Indicators of scientific impact are mainly based on the number of citations received by publications. The number of citations received by publications, the average number of citations for a set of publications and the h-index are examples of citation impact indicators. Disciplinary differences regarding citation practices, age of publications and publication types have been taken into account in the normalised citation impact indicators.
The number of citations received by the publication shows how much it has been used in research since its publication. The citations can be thought to indicate the benefit of the research presented in the publication to the research community, and thus its impact. However, impact is a broad concept, and it can be interpreted in many different ways, so we will use the term citation impact in this guide. Learn more about the number of citations as an impact indicator in the chapter Citations.
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The mean number of citations can be calculated for different publication sets. The mean values are utilised, for example, in normalised indicators. However, for skewed citation distributions, mean values may not always be illustrative indicators.
Normalised indicators refer to indicators that take into account the publication’s field of science, age and type. Determining the publication’s field is a key step in normalisation. In databases, publications are classified under different scientific disciplines based on various grounds and methods. Many international databases use classifications based on field of science classification of publication series: a publication (e.g. a scientific article) is categorized to the same subject category as the publication series (e.g. a journal) in which it has been published. More information about the classifications is available in the chapter Differences between fields of science.
Publications are grouped in terms of their age, discipline/field and publication type. A citation distribution for each group is formed by ordering publications based on their received citations. A mean value of citations is calculated for each distribution. Normalisation is based on the distibutions and mean values. The use of field-normalised indicators aims to allow for comparisons of publications accross disciplines. The sections below present these various field-normalised indicators.
The field-normalised Top x% indicators are based on the database’s field-specific citation distributions. The Top x% indicators show the proportion of the analyzed publication set that belongs to the most frequently cited x percentile of the publications of the same field, publication year and publication type. Top x% indicators are used as indicators of high citation impact. For example, Top 10% share and Top 1% share demonstrate the relative share of publications reaching both high (10%) and top (1%) impact within the publication set.
The Top x% -index show the relative proportion of the analyzed publication set that belongs to the most frequently cited x percentile of the publications of the same field, publication year and publication type. For example, a Top 1% index value exceeding 1 means that more than 1% of the publications in the analysed publication set belong to the most cited 1% of the field of science in question.
Example: how to calculate the Top 10% index
The Top x% share shows the percentage of the analysed publications belonging to the most frequently cited x percentile of the same field of science, publication year and publication type. For example, a value 2% for the Top 1% share means that 2% of the publications in the analysed publication set belong in the most cited 1% of the field of science in question.
Example: how to calculate the Top 10% share
The Highly Cited Papers and Hot Papers of the Essential Science Indicator and Web of Science database are one version of the Top x% indicators. They are based on the publications’ field-specific citation distributions. The Highly Cited Papers and Hot Papers statuses are assigned to publications that exceed the limit values of citations determined in the database.
The Highly Cited Papers status is granted to publications no older than ten years old that exceed the field-normalised limit value of citations required to belong to the Top 1% of most cited papers.
The Hot Papers status is granted to publications no older than two years old that exceed field-normalised limit value of citations required to belong to the Top 0.1% of most cited papers that were added to the database during the same update. The updates are done every two months. For Hot Papers, when counting citations, only the citations by publications that were added in the latest update will be counted.
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The Top x% indicators seek to account for disciplinary differences regarding publication and citation practices as well as accounting for the publication date. They are not sensitive to individual publications with a high number of citations.
Remember that
Field-normalised citation indicators reflect the citation impact of the publications in their respective scientific fields. The use of field-normalised indicators aims to allow for comparisons of citation impact of publications accross disciplines.
These indicators describe the relationship between the number of citations received by a publication or a set of publications and the mean value of citations received by the same type of publications that were published within the same scientific field in the same year. The value corresponding the average citation impact is 1. Values below 1 indicate a lower than average number of citations while values above 1.0 indicate a number of citations that is higher than average. When a unit is assigned score of 1.78, for example, this means that it has 78% higher number of citations than the global average.
