A multidimensional analysis of Aslib proceedings – using everything but the impact factor

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to show that the journal impact factor (IF) is not able to reflect the full impact of scholarly journals and provides an overview of alternative and complementary methods in journal evaluation. Design/methodology/approach – Aslib Proceedings (AP) is exemplarily analyzed with a set of indicators from five dimensions of journal evaluation, i.e. journal output, content, perception and usage, citations and management to accurately reflect its various strengths and weaknesses beyond the IF. Findings – AP has become more international in terms of authors and more diverse regarding its topics. Citation impact is generally low and, with the exception of a special issue on blogs, remains world average. However, an evaluation of downloads and Mendeley readers reveals that the journal is an important source of information for professionals and students and certain topics are frequently read but not cited. Research limitations/implications – The study is limited to one journal. Practical implications – An overview of various indicators and methods is provided that can be applied in the quantitative evaluation of scholarly journals (and also to articles, authors and institutions). Originality/value – After a publication history of more than 60 years, this analysis takes stock of AP, highlighting strengths and weaknesses and developments over time. The case study provides an example and overview of the possibilities of multidimensional journal evaluation

Networks of reader and country status: An analysis of Mendeley reader statistics

The number of papers published in journals indexed by the Web of Science core collection is steadily increasing. In recent years, nearly two million new papers were published each year; somewhat more than one million papers when primary research papers are considered only (articles and reviews are the document types where primary research is usually reported or reviewed). However, who reads these papers? More precisely, which groups of researchers from which (self-assigned) scientific disciplines and countries are reading these papers? Is it possible to visualize readership patterns for certain countries, scientific disciplines, or academic status groups? One popular method to answer these questions is a network analysis. In this study, we analyze Mendeley readership data of a set of 1,133,224 articles and 64,960 reviews with publication year 2012 to generate three different kinds of networks: (1) The network based on disciplinary affiliations of Mendeley readers contains four groups: (i) biology, (ii) social science and humanities (including relevant computer science), (iii) bio-medical sciences, and (iv) natural science and engineering. In all four groups, the category with the addition "miscellaneous" prevails. (2) The network of co-readers in terms of professional status shows that a common interest in papers is mainly shared among PhD students, Master's students, and postdocs. (3) The country network focusses on global readership patterns: a group of 53 nations is identified as core to the scientific enterprise, including Russia and China as well as two thirds of the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries.Comment: 26 pages, 6 figures (also web-based startable), and 2 table

IDENTIFYING CORE MARINE SCIENCE JOURNALS: FACTORS OF EVALUATION

Journal articles are the most important sources for scientific information. More than 10 years after the “Berlin Declaration”, more and more journals are published with open access. Due to this, the journals market is subject to a lot of change. The main aim is to gather information to establish whether our subscriptions still meet the needs of our scientists. Key factors used to identify the core journals for marine sciences are displayed, at least for the scientists of our institution, which is an interdisciplinary research facility. It specializes in the study of coastal oceans and marginal seas and is divided into four sections which focus on different research activities. Because of this, it is important to find a combined set of core journals which reflect the needs of all scientists involved. Recent budget cuts have made it even more necessary to cut down on journal costs. Certain questions had to be answered during the evaluation process. Topics included in those questions were the definition of what core journals are, where our scientists publish their research, which journals they cite, available open access and institutional access to journals specialized in marine sciences and the cost of journals

Are Mendeley reader counts high enough for research evaluations when articles are published?

This is an accepted manuscript of an article published by Emerald Publishing Limited in Aslib Journal of Information Management on 27/10/2017, available online: https://doi.org/10.1108/AJIM-01-2017-0028 The accepted version of the publication may differ from the final published version.Purpose –Mendeley reader counts have been proposed as early indicators for the impact of academic publications. In response, this article assesses whether there are enough Mendeley readers for research evaluation purposes during the month when an article is first published. Design/methodology/approach – Average Mendeley reader counts were compared to average Scopus citation counts for 104520 articles from ten disciplines during the second half of 2016. Findings - Articles attracted, on average, between 0.1 and 0.8 Mendeley readers per article in the month in which they first appeared in Scopus. This is about ten times more than the average Scopus citation count. Research limitations/implications – Other subjects may use Mendeley more or less than the ten investigated here. The results are dependent on Scopus’s indexing practices, and Mendeley reader counts can be manipulated and have national and seniority biases. Practical implications – Mendeley reader counts during the month of publication are more powerful than Scopus citations for comparing the average impacts of groups of documents but are not high enough to differentiate between the impacts of typical individual articles. Originality/value - This is the first multi-disciplinary and systematic analysis of Mendeley reader counts from the publication month of an article

Traditional Knowledge and Modern Information Practice: Proceedings of the 42nd IAMSLIC Conference

Proceedings of the 42nd Annual IAMSLIC Conference, held October 16-20 in Merida, Mexico

Traditional Knowledge and Modern Information Practice

Proceedings of the 42nd IAMSLIC Conference, held in Merida Mexico from October 16-20, 201

Congress UPV Proceedings of the 21ST International Conference on Science and Technology Indicators

This is the book of proceedings of the 21st Science and Technology Indicators Conference that took place in València (Spain) from 14th to 16th of September 2016. The conference theme for this year, ‘Peripheries, frontiers and beyond’ aimed to study the development and use of Science, Technology and Innovation indicators in spaces that have not been the focus of current indicator development, for example, in the Global South, or the Social Sciences and Humanities. The exploration to the margins and beyond proposed by the theme has brought to the STI Conference an interesting array of new contributors from a variety of fields and geographies. This year’s conference had a record 382 registered participants from 40 different countries, including 23 European, 9 American, 4 Asia-Pacific, 4 Africa and Near East. About 26% of participants came from outside of Europe. There were also many participants (17%) from organisations outside academia including governments (8%), businesses (5%), foundations (2%) and international organisations (2%). This is particularly important in a field that is practice-oriented. The chapters of the proceedings attest to the breadth of issues discussed. Infrastructure, benchmarking and use of innovation indicators, societal impact and mission oriented-research, mobility and careers, social sciences and the humanities, participation and culture, gender, and altmetrics, among others. We hope that the diversity of this Conference has fostered productive dialogues and synergistic ideas and made a contribution, small as it may be, to the development and use of indicators that, being more inclusive, will foster a more inclusive and fair world