Evaluate the collective function of references cited together in a given text segment.
Classify their combined role into one of the following categories: 'method', 'background', or 'result'.

Text:‚Ä¶research quality, our results point instead to two alternative explanations: on the one hand, our findings appear to complement recent work by Stern (2004), which argues that firms benefit by promoting science not because it improves theR&Dprocess, but rather because talented employees‚Ä¶
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