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Comparison of citation and usage indicators in research assessment in scientific disciplines and journals

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Abstract

Proceeding from the results of an earlier pilot study usage and citation impact data from the 2013 annual volume of the Web of Science Core Collection were collected and used to build indicators. Besides basic indicators on citation impact, usage counts and international collaboration, we applied the method of Characteristic Scores and Scales to analyse the distributions of citations and usage counts to further test the relation between the usage and citation impact. The results could confirm and extend the results of the previous study to a larger set of subjects and countries. In addition, a new journal metric, the Journals Usage Index, is proposed to supplement journal impact measures by a usage based index.

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Fig. 1
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Fig. 3

Data sourced from Clarivate Analytics Web of Science Core Collection

Fig. 4

Data sourced from Clarivate Analytics Web of Science Core Collection

Fig. 5

Data sourced from Clarivate Analytics Web of Science Core Collection

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Acknowledgements

This paper is an extended version of a previous work presented at the 16th ISSI Conference in Wuhan, China (Chi and Glänzel 2017b). The authors thank Clarivate Analytics for providing usage data of the 2013 annual volume of the Web of Science Core Collection.

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Correspondence to Pei-Shan Chi.

Appendix

Appendix

Key to country abbreviations

Country

ISO code

Chart key

Australia

AUS

A

Belgium

BEL

B

Brazil

BRA

R

Denmark

DNK

K

France

FRA

F

Germany

DEU

D

India

IND

I

Iran

IRN

N

Israel

ISR

L

China PR

CHN

C

Poland

POL

P

Singapore

SGP

G

South Africa

ZAF

Z

Switzerland

CHE

H

USA

USA

U

Key to subject abbreviations

Field code

Major field

Field code

Sub-field

A

Agriculture & Environment

A1

Agricultural Engineering

B

Biosciences

B2

Cell Biology

C

Chemistry

C1

Analytical, Inorganic & Nuclear Chemistry

E

Engineering

E2

Electrical & Electronic Engineering

G

Geosciences & Space Sciences

G1

Astronomy & Astrophysics

H

Mathematics

H2

Pure Mathematics

I

Clinical and Experimental Medicine I

I1

Cardiovascular & Respiratory Medicine

L

Social Sciences II

L1

Business, Economics, Planning

M

Clinical and Experimental Medicine II

M4

Ophthalmology/Otolaryngology

N

Neuroscience & Behavior

N2

Psychology & Behavioral Sciences

P

Physics

P5

Particle & Nuclear Physics

R

Biomedical Research

R1

Anatomy & Morphology

Y

Social Sciences I

Y2

Sociology & Anthropology

Z

Biology

Z3

Microbiology

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Chi, PS., Glänzel, W. Comparison of citation and usage indicators in research assessment in scientific disciplines and journals. Scientometrics 116, 537–554 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-018-2708-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-018-2708-8

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