IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/infome/v9y2015i4p954-961.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Funnel plots for visualizing uncertainty in the research performance of institutions

Author

Listed:
  • Abramo, Giovanni
  • D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea
  • Grilli, Leonardo

Abstract

Research performance values are not certain. Performance indexes should therefore be accompanied by uncertainty measures, to establish whether the performance of a unit is truly outstanding and not the result of random fluctuations. In this work we focus on the evaluation of research institutions on the basis of average individual performance, where uncertainty is inversely related to the number of research staff. We utilize the funnel plot, a tool originally developed in meta-analysis, to measure and visualize the uncertainty in the performance values of research institutions. As an illustrative example, we apply the funnel plot to represent the uncertainty in the assessed research performance for Italian universities active in biochemistry.

Suggested Citation

  • Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Grilli, Leonardo, 2015. "Funnel plots for visualizing uncertainty in the research performance of institutions," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 954-961.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:9:y:2015:i:4:p:954-961
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2015.08.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1751157715300353
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.joi.2015.08.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Giovanni Abramo & Ciriaco Andrea D'Angelo & Flavia Di Costa, 2008. "Assessment of sectoral aggregation distortion in research productivity measurements," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 17(2), pages 111-121, June.
    2. Schneider, Jesper W., 2013. "Caveats for using statistical significance tests in research assessments," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 50-62.
    3. Andrea Bonaccorsi & Cinzia Daraio, 2005. "Exploring size and agglomeration effects on public research productivity," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 63(1), pages 87-120, March.
    4. Lutz Bornmann & Rüdiger Mutz & Hans-Dieter Daniel, 2013. "Multilevel-statistical reformulation of citation-based university rankings: The Leiden ranking 2011/2012," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(8), pages 1649-1658, August.
    5. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2012. "The dispersion of research performance within and between universities as a potential indicator of the competitive intensity in higher education systems," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 6(2), pages 155-168.
    6. Diana Hicks & Paul Wouters & Ludo Waltman & Sarah de Rijcke & Ismael Rafols, 2015. "Bibliometrics: The Leiden Manifesto for research metrics," Nature, Nature, vol. 520(7548), pages 429-431, April.
    7. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Rosati, Francesco, 2013. "The importance of accounting for the number of co-authors and their order when assessing research performance at the individual level in the life sciences," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 198-208.
    8. Sheila M. Bird & Cox Sir David & Vern T. Farewell & Goldstein Harvey & Holt Tim & Smith Peter C., 2005. "Performance indicators: good, bad, and ugly," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 168(1), pages 1-27, January.
    9. Alexander Karlsson & Björn Hammarfelt & H. Joe Steinhauer & Göran Falkman & Nasrine Olson & Gustaf Nelhans & Jan Nolin, 2015. "Modeling uncertainty in bibliometrics and information retrieval: an information fusion approach," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 102(3), pages 2255-2274, March.
    10. Zhihui Zhang & Ying Cheng & Nian Cai Liu, 2014. "Comparison of the effect of mean-based method and z-score for field normalization of citations at the level of Web of Science subject categories," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(3), pages 1679-1693, December.
    11. Ciriaco Andrea D'Angelo & Cristiano Giuffrida & Giovanni Abramo, 2011. "A heuristic approach to author name disambiguation in bibliometrics databases for large-scale research assessments," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(2), pages 257-269, February.
    12. Lutz Bornmann & Rüdiger Mutz & Werner Marx & Hermann Schier & Hans‐Dieter Daniel, 2011. "A multilevel modelling approach to investigating the predictive validity of editorial decisions: do the editors of a high profile journal select manuscripts that are highly cited after publication?," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 174(4), pages 857-879, October.
    13. Ludo Waltman & Clara Calero-Medina & Joost Kosten & Ed C.M. Noyons & Robert J.W. Tijssen & Nees Jan Eck & Thed N. Leeuwen & Anthony F.J. Raan & Martijn S. Visser & Paul Wouters, 2012. "The Leiden ranking 2011/2012: Data collection, indicators, and interpretation," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2419-2432, December.
    14. Colliander, Cristian & Ahlgren, Per, 2011. "The effects and their stability of field normalization baseline on relative performance with respect to citation impact: A case study of 20 natural science departments," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 101-113.
    15. Ciriaco Andrea D'Angelo & Cristiano Giuffrida & Giovanni Abramo, 2011. "A heuristic approach to author name disambiguation in bibliometrics databases for large‐scale research assessments," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(2), pages 257-269, February.
