Scientific elite revisited: patterns of productivity, collaboration, authorship and impact

Li, Jichao; Yin, Yian; Fortunato, Santo; Wang, Dashun

doi:10.1098/rsif.2020.0135

Cited by 61 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 58 publications

(138 reference statements)

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“…According to the authors, this emphasizes the importance of developing science policies to support diverse team sizes. These results are consistent with another study showing that prize-winning papers of Nobel laureates are more likely to be written by less than three authors (Li et al, 2020). Contrasted with the findings in this study, this suggests that the research of the HCRs is of a particular kind and does not represent the entire spectre of major scientific achievements.…”

Section: Research Papersupporting

confidence: 90%

Lone Geniuses or One among Many? An Explorative Study of Contemporary Highly Cited Researchers

Aksnes

Aagaard²

2021

Journal of Data and Information Science

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PurposeThe ranking lists of highly cited researchers receive much public attention. In common interpretations, highly cited researchers are perceived to have made extraordinary contributions to science. Thus, the metrics of highly cited researchers are often linked to notions of breakthroughs, scientific excellence, and lone geniuses.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, we analyze a sample of individuals who appear on Clarivate Analytics’ Highly Cited Researchers list. The main purpose is to juxtapose the characteristics of their research performance against the claim that the list captures a small fraction of the researcher population that contributes disproportionately to extending the frontier and gaining—on behalf of society—knowledge and innovations that make the world healthier, richer, sustainable, and more secure.FindingsThe study reveals that the highly cited articles of the selected individuals generally have a very large number of authors. Thus, these papers seldom represent individual contributions but rather are the result of large collective research efforts conducted in research consortia. This challenges the common perception of highly cited researchers as individual geniuses who can be singled out for their extraordinary contributions. Moreover, the study indicates that a few of the individuals have not even contributed to highly cited original research but rather to reviews or clinical guidelines. Finally, the large number of authors of the papers implies that the ranking list is very sensitive to the specific method used for allocating papers and citations to individuals. In the “whole count” methodology applied by Clarivate Analytics, each author gets full credit of the papers regardless of the number of additional co-authors. The study shows that the ranking list would look very different using an alternative fractionalised methodology.Research limitationsThe study is based on a limited part of the total population of highly cited researchers.Practical implicationsIt is concluded that “excellence” understood as highly cited encompasses very different types of research and researchers of which many do not fit with dominant preconceptions.Originality/valueThe study develops further knowledge on highly cited researchers, addressing questions such as who becomes highly cited and the type of research that benefits by defining excellence in terms of citation scores and specific counting methods.

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Section: Research Papersupporting

confidence: 90%

Lone Geniuses or One among Many? An Explorative Study of Contemporary Highly Cited Researchers

Aksnes

Aagaard²

2021

Journal of Data and Information Science

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“…Kademani et al ( 2005 ) state that the Nobel Prize is awarded for an outstanding contribution carried out by scientists in a particular field of scientific activity which will have an everlasting impact and create altogether new fields for research; obviously the Nobel Prize is not gained by authors with a high publication productivity. According to Li, Yin, Fortunato and Wang ( 2020 ), the Nobelists' careers before winning the prize follow relatively similar patterns to those of ordinary scientists, being characterized by hot streaks and increasing reliance on collaborations.…”

Section: Much Publishing Is Not Strictly Necessarymentioning

confidence: 99%

Letter to the Editor: publish, publish … cursed!

Cano

2021

Scientometrics

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This paper comments on the phenomenon of “publish or perish” associated with the current information explosion and its awful consequence: the curse that hangs over academia which dooms it to publish incessantly irrelevant and pointless documents. The overabundance of publications is not justified and is not even necessary in many contexts for personal promotion, and even less for the advancement of science. Therefore, the current role of scientific journals is highly questionable that its aim could be misleading. Huge numbers of articles are published, but they are not read because the aim is principally “publish for publish,” or publication for its own sake. The standard corrective tool for improving scientific communication—peer review—cannot function adequately, and biases and perversions are introduced which undermine society’s confidence in the scientific enterprise. A dark landscape unfurls itself across the world of scientific information, forcing us to question and improve its current state. Methodologically this paper goes halfway between the essay and the review trying to provoke engaged and useful controversy.

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“…In fact, many researchers have paid attention to the patterns of particular groups (e.g., Nobel Prize laureates [16][17][18][19] and Highly Cited Researchers [6,7,23]) to boost…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using context-dependent DEA to analyze the efficiency of highly funded scientists in China

Xiang

Liang

Guo

et al. 2021

Complex Intell. Syst.

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Funding inputs and research outputs have always been two central issues in the science of science. In recent decades, research funding plays an increasingly important role in scientific research. Thus, it is progressively significant for management authorities to measure the research efficiency of highly funded scientists, which can be helpful for them to make effective policies. However, few researchers use quantitative analysis to study these issues. To promote the research in this field, we begin with collecting a dataset. This dataset contains research funding and other information from 345 highly funded scientists in Mainland China. Next, we use the dataset to measure the efficiency of highly funded scientists based on the data envelopment analysis. In this way, highly funded scientists are placed into several levels according to their research inputs and outputs. We also give their attractiveness and progress scores compared to other grades. The learning path for less efficient scientists is also provided. We find that highly funded scientists have relatively high efficiency in three kinds of projects, such as the Major Research Plan. Besides, the career length and career start year are demonstrated to have a limited impact on the highly funded scientists. These patterns are beneficial for the development of the scientific community and management authorities to make policies.

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Scientific elite revisited: patterns of productivity, collaboration, authorship and impact

Cited by 61 publications

References 58 publications

Lone Geniuses or One among Many? An Explorative Study of Contemporary Highly Cited Researchers

Lone Geniuses or One among Many? An Explorative Study of Contemporary Highly Cited Researchers

Letter to the Editor: publish, publish … cursed!

Using context-dependent DEA to analyze the efficiency of highly funded scientists in China

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