research universities

Abstract

The aim of this study is to understand the influence of social capital (SC) and knowledge creation (KC) activities on research and development (R&D) performance among academic researchers in Malaysian Research Universities (MRU). This research employed a quantitative research design utilizing the survey research method. Three objectives were established and the first is, to formulate a model that identifies the influence of SC and KC on R&D performance in MRU. This was achieved through literature review and preliminary study interviews. Ten researchers from three MRU participated in the interview. Eleven research hypotheses were derived and seven factors, which influenced R&D performance, were identified: the presence of structural, relational and cognitive capital as well as knowledge socialization, externalization, combination and internalization. The second objective is to develop an instrument, which can be used to measure the influence of SC and KC on R&D performance in MRU. This was achieved through systematic literature review and assessment of questionnaires to support the hypotheses and validate the influence model. Data collected was analysed using Cronbach alpha to validate the reliability; while, correlation coefficient and factor analysis were used to check the validity of the instrument. The third objective is to examine the influence of SC on R&D performance in MRU with KC as the mediator. Correlation coefficient was used to test ten hypotheses, while structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to test a hypothesis with KC as the mediator. In addition, multiple regression analysis was utilized to measure the predictive power of the influence model, while SEM was used to evaluate the fitness of the influence model. This study confirms that KC has an indirect mediating influence between SC and R&D performance and also has a stronger influence on R&D performance compared to SC. This study shows that, structural, relational and cognitive social capital is effective in generating tacit knowledge through socialization and internalization activities.