Knowledge Translation Status at The University of Social Welfare & Rehabilitation

Nowadays universities are expected to be accountable for needs of their societies. Knowledge transfer (KT) will address this through exchange of the knowledge between universities and other organizations and public sector. KT seeks to ensure sharing of knowledge between universities as the creators of knowledge and the wider community as recipient of that knowledge. Translation of research findings to the language of audiences and stakeholders constitute a fundamental part of knowledge transfer. The purpose of this research was to study the status of knowledge translation and identifying its influencing factors in the University of Social Welfare & Rehabilitation in Iran. This descriptive study was a performance evaluation with all research staff of the university as its subject population. A sample of 40 faculties with convenience sampling was selected and participated in this study. Research tool was a questionnaire originally developed by KT committee of another university (TUMS) that was modified for this study and its validity and reliability was reassessed (alpha =94%). 47% of participants were female, 50% holding a PhD, 68% faculty members, 53% having more than ten years job experience, 85% having a research experience and more than 70% were connected to organizations other than their own. Findings showed that mean score of items related to users need assessment and translation of it in to a research project was 2.78.Mean score of items related to the production of reliable evidence for decision-making was 2.87.Mean score of items regarding application of research findings by the end users was 2.62 and the total mean was 2.75. There was no significant difference in KT regarding sex, job and research experience. Results suggest that overall knowledge translation status in this university has been moderate, being lower than the expected level. Therefore, the appropriate transfer of research findings must be promoted through strategies that eliminate obstacles and encourage researchers to produce and translate research information available and accessible to stakeholders for use in practice, planning & policy-making.