Fractional counting of citations in research evaluation: A cross- and interdisciplinary assessment of the Tsinghua University in Beijing

In the case of the scientometric evaluation of multi- or interdisciplinary units one risks to compare apples with oranges: each paper has to be assessed in comparison to an appropriate reference set. We suggest that the set of citing papers can be considered as the relevant representation of the field of impact. In order to normalize for differences in citation behavior among fields, citations can be fractionally counted proportionately to the length of the reference lists in the citing papers. This new method enables us to compare among units with different disciplinary affiliations at the paper level and also to assess the statistical significance of differences among sets. Twenty-seven departments of the Tsinghua University in Beijing are thus compared. Among them, the Department of Chinese Language and Linguistics is upgraded from the 19th to the second position in the ranking. The overall impact of 19 of the 27 departments is not significantly different at the 5% level when thus normalized for different citation potentials.     

The overlooked citations: Investigating the impact of ignoring citations to published patent applications

A utility patent application may result in two citable documents: a published patent application (PPA) and a patent if the application is granted. Most analytic works consider only citations to the patent and ignore those to the PPA. This study gathers more than 270,000 U.S. utility patents granted in 2014 and their PPAs, and compares their citation counts up to 2018. Statistics show that citations to patents, on the average, account for less than 50 % of those to the patents and their PPAs combined together, indicating a significant underestimation to the value or impact of the patents. The degree of depreciation is worse when the time gaps between patents and their PPAs are longer, as the PPAs not only have accumulated citations for a longer period, but also individually, concurrently, and continuously receive citations after the patent is granted. This study further applies Main Path Analysis to a conventional citation network involving only citations to the patents and another network augmented with those to the PPAs, using empirical data from United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Cancer Moonshot Patent Data. The main path derived from the augmented network is almost entirely different from that of the conventional network.     

A novel methodology to assess the scientific standing of nations at field level

The formulation of national research policies would benefit greatly from reliable strategic analysis of the scientific infrastructure, aimed at identifying the relevant strengths and weaknesses at field level. Bibliometric methodologies thus far proposed in the literature are not completely satisfactory. This work proposes a novel “output-to-input-oriented” approach, which permits identification of research strengths and weaknesses on the basis of the ratios of top scientists and highly cited articles to research expenditures in each field. The proposed approach is applied to the Italian academic system. 2012–2016 scientific publications are analyzed, in the 218 research fields where bibliometric assessment is appropriate.     

Predicting the citations of scholarly paper

Citation prediction of scholarly papers is of great significance in guiding funding allocations, recruitment decisions, and rewards. However, little is known about how citation patterns evolve over time. By exploring the inherent involution property in scholarly paper citation, we introduce the Paper Potential Index (PPI) model based on four factors: inherent quality of scholarly paper, scholarly paper impact decaying over time, early citations, and early citers’ impact. In addition, by analyzing factors that drive citation growth, we propose a multi-feature model for impact prediction. Experimental results demonstrate that the two models improve the accuracy in predicting scholarly paper citations. Compared to the multi-feature model, the PPI model yields superior predictive performance in terms of range-normalized RMSE. The PPI model better interprets the changes in citation, without the need to adjust parameters. Compared to the PPI model, the multi-feature model performs better prediction in terms of Mean Absolute Percentage Error and Accuracy; however, their predictive performance is more dependent on the parameter adjustment.     

Personnel administration: in-service training at the nonprofessional level

A growing shortage of professional librarians has caused library administrators in all types of libraries to take a hard look at their interpretation of what constitutes professional work. The Free Library of Philadelphia is no exception, and in recent years it has evolved formal position classifications providing for the employment of nonlibrarians in positions formerly classed as professional as well as in the usual clerical and desk assignments. Conceived primarily out of necessity, these classifications and assignments are now readily accepted by the Library's staff, and there is little likelihood that earlier interpretations of professional and nonprofessional duties will ever be revived. This article outlines the Free Library's classification and training plan for nonprofessionals.     

