How altmetrics can help researchers broaden the reach of their work Slides from workshop to pepnet (Public Engagement network) at the University of Leeds on 28th November 2018

1. Public Engagement While You Sleep?
How altmetrics can help researchers broaden
the reach of their work
Kirsten Thompson (OD&PL)
@iamKirstenT
Nick Sheppard (Library)
0000-0002-3400-0274
@mrnick | @OpenResLeeds

2. Overview
What are altmetrics?
Why do they matter?
Altmetrics VS traditional methods
Limitations of altmetrics
Story of a research paper
Making the most of altmetrics (without Altmetrics Explorer)
Manage it locally to share it globally: RDM and Wikimedia
Commons

3. What are altmetrics?

4. What are altmetrics?
What do you already know?
Several providers
• Plum analytics (Elsevier)
• Impact story (non-profit)
• Altmetric.com (Digital Science)

5. Altmetric.com
To track the online attention for a specific piece of research
Altmetric.com needs:
An output
(journal article,
dataset etc)
An identifier
attached to the
output (DOI)
Mentions in a
source we track

6. Research outputs and persistent identifiers
Journal
articles
Datasets Reports / grey
literature
Theses
University
repository
White Rose
Research
Online (WRRO)
Research Data
Leeds (RDL)
In scope for
WRRO
White Rose
Etheses Online
Canonical No Yes N/A Yes
DOI Publisher
allocated
(Crossref)
Library
allocated
(Datacite)
No DOI* Coming 2019
ORCID Yes Yes ? ?
Download stats Yes Yes ? Yes
Tracked by
altmetric.com
Yes Yes No** Not yet
* UoL Library can allocate and mint DOIs for grey literature
** Unless allocated DOI and archived in WRRO

7. The colours of the Donut

8. What is the Donut?
Volume Sources Authors
Score increases the
more people/
sources mention it.
Only count one
mention per
person/ source
Mention
contribution based
on relative reach of
source
e.g. New York Times
vs Trade publication
Who mentions?
Author of record /
publishing journal?
e.g. science
communicator >
journal sharing
same link
Global warming and recurrent
mass bleaching of corals
http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/12
3989/

9. Mention type Weight Points
News 8
Blogs 5
Twitter 1
Facebook 0.25
Sina Weibo 1
Wikipedia 3
Policy Documents (per source) 3
Patents 3
Q&A 0.25
F1000/ Publons/ Pubpeer 1
YouTube 0.25
Reddit/Pinterest 0.25

10. Typical timeline of attention

11. Why do they matter?

12. We rely on filters to make sense of the scholarly literature,
but the narrow, traditional filters are being swamped.
However, the growth of new, online scholarly tools allows us
to make new filters; these altmetrics reflect the broad, rapid
impact of scholarship in this burgeoning ecosystem. We call
for more tools and research based on altmetrics.
Jason Priem, Altmetrics manifesto (2010)
No-one can read everything

13. How does academic
research change and
benefit the economy,
society, culture, public
policy and services,
health, the environment
or quality of life?

14. What are the goals of research?
Quality Engagement Impact
The
scholarship is
robust
• Stands up to
scrutiny
• Can be
replicated
It reaches the
right people
• Other
researchers
• Policy makers
• Practitioners
• The public
It makes a difference
• Advances the field in
some small way
• Changes the way
people think or
approach an issue
• Changes practice

15. Demonstrating impact
RESEARCHERS
Report on impact
to funders,
institutions,
research
assessments and
understand how
their work is
received and used.
FUNDERS
Understand the
reach of funded
research
outputs and
improve and
monitor public
engagement
activities.
PUBLISHERS
Help researchers and
editors extend the
short- and long-term
reach of their
research. Understand
where content is being
discussed and shared.

16. Defining impact
Journal citations? Article citations?Author citations?
News | Blogs | Social media | Twitter | Facebook | Wikipedia

17. The democratization of
knowledge is the acquisition
and spread of knowledge
amongst the common people,
not just privileged elites such as
clergy and academics.
Libraries, in particular public
libraries, and modern digital
technology such as the internet
play a key role, as they provide
the masses with open access
to information. Wikipedia
You can’t trust Wikipedia (can you?)

18. You can’t trust Wikipedia (can you?)
English Wikipedia
•5,754,137 articles
(562 new articles
per day)
•46,383,080 pages
•864,805,170 edits
•301 language
editions
https://tools.wmflabs.org/pageviews/?project=en.wikipedi
a.org&platform=all-access&agent=user&start=2018-10-
26&end=2018-11-26&pages=Brexit%7CGlobal_warming
PM updates HoC on
Brexit negotiations
Trump on climate
change report “I don’t
believe it”

19. Wikipedia and the academy
• The age of “fake news”
• Responsibility to contribute to “global
commons”?
Wikipedian in Residence
• University of Edinburgh
• Bodleian at Oxford
You can’t trust Wikipedia (can you?)

