The document provides an overview of bibliometrics, covering key metrics like citation counts, impact factors, and the Hirsch index, essential for understanding scholarly influence and research quality. It highlights the limitations and concerns associated with impact factors and suggests exercises for practical application using tools like Web of Science and Scopus. The session aims to enhance understanding of these metrics to improve scholarly communication and research evaluation.

1. A bit on bibliometrics
Science Librarian
Rachel Henderson
(CHE / PHA / CMP / MTH)
Rachel.Henderson@uea.ac.uk
Jane Helgesen
Information Skills Librarian
j.helgesen@uea.ac.uk

2. Session aims
Why do you need to know this?
Introduction to terminology
Exploring the resources

3. Why do you need to know this?
Scholarly communication: tracing the history and
evolution of ideas from one scholar to another
Can be seen to measure the scholarly influence of
articles; journals; scholars
Used with other factors in UK Research Excellence
Framework (REF) to determine importance of
research and award money to the institution

4. Garfield’s metrics
Eugene Garfield: ‘Father of citation analysis’
developed the first bibliometric index tools
Citation count
Impact factor
Immediacy Index
Citation Half-life

5. Citation count
Number of times cited within a give time period
Author
Journal
Does not take into account materials outside of
citation database so differs depending on source

6. Exercise
Web of Science subject search – sort by ‘Times
cited’

7. Impact factor
Measures ‘impact’ of a journal (not an article) within a
given subject
Formula is a ratio:
Number of citations to a journal in a given year
for articles occurring in previous 2 years.
DIVIDED BY
number of scholarly articles published in the
journal during those 2 years
So 2011 JIF = Citations in 2011 to articles published
2009-10 / articles published 2009-10

8. Exercise
Look at Journal Citation Reports for a journal that
you use
Find via Web of Science /Additional Resources

9. Concerns with impact factor
Can’t be used to compare cross disciplinary due to
different rates of publication & citation
2 year time frame not adequate for non-scientific
disciplines (has been adjusted to 3-5 years)
Coverage of some disciplines not sufficient in the
ISI databases
Reviews will cite more – journals may include more
to boost impact factor
Doesn’t measure individual researcher’s impact
Is a measure of ‘impact’ a measure of quality?

10. Immediacy index - definition
What it’s supposed to measure: how quickly
articles in a given journal have an impact on the
discipline
Formula: the average number of times an article in
a journal in a given year was cited in that same year

11. Citation half-life - definition
What it’s supposed to measure: Long-term
relevance of articles in a given journal
Formula: median age of articles cited for a
particular journal in a given year

12. Hirsch (H) index
What it’s supposed to measure: Productivity of an
individual, group or institution
Formula: H value is equal to the number of papers
(n) that have n or more citations
It will vary depending on the index database journal
coverage
Biased against early-career researchers as won’t
have had time to be so productive – but study by
Hirsch suggests it’s a predictor of future quality
output

13. H index - exercise
Scopus Author Identifier
WoS author finder

14. Altmetrics
Uses web stats to provide more detailed assessment
of online activity – beyond citations
Use of open data
Blog/twitter mentions
http://altmetrics.org/manifesto/

15. References & websites
EYSENBACH, G. 2011. Can Tweets Predict Citations?
Metrics of Social Impact Based on Twitter and Correlation
with Traditional Metrics of Scientific Impact. J Med
Internet Res [Online]. Available:
http://www.jmir.org/2011/4/e123/.
VAN RAAN, A. F. J. 2006. Comparison of the Hirsch-index
with standard bibliometric indicators and with peer
judgment for 147 chemistry research groups.
Scientometrics, 67, 491-502.
WILLIAMS, G. 2007. Should we ditch impact factors? BMJ,
334, 568-568.
http://www.cwts.nl/ranking/LeidenRankingWebSite.html
http://www.uea.ac.uk/is/collections/researchsupport/Biblio
http://www.ndlr.ie/myri/index.html

16. Thanks to Elaine Bergman who gave permission
for content to be used from
http://www.slideshare.net/librarian68/bibliometric
s-primer
We welcome feedback on this session - did you
find out what you needed to know?