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Evaluating obesity publications: from bibliometrics to altmetrics

  • Research article
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Journal of Diabetes & Metabolic Disorders Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

study the bibliometrics indicators of Iranian authors in the field of obesity and Correlation Comparison between conventional citation counts and altmetrics scores from 2005 to 2019.

Methods

The study uses bibliometric characteristics and altmetric analysis. Population consists of 5359 articles out of 8220 in the field of obesity which have specified Iran as the affiliated country and indexed by Scopus between 2005 to 2019. Citations was extracted from Scopus database and visualized bibliographic data by VOS viewer software version 17, as well as Altmetric Explorer was applied for altmetrics data. The spearman correlation was used to analyze distributions of altmetrics and citation. Statistical analysis was utilized using SPSS software version 17.

Results

According to altmetrics finding among 2221 articles, 90% of articles had focused on different social media. The major interaction of researches has taken place in Twitter respectively News and Facebook. a positive correlation (r = 0.31) has been found between citation and altmetrics. As a result, Institutes with the highest degree of co-authorship had the top 10 articles with the highest altmetrics score.

Conclusion

Depending on the degree of correlation suggest that altmetrics should be seen as complements to, rather than alternatives to citations. Altmetrics indicators will be very useful for health policymaking and aid them with identifying important factors driving altmetric events. Also it could help to reveal the hidden value of some medical papers. Our findings can help international communications for scientific collaboration at the level of business and health care industry, and emergency managers gain a comprehensive understanding of the research area.

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Data availability

Not applicable.

Notes

  1. This topic is explored completely at: https://help.altmetric.com/support/solutions/articles/6000233311-how-is-the-altmetric-attention-score-calculated-

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Acknowledgments

I would like to express my appreciation to Mrs. Hajipour who edited the main manuscript. A special gratitude I give to my professor Dr. Akbar Soltani for his contribution to stimulating suggestions and encouragement helped me to coordinate my project especially in writing this paper.

Funding

This study is performed with supporting funds by Endocrinology and Metabolism Clinical Research Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Evidence-Based Medicine Research Center, Endocrinology & Metabolism Research Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Azadeh Aletaha

  2. Ph.D. Candidate in Health Information science in Librarianship and Medical Information Department, Tehran, Iran

    Azadeh Aletaha

  3. Evidence-Based Medicine Research Center, Endocrinology and Metabolism Clinical Sciences Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Fifth floor, Shariati Hospital, Northern Kargar Ave, Tehran, 14114, Iran

    Akbar Soltani

  4. Ph.D. of knowledge & Information Science, Researcher in scientometric regards Altmetrics, Tehran, Iran

    Firoozeh Dokhani

Authors
  1. Azadeh Aletaha
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  2. Akbar Soltani
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  3. Firoozeh Dokhani
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Contributions

“AA participated in the design of the study, collected data, analyzed data, and wrote a draft of the manuscript. AS helped to write a draft of the manuscript. AS helped to write the search strategy. FD collected data and helped to write a draft of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Firoozeh Dokhani.

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The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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Appendix 1

Appendix 1

  • Search strategy in Scopus

((TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Body Mass Index”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (overweight) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (obesity) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Quetelet* Index”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist Circumference”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (bmi) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (adiposity) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Body Size”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Body Fat Distribution”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist-Hip Ratio”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist-Height Ratio”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist to Hip Ratio”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist Hip Ratio”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Waist to Height Ratio”) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (“Weight height Ratio”)) AND DOCTYPE (ar OR re) AND PUBYEAR >2004 AND PUBYEAR <2015) AND ((AFFILCOUNTRY (iran*) OR AFFILCOUNTRY (persia*) OR AFFILCOUNTRY (i.r.iran) OR AFFILCOUNTRY (i r iran)) AND DOCTYPE (ar OR re) AND PUBYEAR >2004 AND PUBYEAR <2015) AND (EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “CHEM”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “ENGI”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “CENG”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “VETE”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “ARTS”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “BUSI”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “MATE”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “MATH”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “PHYS”) OR EXCLUDE (SUBJAREA, “DECI”))

  • Search terms and protocol

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Aletaha, A., Soltani, A. & Dokhani, F. Evaluating obesity publications: from bibliometrics to altmetrics. J Diabetes Metab Disord 20, 391–405 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40200-021-00758-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40200-021-00758-7

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