IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v117y2018i3d10.1007_s11192-018-2932-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sleeping beauties with no prince based on the co-citation criterion

Author

Listed:
  • ZhangJian Zong

    (Nanjing Medical University)

  • XuanZhen Liu

    (Nanjing Medical University)

  • Hui Fang

    (Nanjing University)

Abstract

In science, a sleeping beauty (SB) refers to a highly cited paper that initially remains unnoticed for several years after publication. It is generally recognized that each SB is awoken by princes, in the form of other papers that cite the SB. Investigations have shown that one feature of a prince is that it has a considerable number of co-citations with the SB. In the present study, we applied a method to screen for princes from among papers citing the SB based on the number of co-citations in the Web of Science and identified four SBs that were awoken without a prince based on the co-citation criterion. There are two possible explanations for this phenomenon. The first is that some SBs may not need a prince to attract the attention of other academics. The authors of three of the four abovementioned SBs were Nobel laureates, and their work was well known in their respective fields. The papers had slept for a long period because their work was ahead of its time. The long period of sleep is a reflection of the authors’ high academic level and degree of insight. The other potential explanation is that princes do not have to be co-cited with SBs. Our findings demonstrate a significant deficiency in the previous criteria relating to princes based on co-citations. Thus, new criteria are required to identify princes.

Suggested Citation

  • ZhangJian Zong & XuanZhen Liu & Hui Fang, 2018. "Sleeping beauties with no prince based on the co-citation criterion," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(3), pages 1841-1852, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:117:y:2018:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-018-2932-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-018-2932-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-018-2932-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11192-018-2932-2?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. Jiang Li & Fred Y. Ye, 2012. "The phenomenon of all-elements-sleeping-beauties in scientific literature," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 92(3), pages 795-799, September.
    2. Min, Chao & Sun, Jianjun & Pei, Lei & Ding, Ying, 2016. "Measuring delayed recognition for papers: Uneven weighted summation and total citations," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 1153-1165.
    3. Aurora A. C. Teixeira & Pedro Cosme Vieira & Ana Patrícia Abreu, 2017. "Sleeping Beauties and their princes in innovation studies," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 110(2), pages 541-580, February.
    4. Rodrigo Costas & Thed N. van Leeuwen & Anthony F.J. van Raan, 2010. "Is scientific literature subject to a ‘Sell‐By‐Date’? A general methodology to analyze the ‘durability’ of scientific documents," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(2), pages 329-339, February.
    5. Rodrigo Costas & Thed N. van Leeuwen & Anthony F.J. van Raan, 2010. "Is scientific literature subject to a ‘Sell-By-Date’? A general methodology to analyze the ‘durability’ of scientific documents," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(2), pages 329-339, February.
    6. Jianjun Sun & Chao Min & Jiang Li, 2016. "A vector for measuring obsolescence of scientific articles," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 107(2), pages 745-757, May.
    7. Wolfgang Glänzel & Balázs Schlemmer & Bart Thijs, 2003. "Better late than never? On the chance to become highly cited only beyond the standard bibliometric time horizon," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 58(3), pages 571-586, November.
    8. Norio Ohba & Kumiko Nakao, 2012. "Sleeping beauties in ophthalmology," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 93(2), pages 253-264, November.
    9. Jiang Li, 2014. "Citation curves of “all-elements-sleeping-beauties”: “flash in the pan” first and then “delayed recognition”," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 100(2), pages 595-601, August.
    10. Jiang Li & Dongbo Shi, 2016. "Sleeping beauties in genius work: When were they awakened?," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 67(2), pages 432-440, February.
    11. James Hartley & Yuh-Shan Ho, 2017. "Who woke the sleeping beauties in psychology?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 112(2), pages 1065-1068, August.
    12. Tibor Braun & Wolfgang Glänzel & András Schubert, 2010. "On Sleeping Beauties, Princes and other tales of citation distributions …," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 19(3), pages 195-202, September.
    13. Ratnadeep Dey & Anurag Roy & Tanmoy Chakraborty & Saptarshi Ghosh, 2017. "Sleeping beauties in Computer Science: characterization and early identification," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(3), pages 1645-1663, December.
    14. Li, Jiang & Shi, Dongbo & Zhao, Star X. & Ye, Fred Y., 2014. "A study of the “heartbeat spectra” for “sleeping beauties”," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 493-502.
    15. Yuh-Shan Ho & James Hartley, 2017. "Sleeping beauties in psychology," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 110(1), pages 301-305, January.
    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. Jianhua Hou & Hao Li & Yang Zhang, 2023. "Altmetrics-based sleeping beauties: necessity or just a supplement?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(10), pages 5477-5506, October.
    2. Hui Fang, 2020. "Investigating the journal impact along the columns and rows of the publication-citation matrix," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(3), pages 2265-2282, December.
    3. Helena H. Zhang & Fred Y. Ye, 2020. "Identifying ‘associated-sleeping-beauties’ in ‘swan-groups’ based on small qualified datasets of physics and economics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(3), pages 1525-1537, March.
    4. Chi, Yuxue & Tang, Xianyi & Liu, Yijun, 2022. "Exploring the “awakening effect” in knowledge diffusion: a case study of publications in the library and information science domain," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(4).
    5. Hui Fang, 2019. "A transition stage co-citation criterion for identifying the awakeners of sleeping beauty publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(1), pages 307-322, October.
    6. Guoliang Lyu & Ganwei Shi, 2019. "On an approach to boosting a journal’s citation potential," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 120(3), pages 1387-1409, September.

