Abstract
The ISI journal impact factor (JIF) is based on a sample that may represent half the whole-of-life citations to some journals, but a small fraction (<10%) of the citations accruing to other journals. This disproportionate sampling means that the JIF provides a misleading indication of the true impact of journals, biased in favour of journals that have a rapid rather than a prolonged impact. Many journals exhibit a consistent pattern of citation accrual from year to year, so it may be possible to adjust the JIF to provide a more reliable indication of a journal’s impact.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Decker, O., Brähler, E. (2001), Diskussion der Bewertung wissenschaftlicher Leistungen in den kultur- und sprachgebundenen Fächern in der Medizin. Z Klin Psychol Psychiatr Psychother, 49: 235–246.
Dong, P., Loh, M., Mondry, A. (2005), The ‘impact factor’ revisited. Biomedical Digital Libraries, 2: 7.
Egghe, L., Rousseau, R. (2000), Aging, obsolescence, impact, growth, and utilization: definitions and relations. JASIS, 51(11): 1004–1017.
Glänzel, W., Schoepflin, U. (1995), A bibliometric study on ageing and reception processes of scientific literature in the social sciences. Journal of Information Science, 21: 37–53.
Jacso, P. (2001), A deficiency in the algorithm for calculating the impact factor of scholarly journals: The journal impact factor. Cortex, 37(4): 590–594.
Jennings, C. (1998), Citation data: the wrong impact? Nature Neuroscience, 1(8):6 41–642.
Kaltenborn, K. F., Kuhn, K. (2004), The journal impact factor as a parameter for the evaluation of researchers and research. Revista Española de Enfermedades Digestivas, 96(7): 460–476.
Lange, L. L. (2002), The impact factor as a phantom: Is there a self-fulfilling prophecy effect of impact? Journal of Documentation, 58(2): 175–184.
Moed, H. F., VAN Leeuwen, T. N., Reedijk, J. (1998), A new classification system to describe the aging of scientific journals and their impact factors. Journal of Documentation, 54(4): 387–419.
Moed, H. F., VAN Leeuwen, T. N., Reedijk, J. (1999), Towards appropriate indicators of journal impact. Scientometrics, 46(3): 575–589.
Monastersky, R. (2005), The number that’s devouring science. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 52(8): A12, http://chronicle.com/free/v52/i08/08a01201.htm
Seglen, P. O. (1997), Why the impact factors of journals should not be used for evaluating research. British Medical Journal, 314: 498–502.
Sombatsompop, N., Markpin, T., Premkamolnetr, N. (2004), Making an equality of ISI impact factors for different subject fields. Scientometrics, 60: 217–235.
Van Leeuwen, T. N., Moed, H. F., Reedijk, J. (1999), Critical comments on Institute for Scientific Information impact factors: a sample of inorganic molecular chemistry journals. Journal of Information Science, 25(6):189–198.
Weingart, P. (2005), Impact of bibliometrics upon the science system: Inadvertent consequences? Scientometrics, 62(1): 117–131.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Vanclay, J.K. Bias in the journal impact factor. Scientometrics 78, 3–12 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-008-1778-4
Received:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-008-1778-4