Do firms report more university knowledge sourcing when informed about engagement channels? Evidence from a field experiment

Does providing information about a wide range of university engagement channels influence the likelihood that companies report that they source knowledge from universities in their innovative efforts? To address this question, we embedded a field experiment in a multi-wave survey on university engagement that randomly exposed firms to information about a variety of engagement channels before asking about knowledge sources for innovation. We find that exposure to these channels significantly increases the likelihood of firms reporting universities as a knowledge source. The magnitude of this effect is substantial, with the propensity to report sourcing knowledge from universities increasing by 34% in our preferred estimate. This increase is concentrated among firms rating universities as of ‘low’ or ‘medium’ importance and among those firms with some university engagement. We discuss the implications for understanding university-industry engagement and the design of innovation surveys.