Academic Workload, Research Productivity, and End of Life: A Single-Case Historiometric Study

Fourteen years of biographical time-series data were analyzed quantitatively retrospectively using the historiometric approach. The data were descriptions of self-recorded daily working hours for one academic researcher's career and life. The researcher's unexpected death was preceded by a notable decline in daily working hours and conference travels commencing two years before. Well-known calendar effects (week and academic year) as well as effects of increased academic rank and duties on working hours were all discernible in these unobtrusive data. However, effort (total working hours) did not predict concurrent or near-future research output, even when teaching load was controlled for.