IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v120y2019i1d10.1007_s11192-019-03121-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Comparison of publication-level approaches to ex-post citation normalization

Author

Listed:
  • Cristian Colliander

    (Umeå University
    Umeå University)

  • Per Ahlgren

    (Uppsala University
    KTH Royal Institute of Technology)

Abstract

In this paper, we compare two sophisticated publication-level approaches to ex-post citation normalization: an item-oriented approach and an approach falling under the general algorithmically constructed classification system approach. Using articles published in core journals in Web of Science (SCIE, SSCI & A&HCI) during 2009 (n = 955,639), we first examine, using the measure Proportion explained variation (PEV), to what extent the publication-level approaches can explain and correct for variation in the citation distribution that stems from subject matter heterogeneity. We then, for the subset of articles from life science and biomedicine (n = 456,045), gauge the fairness of the normalization approaches with respect to their ability to identify highly cited articles when subject area is factored out. This is done by utilizing information from publication-level MeSH classifications to create high quality subject matter baselines and by using the measure Deviations from expectations (DE). The results show that the item-oriented approach had the best performance regarding PEV. For DE, only the most fine-grained clustering solution could compete with the item-oriented approach. However, the item-oriented approach performed better when cited references were heavily weighted in the similarity calculations.

Suggested Citation

  • Cristian Colliander & Per Ahlgren, 2019. "Comparison of publication-level approaches to ex-post citation normalization," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 120(1), pages 283-300, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:120:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-019-03121-z
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-019-03121-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-019-03121-z
    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/s11192-019-03121-z?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. Zitt, Michel, 2010. "Citing-side normalization of journal impact: A robust variant of the Audience Factor," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 4(3), pages 392-406.
    2. Cristian Colliander & Per Ahlgren, 2012. "Experimental comparison of first and second-order similarities in a scientometric context," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 90(2), pages 675-685, February.
    3. Li, Yunrong & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2013. "The comparison of normalization procedures based on different classification systems," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 945-958.
    4. Cristian Colliander, 2015. "A novel approach to citation normalization: A similarity-based method for creating reference sets," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 66(3), pages 489-500, March.
    5. Loet Leydesdorff & Filippo Radicchi & Lutz Bornmann & Claudio Castellano & Wouter Nooy, 2013. "Field-normalized impact factors (IFs): A comparison of rescaling and fractionally counted IFs," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(11), pages 2299-2309, November.
    6. repec:cte:werepe:we1306 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Wolfgang Glänzel & Henk F. Moed, 2013. "Opinion paper: thoughts and facts on bibliometric indicators," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 96(1), pages 381-394, July.
    8. Waltman, Ludo & van Eck, Nees Jan, 2013. "A systematic empirical comparison of different approaches for normalizing citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 833-849.
    9. Juan A Crespo & Yungrong Li & Javier Ruiz–Castillo, 2013. "The Measurement of the Effect on Citation Inequality of Differences in Citation Practices across Scientific Fields," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(3), pages 1-9, March.
    10. Ludo Waltman & Nees Jan van Eck, 2012. "A new methodology for constructing a publication‐level classification system of science," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2378-2392, December.
    11. Loet Leydesdorff & Lutz Bornmann, 2011. "How fractional counting of citations affects the impact factor: Normalization in terms of differences in citation potentials among fields of science," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(2), pages 217-229, February.
    12. Radicchi, Filippo & Castellano, Claudio, 2012. "Testing the fairness of citation indicators for comparison across scientific domains: The case of fractional citation counts," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 121-130.
    13. Wolfgang Glänzel & András Schubert & Bart Thijs & Koenraad Debackere, 2011. "A priori vs. a posteriori normalisation of citation indicators. The case of journal ranking," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 87(2), pages 415-424, May.
    14. Rons, Nadine, 2018. "Bibliometric approximation of a scientific specialty by combining key sources, title words, authors and references," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 113-132.
    15. Thed N. van Leeuwen & Clara Calero Medina, 2012. "Redefining the field of economics: Improving field normalization for the application of bibliometric techniques in the field of economics," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(1), pages 61-70, February.
    16. repec:cte:werepe:we1318 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Li, Yunrong & Radicchi, Filippo & Castellano, Claudio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2013. "Quantitative evaluation of alternative field normalization procedures," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 746-755.
    18. Perianes-Rodriguez, Antonio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2017. "A comparison of the Web of Science and publication-level classification systems of science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 32-45.
    19. Ludo Waltman & Nees Jan Eck, 2012. "A new methodology for constructing a publication-level classification system of science," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2378-2392, December.
    20. Mike Thelwall, 2019. "The influence of highly cited papers on field normalised indicators," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 118(2), pages 519-537, February.
    21. Michel Zitt & Suzy Ramanana-Rahary & Elise Bassecoulard, 2005. "Relativity of citation performance and excellence measures: From cross-field to cross-scale effects of field-normalisation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 63(2), pages 373-401, April.
    22. Loet Leydesdorff & Jung C. Shin, 2011. "How to evaluate universities in terms of their relative citation impacts: Fractional counting of citations and the normalization of differences among disciplines," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(6), pages 1146-1155, June.
    23. Michel Zitt & Henry Small, 2008. "Modifying the journal impact factor by fractional citation weighting: The audience factor," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 59(11), pages 1856-1860, September.
    24. Christoph Neuhaus & Hans-Dieter Daniel, 2009. "A new reference standard for citation analysis in chemistry and related fields based on the sections of Chemical Abstracts," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 78(2), pages 219-229, February.
    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. Peter Sjögårde & Fereshteh Didegah, 2022. "The association between topic growth and citation impact of research publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(4), pages 1903-1921, April.

