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Nature or Science: what Google Trends says

Author

Listed:
  • Houcemeddine Turki

    (University of Sfax)

  • Mohamed Ali Hadj Taieb

    (University of Sfax)

  • Mohamed Ben Aouicha

    (University of Sfax)

  • Ajith Abraham

    (Machine Intelligence Research Labs (MIR Labs))

Abstract

Nature and Science are two major multidisciplinary journals, well-known among the general public and highly-cited by scholarly communities. This article presents Google Trends, a web service providing detailed information on the Google search behavior of Internet users from all countries during the period 2004–2019 and illustrates the preference between Nature and Science. The research shows a general decrease of the demand for both journals and reveals a substantial growth in demand for Nature in some geographic regions and a decline of the interest to Science in many regions. We also found a better affinity to Nature by the general audience and a better affinity to Science in former USSR scholarly allies. This situation is explained on one hand by the editorial policy of the two journals and on the other hand by the influence of the cold war and its aftermath on worldwide scientific societies and the ongoing interest in research areas in different geographic regions.

Suggested Citation

  • Houcemeddine Turki & Mohamed Ali Hadj Taieb & Mohamed Ben Aouicha & Ajith Abraham, 2020. "Nature or Science: what Google Trends says," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 124(2), pages 1367-1385, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:124:y:2020:i:2:d:10.1007_s11192-020-03511-8
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-020-03511-8
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    Cited by:

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    2. Wang, Xiaoguang & He, Jing & Huang, Han & Wang, Hongyu, 2022. "MatrixSim: A new method for detecting the evolution paths of research topics," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(4).

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