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Are leading papers of better quality? Evidence from a natural experiment

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  • Tom Coupé
  • Victor Ginsburgh
  • Abdul Noury

Abstract

European countries in which universities rely on public funding increasingly follow the lead of the United Kingdom and run Research Assessment Exercises. Given the subjective nature of such evaluations, some scientists prefer verifiable measures such as citation counts. This, however, also is prone to problems since the number of cites is correlated, among others, with the order of appearance in an issue. In particular, leading papers are more cited. It is, thus, difficult to assess whether they are of better quality, or whether this happens because they appear first in an issue. We make use of a natural experiment that was carried out by a journal in which papers are randomly ordered in some issues, while this order is at the editors' discretion in other issues. Our estimates suggest that approximately two thirds of the additional cites are due to going first, and one third to higher quality. Copyright 2010 Oxford University Press 2009 All rights reserved, Oxford University Press.

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  • Tom Coupé & Victor Ginsburgh & Abdul Noury, 2010. "Are leading papers of better quality? Evidence from a natural experiment," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 62(1), pages 1-11, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:oxecpp:v:62:y:2010:i:1:p:1-11
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    1. Victor A. Ginsburgh & Jan C. van Ours, 2003. "Expert Opinion and Compensation: Evidence from a Musical Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 289-296, March.
    2. Andrew J. Oswald, 2007. "An Examination of the Reliability of Prestigious Scholarly Journals: Evidence and Implications for Decision‐Makers," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 74(293), pages 21-31, February.
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    5. Liran Einav & Leeat Yariv, 2006. "What's in a Surname? The Effects of Surname Initials on Academic Success," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 20(1), pages 175-187, Winter.
    6. William J. Moore & Robert J. Newman & Peter J. Sloane & Jeremy D. Steely, 2002. "Productivity Effects of Research Assessment Exercises," Departmental Working Papers 2002-15, Department of Economics, Louisiana State University.
    7. Ayres, Ian & Vars, Fredrick E, 2000. "Determinants of Citations to Articles in Elite Law Reviews," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 29(1), pages 427-450, January.
    8. Scott Smart & Joel Waldfogel, 1996. "A Citation-Based Test for Discrimination at Economics and Finance Journals," NBER Working Papers 5460, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Lead papers are not particularly better
      by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2009-03-09 17:21:00

    RePEc Biblio mentions

    As found on the RePEc Biblio, the curated bibliography for Economics:
    1. > Economics Profession > Ranking in Economics > Ranking Articles and Papers

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    Cited by:

    1. V. Ginsburgh & Sheila Weyers, 2014. "Nominees, winners, and losers," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 38(4), pages 291-313, November.
    2. Ma, Chao & Li, Yiwei & Guo, Feng & Si, Kao, 2019. "The citation trap: Papers published at year-end receive systematically fewer citations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 667-687.
    3. Carillo, Maria Rosaria & Papagni, Erasmo & Sapio, Alessandro, 2013. "Do collaborations enhance the high-quality output of scientific institutions? Evidence from the Italian Research Assessment Exercise," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 25-36.
    4. Ho Fai Chan & Bruno S. Frey & Jana Gallus & Benno Torgler, 2013. "Does the John Bates Clark Medal boost subsequent productivity and citation success?," ECON - Working Papers 111, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    5. Daniel S. Hamermesh, 2018. "Citations in Economics: Measurement, Uses, and Impacts," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(1), pages 115-156, March.
    6. Rose, Michael E. & Opolot, Daniel C. & Georg, Co-Pierre, 2022. "Discussants," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(10).
    7. Harris, Mark N. & Novarese, Marco & Wilson, Chris M., 2022. "Being in the right place: A natural field experiment on the causes of position effects in individual choice," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 24-40.
    8. Sultan Orazbayev, 2017. "Diversity and collaboration in Economics," UCL SSEES Economics and Business working paper series 2017-4, UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES).
    9. Maria Rosaria Carillo & Erasmo Papagni & Alessandro Sapio, 2012. "Do collaborations enhance the high-quality output of scientific institutions? Evidence from the Italian Research Assessment Exercise (2001-2003)," Discussion Papers 4_2012, CRISEI, University of Naples "Parthenope", Italy.
    10. Feng Guo & Chao Ma & Qingling Shi & Qingqing Zong, 2018. "Succinct effect or informative effect: the relationship between title length and the number of citations," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(3), pages 1531-1539, September.
    11. Carmela Lutmar & Yaniv Reingewertz, 2021. "Academic in-group bias in the top five economics journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(12), pages 9543-9556, December.
    12. Novarese, Marco & Wilson, Chris M., 2013. "Being in the Right Place: A Natural Field Experiment on List Position and Consumer Choice," MPRA Paper 48074, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Yezhu Wang & Yundong Xie & Dong Wang & Lu Guo & Rongting Zhou, 2022. "Do cover papers get better citations and usage counts? An analysis of 42 journals in cell biology," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(7), pages 3793-3813, July.
    14. Ho Fai Chan & Bruno S. Frey & Jana Gallus & Benno Torgler, 2013. "Does the John Bates Clark Medal boost subsequent productivity and citation success?," ECON - Working Papers 111, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    15. Oswald, Andrew J., 2008. "Can We Test for Bias in Scientific Peer-Review?," IZA Discussion Papers 3665, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Chan, Ho Fai & Frey, Bruno S. & Gallus, Jana & Torgler, Benno, 2014. "Academic honors and performance," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 188-204.
    17. Reingewertz, Yaniv & Lutmar, Carmela, 2018. "Academic in-group bias: An empirical examination of the link between author and journal affiliation," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 74-86.
    18. Brooks, Chris & Fenton, Evelyn M. & Walker, James T., 2014. "Gender and the evaluation of research," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(6), pages 990-1001.

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