On the skewness of journal self‐citations and publisher self‐citations: Cues for discussion from a case study

This paper takes the cue from the case of a retracted paper, cited both by the retraction notice and by an article published later in the same journal. This led to analysis and discussion on the skewness of citations in the journal Sustainability and within Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI) journals, particularly investigating self‐citations at journal and publisher levels. I analysed articles published by Sustainability in 2015 and found that self‐citations are higher than expected under a uniform probability distribution. Self‐citations in this journal make a 36% difference to the journal's impact factor. This research raises the question of what citation patterns can be expected as normal, and where the boundary between normal and anomaly lies. I suggest the issue deserves further investigation because self‐citations have several implications, ranging from impact factors to visibility and influence of scientific journals.     

Revisiting the scaling of citations for research assessment

Over the past decade, national research evaluation exercises, traditionally conducted using the peer review method, have begun opening to bibliometric indicators. The citations received by a publication are assumed as proxy for its quality, but they require standardization prior to use in comparative evaluation of organizations or individual scientists: the citation data must be standardized, due to the varying citation behavior across research fields. The objective of this paper is to compare the effectiveness of the different methods of normalizing citations, in order to provide useful indications to research assessment practitioners. Simulating a typical national research assessment exercise, he analysis is conducted for all subject categories in the hard sciences and is based on the Thomson Reuters Science Citation Index-Expanded^®. Comparisons show that the citations average is the most effective scaling parameter, when the average is based only on the publications actually cited.     

Health discussions on the Internet: A study of knowledge communication through citations

The Internet is a convenient but complex source for health information used by an increasing number of health consumers. Especially for people suffering from a chronic illness (e.g., diabetes), information seeking forms a part of the daily management of the disease, a “project of life.” This study of Web texts examines the citation patterns for a specific and controversial health issue: the beneficial or hazardous use of dietary chromium supplementation in diabetes self-management. Texts from different categories of Web sources (scientific, professional, educational, and commercial sources, as well as diabetes discussion groups) were analyzed in order to study how knowledge is transferred between sources, and how diabetics participating in discussion groups refer to and make sense of the information from different sources on the Internet. The citation patterns suggest that deviations from the traditional models of scientific knowledge dissemination can occur in the Internet environment.     

The collaboration behaviors of scientists in Italy: A field level analysis

The analysis of research collaboration by field is traditionally conducted beginning with the classification of the publications from the context of interest. In this work we propose an alternative approach based on the classification of the authors by field. The proposed method is more precise if the intended use is to provide a benchmark for the evaluation of individual propensity to collaborate. In the current study we apply the new methodology to all Italian university researchers in the hard sciences, measuring the propensity to collaborate for the various fields: in general, and specifically with intramural colleagues, extramural domestic and extramural foreign organizations. Using a simulation, we show that the results present substantial differences from those obtained through application of traditional approaches.     

How to consider fractional counting and field normalization in the statistical modeling of bibliometric data: A multilevel Poisson regression approach

The numerical-algorithmic procedures of fractional counting and field normalization are often mentioned as indispensable requirements for bibliometric analyses. Against the background of the increasing importance of statistics in bibliometrics, a multilevel Poisson regression model (level 1: publication, level 2: author) shows possible ways to consider fractional counting and field normalization in a statistical model (fractional counting I). However, due to the assumption of duplicate publications in the data set, the approach is not quite optimal. Therefore, a more advanced approach, a multilevel multiple membership model, is proposed that no longer provides for duplicates (fractional counting II). It is assumed that the citation impact can essentially be attributed to time-stable dispositions of researchers as authors who contribute with different fractions to the success of a publication’s citation. The two approaches are applied to bibliometric data for 254 scientists working in social science methodology. A major advantage of fractional counting II is that the results no longer depend on the type of fractional counting (e.g., equal weighting). Differences between authors in rankings are reproduced more clearly than on the basis of percentiles. In addition, the strong importance of field normalization is demonstrated; 60% of the citation variance is explained by field normalization.     

GILS metadata initiatives at the state level

Metadata has emerged as a tool for providing access and managing information resources in Government Information Locator Services (GILS) in several states. Various metadata schemes have developed, building on efforts in the federal government, library, and information science communities. Methods of metadata application include incorporation into the resources, metadata wrappers, and development of repositories to store metadata separate from the resources it describe. Metadata use is also developing as a strategy for preservation of resources. Developments in RDF, XML and Z39.50 may provide means for integrating diverse metadata-based resources. At the same time, developments outside the GILS community offer alternatives that have potential to inform or replace GILS as a method of citizen access to government information.     