    16. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2011. "Assessing the varying level of impact measurement accuracy as a function of the citation window length," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 5(4), pages 659-667.
    17. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2012. "Revisiting the scaling of citations for research assessment," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 6(4), pages 470-479.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Rosati, Francesco, 2016. "A methodology to measure the effectiveness of academic recruitment and turnover," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 31-42.
    2. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Andrea Ciriaco & Grilli, Leonardo, 2016. "From rankings to funnel plots: The question of accounting for uncertainty when assessing university research performance," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 854-862.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Andrea Ciriaco & Grilli, Leonardo, 2016. "From rankings to funnel plots: The question of accounting for uncertainty when assessing university research performance," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 854-862.
    2. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
    3. Giovanni Abramo & Corrado Costa & Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo, 2015. "A multivariate stochastic model to assess research performance," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 102(2), pages 1755-1772, February.
    4. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Soldatenkova, Anastasiia, 2016. "The ratio of top scientists to the academic staff as an indicator of the competitive strength of universities," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 596-605.
    5. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2015. "Should the research performance of scientists be distinguished by gender?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 25-38.
    6. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2014. "Are the authors of highly cited articles also the most productive ones?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 89-97.
    7. Giovanni Abramo & Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo & Anastasiia Soldatenkova, 2017. "How long do top scientists maintain their stardom? An analysis by region, gender and discipline: evidence from Italy," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 110(2), pages 867-877, February.
    8. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2016. "A comparison of university performance scores and ranks by MNCS and FSS," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 889-901.
    9. Abramo, Giovanni & D'Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Di Costa, Flavia, 2019. "Diversification versus specialization in scientific research: Which strategy pays off?," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 82, pages 51-57.
    10. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2015. "Ranking research institutions by the number of highly-cited articles per scientist," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 915-923.
    11. Lutz Bornmann & Werner Marx, 2014. "How to evaluate individual researchers working in the natural and life sciences meaningfully? A proposal of methods based on percentiles of citations," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 98(1), pages 487-509, January.
    12. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2015. "Evaluating university research: Same performance indicator, different rankings," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 514-525.
    13. Jan Schulz, 2016. "Using Monte Carlo simulations to assess the impact of author name disambiguation quality on different bibliometric analyses," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 107(3), pages 1283-1298, June.
    14. Giovanni Abramo & Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo & Francesco Rosati, 2016. "The north–south divide in the Italian higher education system," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(3), pages 2093-2117, December.
    15. Abramo, Giovanni & Cicero, Tindaro & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2013. "The impact of unproductive and top researchers on overall university research performance," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 166-175.
    16. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea, 2015. "A methodology to compute the territorial productivity of scientists: The case of Italy," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 675-685.
    17. Abramo, Giovanni & D’Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Soldatenkova, Anastasiia, 2017. "An investigation on the skewness patterns and fractal nature of research productivity distributions at field and discipline level," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 324-335.
    18. Giovanni Abramo & Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo, 2014. "How do you define and measure research productivity?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(2), pages 1129-1144, November.
    19. Bornmann, Lutz & Stefaner, Moritz & de Moya Anegón, Felix & Mutz, Rüdiger, 2016. "Excellence networks in science: A Web-based application based on Bayesian multilevel logistic regression (BMLR) for the identification of institutions collaborating successfully," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 312-327.
    20. Cinzia Daraio & Simone Di Leo & Loet Leydesdorff, 2022. "Using the Leiden Rankings as a Heuristics: Evidence from Italian universities in the European landscape," LEM Papers Series 2022/08, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:9:y:2015:i:4:p:954-961. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/joi .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.