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The role of trade literature in the communication system

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Abstract

Bibliometric methods in general undervalue technological research. This study examines the relation in literature between technological/industrial journals and scientific journals in the case of the plastics industry and polymer science. Trade-journals cannot be used in a straightforward bibliometric manner, but can be an aid in mapping the different groups and reveal the ‘hidden’ communication between technological and scientific communities.

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Notes and references

  1. The same holds for the way patents cite scientific literature, cf.Evaluation of National Performance in Basic Research, ABRC Science Policy Studies No. 1, Department of Education and Science, (1986) 237.

  2. Interview with the editor, April 1986.

  3. L. LEYDESDORFF, The development of frames of references,Scientometrics, 9 (1986) 103.

  4. This metaphor is used in the sense that when journal A cites articles from journal B, A receives information from B. Citations, however, have more than a communicative function only. A too literal interpretation of this metaphor is therefore dangerous, but it does help to understand the arrows in the figures.

  5. S. ZELDENRUST,Trends in Polymer Science, forthcoming.

  6. S. ZELDENRUST, op. cit. not 9Trends in Polymer Science, forthcoming.

  7. L. LEYDESDORFF, op. cit. note 7. The development of frames of references,Scientometrics, 9 (1986) 103.

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  8. L. LEYDESDORFF, op. cit. note 7. The development of frames of references,Scientometrics, 9 (1986) 103.

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  9. One possible explanation for the appearance ofModern Plastics among the chemical journals might well lie in the difference in language compared with the ‘general’ trade journals (nrs. 1, 2, 3, 12, 13), which are all in German. Note however, that the Germanscientific journals (nrs. 9, 18, 22, 23) are regularly included in the groups of English scientific journals.

  10. S. ZELDENRUST, op. cit. note 9.Trends in Polymer Science, forthcoming.

  11. Translated from Dutch; H. VAN DEN BELT and A. RIP,Technologie-ontwikkeling: het Nelson-Winter/Dosi-Model, LISBON/R-84/21, Leiden, (1984). See also: H. VAN DEN BELT, and A. RIP, ‘The Nelson-Winter/Dosi model and Synthetic Dye Chemistry’, in W. E. BIJKER, T. P. HUGHESAND, T. J. PINCH (Eds),The Social Construction of Technological Systems. New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology, Cambridge, MA:MIT Press, 1987.

  12. W. TURNER, M. CALLON, State intervention in academic and industrial research: The case of macromolecular chemistry in France, in: M. CALLON, J. LAW, A. RIP (Eds),Mapping the Dynamics of Science and Technology, London, Macmillan, 1986, p. 144.

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Van Steijn, F., Rip, A. The role of trade literature in the communication system. Scientometrics 13, 81–91 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02017176

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