科技期刊编辑要善于发现参考文献的隐蔽性差错

科技期刊编辑不仅要能够严格规范参考文献著录格式,还应利用文献检索技能、专业知识挖掘隐蔽性差错,向作者提出合理的修改意见,从而提高论文质量。     

基于引用期刊质量的影响因子修正法

长期以来学术期刊影响因子的计算仅仅统计被引用文章的篇数而没有考虑引用期刊的学术质量,这种计算方法有不尽合理之处.认为在计算影响因子时应充分考虑引用期刊的质量,建议以引用文献的期刊质量为权重对原影响因子公式进行修正.经统计学模拟计算表明,修正后的公式能更客观地对期刊进行评价,这将有利于建立起更公正、合理的期刊评价体系.     

Training at the postgraduate level for medical librarians: a review.

Postgraduate education for medical librarians is approachable from several perspectives, including internships, certificate programs, and continuing education programs. The diverse population of medical library personnel calls for a varied yet coordinated system of postgraduate education involving the Medical Library Association, regional medical libraries, library schools, and the National Library of Medical, in addition to active participation by all librarians in the health sciences field. Basic philosophies for each of the major types of programs are discussed and recommendations for future training of health sciences librarians are provided.     

Faculty citations: An approach to assessing the impact of diminishing resources on scientific research

In an effort to assess the impact of diminished library resources on scientific research, the Georgia Institute of Technology library collection was evaluated by analyzing the sources cited in the publications of faculty in the applied and physical sciences for 1989. This study indicates that even with substantial periodical cancellations, the periodical collection supports the majority of faculty needs since they rely primarily on core journals in their disciplines. Other materials cited less frequently in published faculty research — monographs, proceedings, technical reports, other serials, and government documents — are examined. The limitations of this method, its institutionally specific results, and the need to learn more about the information-seeking behaviors of research science faculty are also discussed.     

Challenges of measuring software impact through citations: An examination of the lme4 R package

The rise of software as a research object is mirrored by increasing interests in quantitative studies of scientific software. However, inconsistent citation practices have led most existing studies of this type to base their analysis of software impact on software name mentions, as identified in full-text publications. Despite its limitations, citation data exists in much greater quantities and covers a broader array of scientific fields than full-text data, and thus can support investigations with much wider scope. This paper aims to analyze the extent to which citation data can be used to reconstruct the impact of software. Specifically, we identify the variety of citable objects related to the lme4 R package and examine how the package’s impact is dispersed across these objects. Our results shed light on a little-discussed challenge of using citation data to measure software impact: even within the category of formal citation, the same software object might be cited in different forms. We consider the implications of this challenge and propose a method to reconstruct the impact of lme4 through its citations nonetheless.     

Appropriate use of information at the secondary school level: Understanding and avoiding plagiarism

This study explores students' understanding of plagiarism and their information use practices. Based on earlier findings regarding students' orientation toward processes and the degree of plagiarism exhibited, it analyses four cases in a new Australian study of Year 11 students. The two students who plagiarized least are compared with the two who plagiarized most in an ancient history assignment. Those who plagiarized most were less engaged with their topics; remembered less about them a month later; demonstrated less interest in processes such as learning, seeking meaning, or understanding; and were less able to recognize plagiarism than did those who plagiarized least. Those who plagiarized least incorporated direct quotations more effectively, used fewer quotations, and synthesized information and ideas better than did the others. Learning experiences that emphasize student engagement and construction of knowledge through appropriate and effective information use should take precedence over attempts to detect plagiarism without providing alternatives.     

HTTP 404-page (not) found: Recovery of decayed URL citations

Study investigates the availability, persistence and half life of URL citations cited in two Indian LIS journals articles published between 2002 and 2010. This study also investigates how researchers can resurrect lapsed URL citations cited in research articles, using Wayback machine. A total of 1290 URLs cited in 472 research articles published in Indian LIS journals spanning a period of 9 years (2002–2010) were extracted. Study found that only 18.91% (1290 out of 6820) of URLs cited in these journal articles. 39.84% of URL citations were not accessible and remaining 60.15% of URL citations were still accessible. The HTTP 404 error message-“page not found” was the overwhelming message encountered and represented 54.86% of all HTTP error messages. However 51.06% URLs were recovered from HTTP 404 error message. Study also noticed that the half-life of URL citations was increased from 6.33 years to 13.85 years after recovering missing URLs from Wayback machine.