Altmetrics refers to new ways of measuring the impact of scholarly work using social media and online references. This document discusses the emergence of altmetrics and tools for measuring the likes, shares, downloads and mentions of academic articles, datasets and other research outputs on platforms like Twitter, Facebook, blogs and more. It outlines services like ImpactStory, Altmetric.com and PlumX that provide altmetric data and profiles. While altmetrics give a more complete picture of impact, there is debate around whether online attention equates to quality and whether certain topics receive disproportionate attention online.

1. Altmetrics: the movement, the
tools, and the implications
Kimberley R. Barker, MLIS
Andrea Horne Denton, MILS
Claude Moore Health Sciences Library
University of Virginia Health System
April 16, 2014
Creative Commons license:
CC BY-NC-SA

2. Defining altmetrics
• J. Priem (@jasonpriem), I like the term
#articlelevelmetrics, but it fails to imply
*diversity* of measures. Lately, I'm liking
#altmetrics., 4:28 AM - 29 Sep 10, Tweet
• “…the creation and study of new metrics
based on the Social Web for analyzing, and
informing scholarship.”
– http://altmetrics.org/about/

3. Awareness,
not
promotion!

4. Why should you care?
Br J Sports Med doi:10.1136/bjsports-2013-092417

5. Before altmetrics…
• Traditional products and measures of
academic success
– Publications
– Conference presentations/posters
– Committee work
– Number of times your work was cited
– Impact Factor and journal rank
– H-index

6. From metrics to altmetrics
Measures
Traditional
Research
Products
Traditional
- Article
- Chapter
- Books
Times Cited
Impact Factor + Rank
H-index

7. From metrics to altmetrics
Measures
Traditional New
Research
Products
Traditional
- Article
- Chapter
- Books
Times Cited
Impact Factor +
Rank
H-index
Page Views
Downloads

8. From metrics to altmetrics
Measures
Traditional New
Research
Products
Traditional
- Article
- Chapter
- Books
Times Cited
Impact
Factor +
Rank
H-index
Page Views
New
- Datasets
- Blog post
- Others
None Downloads

9. What other additional scholarly
contributions can you think of?
• Blogs
• Invited Interviews
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Reddit

10. To recap: why the shift?
• Academic work online
– Articles - measured by page views, downloads, etc?
– Academic work disseminated online, e.g. Figshare,
SlideShare, etc.
• Academic engagement on social platforms
– i.e., serious discussion taking place on Twitter &
Facebook
In a nutshell, academics are engaging in non-traditional
arenas and rightfully want credit for that engagement.

11. Other forces?
• Additional scholarly contributions:
– Data sets
– Patents
– Software
– Copyrights
NSF “Publications” broadened to
“Products of Research”
As of Jan 2013 “citable and
accessible including but not
limited to publications, data
sets, software, patents, and
copyrights."

12. How does “altmeasuring” work?
• Altmetrics are measured, just as are more
traditional metrics, such as published articles
• New products require new measurements

13. Examples of new measurements
• Downloads and page views
• Track-backs
• Tweets and retweets
• Links from review services (e.g. Facultyof1000)
• Sharing, social bookmarking

14. Tools

15. Old-ish tools
• Google Analytics
• Bit.ly
• Spring Metrics (websites)

16. Emerging Tools
• ImpactStory
• Altmetric.com
• PlumX

17. ImpactStory
• Your impact profile on the web: we reveal the
diverse impacts of your articles, datasets,
software, and more
• Jason Priem and Heather Piwowar
• Free

18. Sample ImpactStory Profile

19. Profile Details

20. Profile Details

21. Altmetric.com
• London-based start-up
• Funding from Digital Science (LabGuru, FigShare)

22. Altmetric’s widget (“donut”)
• Used by publishers/journals
• Nature Publishing, Cell Press
• Royal Society of Chemistry as of Sept 2013
• BMJ specialty journals as of Oct 2013
• Springer
• Etc
• Etc

23. Altmetric Explorer
• Subscription product – monitor, search and
measure conversations about your
publications and those of your competitors
£45 a month

24. Nature Neuroscience

25. Nature Neuroscience

26. Nature Neuroscience

28. RSC and Altmetric

29. RSC and Altmetric

30. Altmetric Bookmarklet
• Free
• Reading a paper and want to find out
its Altmetric details? Install the
bookmarklet in your browser
• When viewing the paper, “Altmetric
it”

31. Altmetric Bookmarklet

32. Altmetric Bookmarklet

33. Plum Analytics
• PlumX analysis tool
• Bought by EBSCO, a provider of library
subscription databases and journals

34. Plum Analytics
• Plum Metrics
– Usage (downloads, views, ILL)
– Captures (favorites, bookmarks)
– Mentions (blog posts, news, Wikipedia)
– Social media (tweets, likes)
– Citations (PubMed, Scopus, patents)

35. PlumX: the basics
• Analysis tool aimed at helping institutions
understand influence of researchers’ work
through altmetrics
• Compiles institutional repository data with other
data sources
• Works with customers to add initial data in bulk-
individuals then claim info (can use ORCID ID)
• Pitt PlumX “dashboard” https://plu.mx/pitt/g/
• Michael Pinsky, MD https://plu.mx/u/mpinsky

36. PlumX

37. Metrics Preview in Search Results

38. PlumX Author Profiles

39. Artifact View

40. However…

41. The Debate…
• Impact vs. attention
• David C.’s Improbable Science… “Why you
should ignore altmetrics and other
bibliometric nightmares”
http://www.dcscience.net/?p=6369
• Popular topics get higher counts, quickly, but
then fade? How does this reflect quality?

42. The Debate…
• Does social media help promote good
science? Or not? (e.g. anti-vaccine)

43. Positives & Negatives
• Positives
– Speed of feedback
– More complete picture of scholarly activities
• Negatives
– Not commonly recognized by
scholars/administrators
– Can be “gamed”

44. Altmetrics: worth pursuing?

45. If you’re interested…
• Some next steps:
–Investigate use of measurement tools
–Set up social media profiles and lurk
–Experiment with low-commitment
activities

46. See our LibGuide for further resources
http://guides.hsl.virginia.edu/hsl-altmetrics