Scholarly citations can be traced all the way back to the 15th century, but in the 21st century the internet, social media and the open access movement have made it easier than ever before for the public to engage with scholarly outputs. Altmetrics provide a measure of public engagement with web-native scholarship. They can be embedded into publishing platforms and institutional repositories as article-level metrics, and they provide evidence of impact for open access mandates. Three leading altmetrics aggregators are discussed: Altmetric.com; ImpactStory.org; PlumAnalytics.com. An institutional systems approach is recommended to mitigate the "pond-mentality" of the growing number of sources that provide measures of impact for research output. Research profiling systems are able to harvest most of these ponds and so save time for the researcher and research manager. In addition, national profiling systems would leverage economies of scale to increase the visibility and impact of all players, making it easier for potential investors and collaborators to find research partners. Altmetricians are challenged to develop a metric that measures the openness of a research entity.

1. Altmetrics as indicators of public impact
Pat Loria, Charles Sturt University Library
Open Access and Research Conference
QUT, Brisbane Australia, 31 Oct – 1 Nov 2013
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2. Scholarly citation timeline
Voltaire (1744): "the empty, sterile science of facts and dates"
1560
In-text citations
in Pasquier’s
Recherches de
la France
1450
Printing
Press
1696
Scholarly footnotes
in Bayle's
Historical and
Critical Dictionary
1906
2004
Chicago
Manual of Style
Facebook &
Google Scholar
1498
1665
1700-1828
1950
2006
Endnotes in
Richard White’s
Histories [of
Britain]
First scientific journal
Various controversies
and debates documented
over content, purpose
and use of citations
Development of
citation indexing
(Eugene Garfield)
Twitter
Philosophical
Transactions of the
Royal Society
Scholarly communication uses available communication systems
2010-2013
Various controversies and debates over
use and value of citations via social media
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3. The rise of social media1
1997
2001
2003
2005
Blogging
Wikipedia
LinkedIn
YouTube
1999
Friends
Reunited (UK)
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•
•
•
1.
2.
2002
Friendster (US)
2004
Facebook,
MySpace, Flickr,
Podcasting
2006
Twitter
2010 Barack Obama on Facebook, Twitter & MySpace
2013 Facebook & YouTube grow to over 1 billion users each
2013 Twitter 500 million users, LinkedIn 225 million users
17 million faculty members and graduate students in the world2
http://www.uncp.edu/home/acurtis/NewMedia/SocialMedia/SocialMediaHistory.html
http://www.richardprice.io/post/12855561694/the-number-of-academics-and-graduate-students-in-the
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4. Research impact matrix
17 million potential users
3 billion potential users
Scholarly
Public
Traditional Citations
Social & Mainstream Media
Impact
Government
Industry
Public Policy
Research & Development
Total research impact is measured across all sectors by metrics and impact narrative
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5. Altmetrics as indicators of public impact
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“Altmetrics” coined by Jason Priem, cofounder of ImpactStory.org
Altmetrics aggregate online impact of web-native scholarship
Most aggregators have adopted an open source business model
Altmetrics can be embedded into profiles, repositories & other systems
Altmetrics begin accruing much faster than traditional metrics
Include non-traditional outputs (datasets, software, slides, websites)
Facilitate qualitative exploration of sources and sentiment of impact
Altmetrics complement traditional metrics and research evaluation
Provide evidence of public engagement with scholarly output
A “researcher’s footprint in the community” ~ Kaitlin Thaney (Mozilla Science Lab)
http://www.altmetric.com/blog/thoughts-from-the-fishbowl-plos-alm-workshop-2013/
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6. Altmetrics push factors
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Evidence of public impact in grant applications and funding reports
Supporting evidence for employment, promotion and performance
Broader understanding of impact landscape for research managers
Compliment other impact metrics in repositories and public profiles
Add to evidence base for government impact evaluation exercises
Provide supporting evidence that open access mandates are working
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7. Altmetrics pull factors
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Researchers who want to gauge extent of public interest in their work
Research groups who want to know what is creating public interest
Repository managers to know how research output is being used
Research managers to know how their institution is being discussed
Funding agencies and research partners interested in public impact
Anyone interested in seeing the impact of publicly-funded research
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8. Altmetric.com bookmarklet
http://www.youtube.com/v/_Alsg7AyrhM
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9. Altmetrics for publishers and repositories
https://www.youtube.com/v/XE8hDetxEt0#t=18
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10. Altmetric.com Explorer
Free to librarians!
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11. Altmetric.com embeddable badges
Examples of embeddable badges:
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12. Altmetric for Scopus
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13. Altmetric.com API (example from Nature.com)
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14. ImpactStory.org
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15. ImpactStory.org
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16. ImpactStory.org
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17. PlumAnalytics.com PlumX
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18. Can also search by Groups & Individuals
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19. Future of altmetrics?
• Due to growing use of social media to share research outputs,
altmetrics will continue gaining prominence in measuring impact
• Aggregators and users will continue collaborating to refine altmetrics
web apps and develop more group and institutional reporting tools
• Standards need to be developed on collection and use of altmetrics,
e.g. NISO to Develop Standards for Altmetrics
• Altmetrics need to be incorporated into a systems approach to
tracking and recording research impact!
Under cooperative games, players can coordinate their strategies
and share the payoff
(John C.S. Lui, Chinese University of Hong Kong)
http://www.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~cslui/CSC6480/cooperative_game.pdf
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20. Pond mentality
Is it worth the time of
the researcher or the
research manager?
Institutional
Repositories
Impact
Narratives
Citation
Databases
Researcher
Publishing
Platforms
Altmetrics
Social
Research
Networks
We need to work smart,
not hard, when it comes
to reporting impact
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21. Systems approach to altmetrics
• Altmetrics can be harvested by third-party systems:
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Institutional repositories
Research information management systems
Research profiling systems
Open Access and commercial publishers
• Altmetrics are more useful in concert with:
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Other impact metrics
Narrative impact data
A system that pulls everything together and generates internal/external reports
A system that can be set up to export data to a public profiling system
A system that saves the time of researchers and research management staff
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22. Altmetrics in a national profiling system?
Research visibility promises better returns than research evaluation!
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Cooperation will increase visibility and impact for all players
Aim is to increase cooperation, collaboration and productivity
Reporting by field, region, institution, program, group & individual
Would aggregate data from ponds and facilitate impact narrative
Create capacity not competition
(Pat Loria)
Image: http://www.theclimatecup.eu/articles-mostra-2279-eng-competition.htm
Image: http://www.laurelfelt.org/cooperation/
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23. In the meantime...
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Faculty liaison librarians can instruct researchers in altmetrics
Researchers should think about having a research impact strategy
Research managers should take deeper and broader view of impact
Funding agencies to contemplate impact statement in final reports
Research evaluation exercises should broaden definition of impact
Altmetricians could develop metrics to measure research openness
O-index = ??
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24. Thank You
Twitter: @pat_loria
Email: ploria@csu.edu.au
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