    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. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
    2. Bouyssou, Denis & Marchant, Thierry, 2016. "Ranking authors using fractional counting of citations: An axiomatic approach," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 183-199.
    3. Waltman, Ludo & van Eck, Nees Jan, 2013. "A systematic empirical comparison of different approaches for normalizing citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 833-849.
    4. Bornmann, Lutz & Haunschild, Robin, 2016. "Citation score normalized by cited references (CSNCR): The introduction of a new citation impact indicator," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 875-887.
    5. Ludo Waltman & Nees Jan Eck, 2013. "Source normalized indicators of citation impact: an overview of different approaches and an empirical comparison," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 96(3), pages 699-716, September.
    6. Ahlgren, Per & Waltman, Ludo, 2014. "The correlation between citation-based and expert-based assessments of publication channels: SNIP and SJR vs. Norwegian quality assessments," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 985-996.
    7. Bornmann, Lutz & Haunschild, Robin, 2016. "Normalization of Mendeley reader impact on the reader- and paper-side: A comparison of the mean discipline normalized reader score (MDNRS) with the mean normalized reader score (MNRS) and bare reader ," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 776-788.
    8. Liwei Cai & Jiahao Tian & Jiaying Liu & Xiaomei Bai & Ivan Lee & Xiangjie Kong & Feng Xia, 2019. "Scholarly impact assessment: a survey of citation weighting solutions," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 118(2), pages 453-478, February.
    9. Perianes-Rodriguez, Antonio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2017. "A comparison of the Web of Science and publication-level classification systems of science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 32-45.
    10. Li, Yunrong & Radicchi, Filippo & Castellano, Claudio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2013. "Quantitative evaluation of alternative field normalization procedures," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 746-755.
    11. Ludo Waltman & Erjia Yan & Nees Jan Eck, 2011. "A recursive field-normalized bibliometric performance indicator: an application to the field of library and information science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 89(1), pages 301-314, October.
    12. Ruiz-Castillo, Javier & Waltman, Ludo, 2015. "Field-normalized citation impact indicators using algorithmically constructed classification systems of science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 102-117.
    13. Mingers, John & Leydesdorff, Loet, 2015. "A review of theory and practice in scientometrics," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 246(1), pages 1-19.
    14. Bornmann, Lutz & Marx, Werner, 2018. "Critical rationalism and the search for standard (field-normalized) indicators in bibliometrics," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 598-604.
    15. Bornmann, Lutz & Marx, Werner, 2015. "Methods for the generation of normalized citation impact scores in bibliometrics: Which method best reflects the judgements of experts?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 408-418.
    16. Rons, Nadine, 2018. "Bibliometric approximation of a scientific specialty by combining key sources, title words, authors and references," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 113-132.
    17. Dunaiski, Marcel & Geldenhuys, Jaco & Visser, Willem, 2019. "Globalised vs averaged: Bias and ranking performance on the author level," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 299-313.
    18. Waltman, Ludo & van Eck, Nees Jan & van Leeuwen, Thed N. & Visser, Martijn S., 2013. "Some modifications to the SNIP journal impact indicator," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 272-285.
    19. Lutz Bornmann & Werner Marx & Andreas Barth, 2013. "The Normalization of Citation Counts Based on Classification Systems," Publications, MDPI, vol. 1(2), pages 1-9, August.
    20. M. Zitt, 2011. "Behind citing-side normalization of citations: some properties of the journal impact factor," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 89(1), pages 329-344, October.

    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:120:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-019-03121-z. 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.