{"id":1995,"date":"2013-11-04T08:46:17","date_gmt":"2013-11-04T08:46:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.editage.com\/insights\/using-citation-analysis-to-measure-research-impact\/"},"modified":"2025-01-15T06:45:31","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T06:45:31","slug":"using-citation-analysis-to-measure-research-impact","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.editage.com\/insights\/using-citation-analysis-to-measure-research-impact","title":{"rendered":"Using citation analysis to measure research impact"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The landscape of science and research is rapidly evolving. Gone are the days when all members of a university department would celebrate the successful publication of a colleague\u2019s paper.1<\/sup>\u00a0Earlier, scientists would simply consider the number of papers they had published as a measure of their academic standing. Today, the focus is increasingly shifting from whether a researcher has published a paper to where he\/she has published it and the impact that piece of research has on the scientific community and the world at large.2<\/sup>\u00a0

How can you measure the quality of a research paper? More importantly, how can you determine whether your research is making an impact and is considered important? An objective way is through citation analysis.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>
\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Citation<\/p>\n

Why count citations in the first place? The list of references directing readers to prior relevant research is considered a fundamental part of any research paper.<\/span>3<\/sup>\u00a0A reference or citation is a form of acknowledgment that one research paper gives to another. Research is additive\u2014scientists build on past work to discover new knowledge. To identify gaps in existing research and choose a research topic, researchers read the relevant published research and use this existing material as a foundation for arguments made in their own research papers.<\/span><\/p>\n

11 reasons to cite previous work<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. To direct readers to an authentic source of relevant information<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  2. To help other researchers trace the genealogy of your ideas<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  3. To acknowledge pioneers and peers<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  4. To direct readers to previously used methods, and equipment<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  5. To criticize or correct previous work<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  6. To substantiate your claims and arguments with evidence<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  7. To show that you have considered various opinions in framing your arguments<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  8. To highlight the originality of your work in the context of previous work<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  9. To guide other researchers in their work<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  10. To build your credibility as an author<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n
  11. Finally, because not citing sources can amount to plagiarism<\/span>4<\/sup><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    What are the various citation-based metrics?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

    Citation analyses can be grouped according to some broad types based on who\/what is being evaluated.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Ranking journals<\/span>: Journals are ranked by counting the number of times their papers are cited in other journals. Journal-level metrics are generally meant to serve as an indicator of journal prestige. The most well known of these is the journal impact factor, from Journal Citation Reports<\/span>\u00ae<\/sup>(a product of Thomson Reuters). The journal impact factor is calculated as the average number of citations all articles in a journal receive over a specific period of time.<\/span>5<\/sup><\/li>\n
    2. Ranking researchers<\/span>: Various citation metrics are now used for this purpose. Researchers are ranked by counting the number of times their individual papers are cited in other published studies. These metrics are also used to evaluate researchers for hiring, tenure, and grant decisions. A researcher-level metric that is gaining popularity is the h index,<\/span>6<\/sup>\u00a0which is calculated by considering a combination of the number of papers published by a researcher and the number of citations these papers have received.<\/span><\/li>\n
    3. Ranking articles<\/span>: Article-level citation counts may provide an accurate evaluation of the quality and impact of a specific piece of work, regardless of the author. Unfortunately though, such metrics are rarely considered because obtaining these data is tedious and time-consuming.<\/span>7<\/sup><\/li>\n
    4. Ranking universities and countries<\/span>: There are databases that rank universities and countries by considering their overall research output through criteria such as citable documents, citations per document, and total citations. These metrics help determine which universities and countries have the most and\/or best scientific output. For example, Scimago Research Group (<\/span>http:\/\/www.scimago.es\/<\/a>\u00a0) releases annual reports of institution- and country-wise rankings.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      How can citation analysis help you?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

      Researchers today are faced with increasing pressure to get published. Academic departments are expected to meet specific levels of publication output. Clearly, there is a lot at stake in the assessment of research quality for both individuals and institutions. Given this, governments, funding agencies, and tenure and promotion committees are looking toward simple and objective methods to assess increasing research volumes in the least possible time. To this end, they are turning more and more to citation analysis for objective parameters of impact assessment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

      \"Citation<\/p>\n

      Pitfalls of citation analysis<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

      When using citation analysis, it is important to bear in mind some of its limitations<\/span>3,7<\/sup>:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n