The Finnish national guide to publication metrics is implemented and maintained by the Finn-ARMA's publication metrics network. This guide is intended for people who, in their work or other activities, need information on the analysis of publications and the tools used for this purpose. Users of the guide do not need any prior knowledge of publication metrics, but an understanding of scientific publishing practices and the operating environment of Finnish research organisations is necessary.
The guide introduces the main concepts of publication metrics and methods for analysing different subjects based on publications. The guide presents a wide range of different indicators, data sources and tools. The guide also highlights the metrics that are most closely related to publication metrics from other perspectives. In addition, the responsible use of publication metrics plays a central role in the content of the guide, which, in addition to its own chapter, is embedded in other chapters of the guide as a perspective or as highlights.
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The content of the guide
Background of the guide
The idea for a national guide to publication metrics was born in the National responsible metrics working group in spring 2020, when the group was working on the National recommendation on the responsible use of publication metrics (PDF in Finnish). The final decision to produce the national guide was taken at a meeting of the Finn-ARMA's publication metrics network in autumn 2020 and the project was launched by the development group in January 2021. At the start of the project, 13 Finnish organisations signed up.
The original idea was to base the guide on the Oulu University Library’s guide Evaluation based on scientific publishing, which has been used in the past by several other research organisations in addition to the University of Oulu. However, it very soon became apparent that the content was going to change significantly and, in the end, most of the content was created and rewritten from scratch. More than 60 Finnish experts participated in the content production and commenting during autumn 2021 and spring 2022. The development group and the experts who participated in writing the content are listed on the guide's authors page.
Future updates to the guide
The Finnish version of the guide was introduced in June 2022 and the English version in February 2023. After the launch of the English version, the project group ceased its activities, and the maintenance of the guide is continued by a permanent working group under the Finn-ARMA's publication metrics network
The working group will meet regularly to keep the content up to date and decide on any changes to the content. The group also processes comments on the guide and its content, as well as requests for additions and editing. These can be submitted to the working group by using the comments feature at the bottom of each page of the guide (login required) or by sending an email to: kjmo@postit.csc.fi.
