Abstract
It has been observed that Southeast Asian countries and universities have ranked poorly in global research productivity and impact. The same is true for the field of language and linguistics. Some studies revealed that productivity and citation patterns in this field are lower compared to other fields of study. Thus, this study sought to examine the research performance of SEA countries and universities in the field of language and linguistics for efficient policy-making. The research performance of each SEA country and university was assessed through Scopus database using the following bibliometric indicators: total number of publications (P), total number of citations excluding self-citations (C), citations per publication (CPP), percent of non-cited articles (%PNC), and h-index. Findings revealed that SEA countries have only produced almost 2 % of all published articles in language and linguistics and around 1 % share in overall worldwide field citations. Interestingly, both the SEA countries and universities exhibit a trend toward increasing their yearly research productivity and citations. However, research productivity and citations in the field of language and linguistics are dominated by selected universities in each country particularly in Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines. This study has implications for research policy-making and future studies.
References
Abramo, G., Cicero, T., & D’Angelo, C. A. (2012). The dispersion of research performance within and between universities as a potential indicator of the competitive intensity in higher education systems. Journal of Informetrics, 6(2), 155–168.
Arik, E. (2015). A bibliometric analysis of linguistics in Web of Science. Journal of Scientometric Research, 4(1), 20–28.
Bornmann, L., & Marx, W. (2014). How to evaluate individual researchers working in the natural and life sciences meaningfully? A proposal of methods based on percentiles of citations. Scientometrics, 98(1), 487–509.
Braun, T., Glänzel, W., & Schubert, A. (2006). A Hirsch-type index for journals. Scientometrics, 69(1), 169–173.
Cerovšek, T., & Mikoš, M. (2014). A comparative study of cross-domain research output and citations: Research impact cubes and binary citation frequencies. Journal of Informetrics, 8(1), 147–161.
Chan, K. C., Tong, J. Y., & Zhang, F. F. (2013). Accounting research in the Asia-Pacific region: An update. Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, 41(4), 675–694.
Chen, C., Lo, H. L., Tzeng, P. C., Chiu, Y. W., Chiu, W. T., & Kuo, K. N. (2010). Comparison of the increasing number of published systematic reviews in selected countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Journal of Experimental & Clinical Medicine, 2(2), 79–86.
Deem, R., Mok, K. H., & Lucas, L. (2008). Transforming higher education in whose image? Exploring the concept of the ‘world-class’ university in Europe and Asia. Higher Education Policy, 21(1), 83–97.
DeMaria, A. (2009). Research productivity among nations. Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 54(25), 2460–2462.
Erfanmanesh, M., Jahromi, R. B., Hosseini, E., & Gholamhosseinzadeh, Z. (2013). Scientific productivity, impact and collaboration of the top Asian countries in Scopus during 1996–2010. COLLNET Journal of Scientometrics and Information Management, 7(1), 97–110.
Ezema, I. J., & Asogwa, B. E. (2014). Citation analysis and authorship patterns of two linguistics journals. portal: Libraries and the Academy, 14(1), 67–85.
Ezema, I. J., & Ugwuanyi, C. F. (2014). Application of citation analysis in the development of core Nigerian Languages Texts in Nigeria University Libraries. Library Philosophy and Practice. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/1131/.
Genoni, P., & Haddow, G. (2009). ERA and the ranking of Australian humanities journals. Australian Humanities Review, 46, 7–26.
Georgas, H., & Cullars, J. (2005). A citation study of the characteristics of the linguistics literature. College & Research Libraries, 66(6), 496–516.
Gholizadeh, H., Salehi, H., Embi, M. A., Danaee, M., Ordi, A., Tanha, F., et al. (2014). Economic growth and internet usage impact on publication productivity among ASEAN’s and world’s best universities. Modern Applied Science, 8(5), 169–178.
Gupta, B. M., & Mahesh, G. (2013). A comparative analysis of social sciences research publications in four South Asian countries. Library Philosophy and Practice. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libphilprac/956/.
