Citation analysis and the development of science: A case study using articles by some Nobel prize winners

Abstract

Using citation data of articles written by some NobelPrize winners in physics, we show that concave, convex, and straight curves represent different types of interactions between old ideas and new insights. These cases illustrate different diffusion characteristics of academic knowledge, depending on the nature of the knowledge in the new publications. This work adds to the study of the development of science and links this development to citation analysis.

Selfish Memes: An Update of Richard Dawkins’ Bibliometric Analysis of Key Papers in Sociobiology

“…Hamilton's paper took 20 years to reach saturation, whilst Smith and Price's took 14 years and Trivers' took only 8 years. The remarkable similarity between the cumulative citation curves shown here is in marked contrast to the variation in curves shown in a study of Nobel-winning papers in physics [36]. Liu and Rousseau identified several different types of cumulative citation curve and argued that they reflect to some extent the dynamics of resistance to, and acceptance of, new ideas.…”

On the growth dynamics of citations of articles by some Nobel Prize winners

“…However, to assess whether unaccepted ideas can also give concave curves, cumulative citation data of the paper by Fleischmann and Pons (1989), abbreviated here as F-S, on unaccepted idea of cold fusion are also analyzed. The bibliometric data on the growth of cumulative citations L(t) with citation duration t are reported by Liu and Rousseau (2014).…”

“…However, using citation data of articles written by selected Chinese American Nobel prize winners in physics, Liu and Rousseau (2014) reported three types of cumulative citation L(t) plots: (1) normal S-shaped plots with initial convex curvature followed by concave curvature, (2) inverse S-shaped plots with initial concave curvature followed by convex curvature, and (3) linear plots of L(t) data. The above authors pointed out that these differences in the L(t) curves are representative of different types of interactions between old ideas and new insights and are associated with different diffusion and integration processes of scientific information necessary for the development of science.…”

“…It is well known that the cumulative number L(t) of various items (e.g., articles, journals and authors) in a database or citations of the publication output of an author initially increases rapidly with time, followed by a maximum level attained after a certain time, exhibiting an S-shaped curve (Avramescu, 1979;Bharathi, 2011;Egghe, Ravichandra Rao, & Rousseau, 1995;Gupta, 1990;Liu & Rousseau, 2014;Price, 1963;Sangwal, 2011aSangwal, , 2012a. Various models have been developed and applied over years to describe this growth behavior of items (Price, 1963;Egghe & Ravichandra Rao, 1992;Sangwal, 2011aSangwal, , 2012bWong & Goh, 2010).…”

“…The growth behavior of citations of the selected Nobel Prize winning articles and the relevant citation data have previously been described and discussed by Liu and Rousseau (2014).…”