EXPLORING DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS IN RESEARCH COMMERCIALIZATION IN UNIVERSITIES

Abstract

Commercialization of research is receiving increasing attention across various research fields in universities. The aim of this study is to identify the differences in demographic factors (gender, age, position, type of university, research experience, knowledge of commercialization, and research field) in research commercialization activities among lecturers in public universities in Malaysia. A cross-sectional descriptive research design was used, and a sample size of 155 lecturers was selected through simple random sampling from 20 public universities in Malaysia. Primary data was collected through a questionnaire in the form of a Google Form distributed via email. Subsequently, the collected data was analyzed using Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 26.0. The results of the t-Test and ANOVA analyses indicated that there were no significant differences in research commercialization activities based on demographic factors, including gender, age, position, type of university, research experience, knowledge of commercialization, and research field. This demonstrates that academic researchers should not perceive demographic factors as barriers to their research commercialization activities. Therefore, the findings of this study are expected to benefit those involved in formulating various strategies and decision-making processes, with the aim of stimulating greater efforts in the commercialization of research results, especially at the university level.