Hicks, D. (2012). Performance-based university research funding systems. Research Policy, 41(2), 251–261.
Hirsch, J. E. (2005). An index to quantify an individual’s scientific research output. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 102(46), 16569–16572.
Jacso, P. (2008). Testing the calculation of a realistic h-index in Google Scholar, Scopus, and Web of Science for FW Lancaster. Library Trends, 56(4), 784–815.
Jacsó, P. (2009). The h-index for countries in Web of Science and Scopus. Online Information Review, 33(4), 831–837.
Kliegl, R., & Bates, D. (2011). International collaboration in psychology is on the rise. Scientometrics, 87, 149–158.
Lee, M. N. (2003). The academic profession in Malaysia and Singapore: Between bureaucratic and corporate cultures. In P. Altbach (Ed.), The decline of the guru (pp. 135–165). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Lek, D. (2014). Cross border higher education in ASEAN: Structures, policies, development and integration. In ASEAN-Canada Research Partnership Working Paper Series (Vol. 4, pp. 1–26).
Levine, T. R. (2010). Rankings and trends in citation patterns of communication journals. Communication Education, 59(1), 41–51.
Marginson, S., & Van der Wende, M. (2007). To rank or to be ranked: The impact of global rankings in higher education. Journal of Studies in International Education, 11(3–4), 306–329.
Meho, L. I., & Yang, K. (2007). Impact of data sources on citation counts and rankings of LIS faculty: Web of Science versus Scopus and Google Scholar. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(13), 2105–2125.
Nederhof, A. J. (2011). A bibliometric study of productivity and impact of modern language and literature research. Research Evaluation, 20(2), 117–129.
Nguyen, T. V., & Pham, L. T. (2011). Scientific output and its relationship to knowledge economy: An analysis of ASEAN countries. Scientometrics, 89(1), 107–117.
Organisation for Economic Co-operation, Development (OECD). (2004). Internationalisation and trade in higher education: Opportunities and challenges. Paris: OECD.
Prathap, G. (2006). Hirsch-type indices for ranking institutions’ scientific research output. Current Science, 91, 1439–1440.
Radev, D. R., Joseph, M. T., Gibson, B., & Muthukrishnan, P. (2016). A bibliometric and network analysis of the field of computational linguistics. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 67(3), 683–706.
Rubdy, R., & Tupas, T. R. F. (2009). Research in applied linguistics and language teaching and learning in Singapore (2000–2007). Language Teaching, 42(03), 317–340.
Scopus. (2015). Content. https://www.elsevier.com/solutions/scopus/content.
Sombatsompop, N., Markpin, T., Ratchatahirun, P., Yochai, W., Ittiritmeechai, S., Premkamolnetr, N., et al. (2011). Research productivity and impact of ASEAN countries and universities in the field of energy and fuel. Malaysian Journal of Library & Information Science, 16(1), 35–46.
Tijssen, R. J., Van Leeuwen, T. N., & Van Wijk, E. (2009). Benchmarking university-industry research cooperation worldwide: Performance measurements and indicators based on co-authorship data for the world’s largest universities. Research Evaluation, 18(1), 13–24.
van Raan, A. F. J. (2003). The use of bibliometric analysis in research performance assessment and monitoring of interdisciplinary scientific developments. Technikfolgenabschätzung: Theorie und Praxis, 12(1), 20–29.
Vergidis, P. I., Karavasiou, A. I., Paraschakis, K., Bliziotis, I. A., & Falagas, M. E. (2005). Bibliometric analysis of global trends for research productivity in microbiology. European Journal of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, 24(5), 342–346.
Vinluan, L. R. (2011). Research productivity in education and psychology in the Philippines and comparison with ASEAN countries. Scientometrics, 91(1), 277–294.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Barrot, J.S. Research impact and productivity of Southeast Asian countries in language and linguistics. Scientometrics 110, 1–15 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-016-2163-3
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-016-2163-3