A Measure of Total Research Impact Independent of Time and Discipline

Abstract

Authorship and citation practices evolve with time and differ by academic discipline. As such, indicators of research productivity based on citation records are naturally subject to historical and disciplinary effects. We observe these effects on a corpus of astronomer career data constructed from a database of refereed publications. We employ a simple mechanism to measure research output using author and reference counts available in bibliographic databases to develop a citation-based indicator of research productivity. The total research impact (tori) quantifies, for an individual, the total amount of scholarly work that others have devoted to his/her work, measured in the volume of research papers. A derived measure, the research impact quotient (riq), is an age-independent measure of an individual's research ability. We demonstrate that these measures are substantially less vulnerable to temporal debasement and cross-disciplinary bias than the most popular current measures. The proposed measures of research impact, tori and riq, have been implemented in the Smithsonian/NASA Astrophysics Data System.

Citation classics in neurointerventional research: a bibliometric analysis of the 100 most cited articles

“…Generally, scientific articles are not cited until one or two years after publication, reach a peak after 3–10 years, and show a decreasing trend thereafter 19. This pattern of citations in scientific literature may result in underestimation of recently published articles irrespective of their actual impact 20. To overcome this problem we used an alternative measure of citations, which was calculated by dividing the total number of citations by the number of years and months since publication.…”

Research productivity of doctor of physical therapy faculty promoted in the southeastern United States

“…While there is much discussion as to the nature of these measures as valid means of determining productivity, this article only attempts to measure these often used metrics to compare the results against recognized standards in other professions and previous publications of research productivity [4,5]. However, it should be noted that citation rates and article visibility, along with the number of co-authors and the curation of journal publications can vary greatly between fields, disciplines, and sub-disciplines [4]. As physical therapy programs and departments incorporate a broad, interdisciplinary approach – which is reflected in their faculty’s degrees, credentials, age, experience in academia, and resource availability – these issues may be valid points of concern especially when considering promotion.…”

Searching the Footprints of Pioneers on Neurology: A Bibliometric Analysis

“…There were inherent limitations in the current citation classics, such as debate regarding the value of citation rates [40]. In addition, the method of the use of the total citations favors older publications and older journals [40].…”

“…In addition, the method of the use of the total citations favors older publications and older journals [40]. The citation of a scientific article usually follows a time lapse and is usually not cited until 1-2 years after publication, reaches a peak after 3-10 years, and then declines [40].…”

“…However, reviewing articles that are cited frequently can provide information about the dominant areas of a discipline and highlight the growth of particular fields as well as the work that influences clinical practices the most. In addition, the impact factor, which is a marker of citations, is widely used to indicate the importance of a given journal in its specific field of interest, and has emerged as a marker of the quality and rank of journals [40]. …”