Examples: how to calculate field-normalised citation indicators.
Example 1. A review article has been cited 15 times. Review articles in journals of the same field that have been published in the same year have received an average of 12 citations. Calculating the normalised citation index of the review article: 15/12= 1.25.
Example 2. When calculating a normalised citation index for a set of publications, the citation indices of individual publications need to be combined. Calculating a field-normalised citation index for a set of three publications:
Publication | Citations received by the article | Mean value of the citations of similar articles | Citation index of the article |
---|---|---|---|
1. | 15 | 12 | 15/12= 1, 25 |
2. | 100 | 85 | 100/85=1,17 |
3. | 60 | 30 | 60/30=2 |
The citation index of the publication set is (1,25+1,17+2)/3 = 1,47 = 1,5 |
The field-normalised citation indicators seek to account for the differences between fields of science regarding publication and citation practices as well as accounting for the publication date.
Remember that
Top x% indices | Data source | Comments about the indicator | Link to method description |
PP(top x%) | CWTS Leiden ranking | ||
top 10-index | State of scientific research in Finland | Bibliometrisiin analyyseihin liittyviä käsitteitä (in Finnish only) | |
Top x% shares | |||
InCites | View the InCites: Understanding the Metrics tab `Percentiles´ | ||
Outputs in Top Citation Percentiles | SciVal | Non-field-normalized "Outputs in Top Citation Percentile" indicator is based on citations.
The field-normalized "Outputs in Top Citation Percentile" indicator is determined based on the publications' FWCI values. The citation window for FWCI values is the year of publication plus the following three full years. | View SciVal Metric: Outputs in Top Citation Percentiles Yrjö Leino & Marianne Gauffriau. Guest Post: Understanding SciVal’s calculation of field-weighted percentile indicators – The Bibliomagician SciVal also features the Outputs in Top Citation Percentiles -indicator , which is not normalised by the scientific field. |
Top % publications | |||
Highly cited papers | Essential Science Indicators, Web of Science, InCites | Essential Science Indicators - Highly Cited Papers | |
Hot papers | Essential Science Indicators, | ||
Normalised citation indicators | |||
Category Normalized Citation Impact (CNCI) | InCites | InCites: Understanding the Metrics | |
Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) | SciVal | Research Metrics Guidebook | |
Mean Normalized Citation Score (MNCS) | Leiden ranking | Indicators The CWTS Leiden Ranking | |
The Field Citation Ratio (FCR) | Dimensions | What is the FCR? | |
Co-citation Percentile Rank (CPR) | JYUcite | JYUcite: What is CPR? |
One of the best known bibliometric indicators is the h-index, also known as Hirsch index. It was developed by Jorge E. Hirsch in 2005. Read more about the topic in the original article.
A researcher’s h-index is determined as follows: the researcher’s h-index value is h, if h number of their publications have received at least h citations and rest of their publications have received a maximum of h citations.
Example.
An h-index value of 10 means that a researcher has 10 publications that have all at least 10 citations. Their potential other publications have been cited a maximum of ten times.
Example.
The h-index value of two researchers can be the same even if their publication profiles (number of publications and the number of citations received by them) are very different.
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Data source | Description |
---|---|
Web of Science | The h-index value is based on a list of publications ranked in descending order by the Times Cited count. An index of h means that there are h papers that have each been cited at least h times. Read more: Web of Science: h-index information |
Scopus | A scientist has an index h if h of his/her Np papers has at least h citations each, and the other (Np h) papers have no more than h citations each. Read more: The Scopus h-index, what’s it all about? |
Google Scholar | The h-index of a publication is the largest number h such that at least h articles in that publication were cited at least h times each. For example, a publication with five articles cited by, respectively, 17, 9, 6, 3, and 2, has the h-index of 3. Read more: Google Scholar metrics |