    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. Jianhua Hou & Xiucai Yang, 2019. "Patent sleeping beauties: evolutionary trajectories and identification methods," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 120(1), pages 187-215, July.
    2. Hui Fang, 2019. "A transition stage co-citation criterion for identifying the awakeners of sleeping beauty publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(1), pages 307-322, October.
    3. Hui Fang, 2018. "Analysing the variation tendencies of the numbers of yearly citations for sleeping beauties in science by using derivative analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 115(2), pages 1051-1070, May.
    4. Hou, Jianhua & Yang, Xiucai, 2020. "Social media-based sleeping beauties: Defining, identifying and features," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 14(2).
    5. Helena H. Zhang & Fred Y. Ye, 2020. "Identifying ‘associated-sleeping-beauties’ in ‘swan-groups’ based on small qualified datasets of physics and economics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 122(3), pages 1525-1537, March.
    6. Miura, Takahiro & Asatani, Kimitaka & Sakata, Ichiro, 2023. "Revisiting the uniformity and inconsistency of slow-cited papers in science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 17(1).
    7. Adil El Aichouchi & Philippe Gorry, 2018. "Delayed recognition of Judah Folkman’s hypothesis on tumor angiogenesis: when a Prince awakens a Sleeping Beauty by self-citation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(1), pages 385-399, July.
    8. Aurora A. C. Teixeira & Pedro Cosme Vieira & Ana Patrícia Abreu, 2017. "Sleeping Beauties and their princes in innovation studies," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 110(2), pages 541-580, February.
    9. Yang, Jinqing & Bu, Yi & Lu, Wei & Huang, Yong & Hu, Jiming & Huang, Shengzhi & Zhang, Li, 2022. "Identifying keyword sleeping beauties: A perspective on the knowledge diffusion process," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1).
    10. Ratnadeep Dey & Anurag Roy & Tanmoy Chakraborty & Saptarshi Ghosh, 2017. "Sleeping beauties in Computer Science: characterization and early identification," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(3), pages 1645-1663, December.
    11. You Song & Fangling Situ & Hongjun Zhu & Jinzhi Lei, 2018. "To be the Prince to wake up Sleeping Beauty: the rediscovery of the delayed recognition studies," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(1), pages 9-24, October.
    12. Sepideh Fahimifar & Elmira Janavi & Fatemeh Fadaei, 2024. "Awakening the beauty: a journey through dormant gems in strategic management literature," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 58(4), pages 3331-3362, August.
    13. Jianhua Hou & Xiucai Yang & Haoyang Song & Haiyue Yao, 2023. "Will patent family be dormant? Research on the identification and characteristics of sleeping beauty’s patent family," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(10), pages 5361-5387, October.
    14. Jiang Li & Fred Y. Ye, 2016. "Distinguishing sleeping beauties in science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 108(2), pages 821-828, August.
    15. Onodera, Natsuo, 2016. "Properties of an index of citation durability of an article," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 981-1004.
    16. Jianhua Hou & Xiucai Yang & Yang Zhang, 2023. "The effect of social media knowledge cascade: an analysis of scientific papers diffusion," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(9), pages 5169-5195, September.
    17. Lutz Bornmann & Adam Y. Ye & Fred Y. Ye, 2018. "Identifying “hot papers” and papers with “delayed recognition” in large-scale datasets by using dynamically normalized citation impact scores," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(2), pages 655-674, August.
    18. Jianhua Hou & Hao Li & Yang Zhang, 2023. "Altmetrics-based sleeping beauties: necessity or just a supplement?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(10), pages 5477-5506, October.
    19. Li, Xin & Ma, Xiaodi & Feng, Ye, 2024. "Early identification of breakthrough research from sleeping beauties using machine learning," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2).
    20. Lachance, Christian & Larivière, Vincent, 2014. "On the citation lifecycle of papers with delayed recognition," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 863-872.

    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:spr:scient:v:117:y:2018:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-018-2932-2. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.