Benchmarking scientific performance by decomposing leadership of Cuban and Latin American institutions in Public Health

This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Scientometrics. The final authenticated version is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11192-015-1831-z”.Comparative benchmarking with bibliometric indicators can be an aid in decision-making with regard to research management. This study aims to characterize scientific performance in a domain (Public Health) by the institutions of a country (Cuba), taking as reference world output and regional output (other Latin American centers) during the period 2003–2012. A new approach is used here to assess to what extent the leadership of a specific institution can change its citation impact. Cuba was found to have a high level of specialization and scientific leadership that does not match the low international visibility of Cuban institutions. This leading output appears mainly in non-collaborative papers, in national journals; publication in English is very scarce and the rate of international collaboration is very low. The Instituto de Medicina Tropical Pedro Kouri stands out, alone, as a national reference. Meanwhile, at the regional level, Latin American institutions deserving mention for their high autonomy in normalized citation would include Universidad de Buenos Aires (ARG), Universidade Federal de Pelotas (BRA), Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientı´ficas y Te´cnicas (ARG), Instituto Oswaldo Cruz (BRA) and the Centro de Pesquisas Rene Rachou (BRA). We identify a crucial aspect that can give rise to misinterpretations of data: a high share of leadership cannot be considered positive for institutions when it is mainly associated with a high proportion of non-collaborative papers and a very low level of performance. Because leadership might be questionable in some cases, we propose future studies to ensure a better interpretation of findings.This work was made possible through financing by the scholarship funds for international mobility between Andalusian and IberoAmerican Universities and the SCImago GroupPeer reviewe

Software survey: VOSviewer, a computer program for bibliometric mapping

We present VOSviewer, a freely available computer program that we have developed for constructing and viewing bibliometric maps. Unlike most computer programs that are used for bibliometric mapping, VOSviewer pays special attention to the graphical representation of bibliometric maps. The functionality of VOSviewer is especially useful for displaying large bibliometric maps in an easy-to-interpret way. The paper consists of three parts. In the first part, an overview of VOSviewer's functionality for displaying bibliometric maps is provided. In the second part, the technical implementation of specific parts of the program is discussed. Finally, in the third part, VOSviewer's ability to handle large maps is demonstrated by using the program to construct and display a co-citation map of 5,000 major scientific journals

Thematic characterization of research on Information Science in Brazil from 2000-2009

Este artículo tiene por objetivo analizar cuáles han sido los principales temas de interés en el campo de la investigación científica dentro del área de la Ciencia de la Información en Brasil a lo largo de la primera década de este siglo (2000-2009). Para ello se ha analizado el contenido de la producción científica publicada en cuatro de las principales revistas nacionales de la disciplina: Ciência da Informação, DataGramaZero, Perspectivas em Ciência da Informação y Transinformação. La metodología aplicada se basa en el análisis de co-ocurrencia de palabras-clave y en la representación e interpretación de los resultados por medio del análisis de redes sociales. Para dotar de un marco de interpretación a los resultados obtenidos se propone una comparación con las áreas temáticas propuestas por la Associação Nacional de Pesquisa e Pós-Graduação em Ciência da Informação en sus Grupos de Trabajo por tratarse de un espacio institucionalizado en donde, por consenso, se debate la investigación en la Ciencia de la Información brasileña. Se concluye en que es el estudio de la propia disciplina la que acapara los mayores esfuerzos de investigación