20. Beyond compliance
•Democratization of knowledge
•Science communication
•Impact
–Wikipedia 6th referrer of DOI clicks in
2015/2016
•Around 1000 DOIs associated with University
of Leeds cited across Wikipedia [18 October
2017 - data source Almetric.com]
•Only 96 links to records in WRRO (Open
Access)
•referrals from Wikipedia significant

21. Altmetrics VS traditional

22. •Citation count & h-index
•Journal Impact Factor (JIF)
•Only report academic engagement
Traditional metrics
Nobel winner declares boycott of top science journals (Guardian 2013)

23. Altmetrics help expand our view of
research attention, enabling
researchers and organisations to
understand and report on broader
societal attention to their work
beyond academia and traditional
citation metrics.
What’s the alternative?
Article level rather than journal level

24. Problems with traditional metrics
2. SCOPE
Broader
engagement
and use not
captured.
3. ACCESSIBILITY
Empowering
readers, editors,
authors, etc.
1. NARROW
Not all research is
cited in traditional
journals.
Altmetrics track any digital object produced
in the research lifecycle

25. Altmetrics
ALTMETRICS
Immediate
TRADITIONAL
METRICS
Often slow to
accrue
(2-5 years)
citations

26. Exercise

27. The Altmetric Explorer
NOTE: Leeds University does not currently subscribe to this
service.
FOR DEMONSTRATION PURPOSES ONLY

28. Go to:
Altmetricexplorer.com
/login
Login credentials:
Username:
charlotte+leeds
@altmetric.com
Password:
oa1eeds2018
charlotte+leeds@altmetric.com
exp29nov18

29. Limitations of altmetrics

30. Limitations of altmetrics
• Altmetrics don’t tell the whole story: altmetrics are a
complement to, not a replacement for, things like informed
peer review and citation-based metrics.
• Like any metric, there’s a potential for gaming:
providers have measures in place to identify and correct
for gaming. Look at the underlying qualitative data.
• Altmetrics are relatively new: though we’re learning a lot
about how often research is shared online, we don’t yet
know a lot about why – more research is needed.
Always look at what people are saying
And not just at the numbers
Attention doesn’t = quality

31. Story of a research paper

32. Heading
Text
• Date of acceptance: 16 Feb 2017
• Date of publication: 16 March 2017
• Date deposited to WRRO: 20 Nov 2017
• Date released from embargo: 16 Sep 2017
• Date cited on Wikipedia: 12 Jan 2018
• OA link added to Wikipedia: 22 Nov 2018

33. Heading
• News (New York Times, TIME, Bury Times)
• Blogs (The Carbon Brief, Climate News Network)
• Policy Documents (Analysis & Policy Observatory (APO)
• Twitter - 2151 tweets / 1581 users / 5,272,219 followers
• Facebook – 31 public wall posts from 28 users
• Wikipedia (next slide)
• Dimensions (364 citations)

35. Making the most of altmetrics

36. Bookmarklet for researchers
Enhancing your publication strategy with Altmetric data and
tools
https://youtu.be/_Alsg7AyrhM

37. Using the Bookmarklet
https://www.bmj.com/content/344/bmj.e70

38. Increase the
visibility of your
research – use
social media
https://twitter.com/DavidCookeMD/status/1015967009274642432

39. Optimise your profiles
• Brand yourself
• What are
your keywords?
• Orchid ID
• Use hashtags
• Serve your
community
Join the conversation:
#WhyResearchersTweet
https://twitter.com/hashtag/whyresearcherstweet

40. Manage it locally
share it globally

41. Manage it locally to share it globally: RDM
and Wikimedia Commons
•First Data Management Engagement Award
–Sponsored by SPARC Europe, University
of Cambridge, Jisc
– http://www.rdmengagementaward.org/
•Link RDM with the open science movement
•Wikimedia suite of tools
–share openly licensed research material
via Wikimedia Commons
–can be used to improve Wikipedia

42. The Proposal
• Purpose: Link Research Data
Management (RDM) with the open
science movement via the Wikimedia
suite of tools.
•Editathon across the White Rose
Consortium focussed on a specific
subject and featuring academics from
each of the 3 universities (Leeds,
Sheffield and York).
https://sparceurope.org/download/2
906/ [PDF]
http://climate.leeds.ac.uk/the-
science-is-settled-exploring-
expert-views-on-climate-
communication/

43. Feedback
•“a good idea to select a topic of high public interest such as
climate science or conservation to stimulate more
researchers to share more research data”
•“outcomes are limited to participants of the day, thereby
limiting the potential impact”
•“It would have been helpful to have more information on
how to get researchers to attend”
•“Reviewers believe that there is high potential to transfer
this concept to others to hold similar events in the future
based on the same format were this written up as a case
study and guidelines made available.”
http://www.rdmengagementaward.org/

44. Alomari, Muhannad and Hogg, David C. and Cohn, Anthony
G. (2017) Leeds Robotic Commands. University of Leeds.
[Dataset] https://doi.org/10.5518/110
Example: Baxter the Robot

46. https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:ListFile
s/OAnick&ilshowall=1

47. What next?
• Short term
– Get upskilled!
– Wikimedia UK
– Local engagement
• Medium to long term
– Public Engagement strategy
– Wikipedian in Residence?
• Promote data as a scholarly output in its own right
– Repositories / DOIs
– Share publications AND underlying data
• Social media networks
– Twitter / blogs
– Wikipedia

48. My first editathon
• Women in Red - a project to add biographies
of women to Wikipedia
–6th December in Edinburgh
–meet with Wikimedian in Residence / wider
Library team
• Florence Bell
–Worked under William Astbury
–PhD awarded in 1939
–Recently digitised (http://bit.ly/2A63RVs)
–A PhD Student with X-ray vision
–https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florence_Bell
_(scientist)
• Engagement opportunity

49. Get involved

50. Get involved
To register your interest in
the project please use this
form:
RDM Engagement – we
need your help!
Find out more: we will email
you links to resources
relating to this session.

51. Further help and information
•Research Support
–https://library.leeds.ac.uk/info/1406/researcher_support
•Email
–research@library.leeds.ac.uk
–researchdataenquiries@leeds.ac.uk
•Tel: 0113 343 4554
•Twitter: @OpenResLeeds
•Getting Started with Social Media
https://www.sdduonline.leeds.ac.uk/socialmedia/development