Coercive Journal Self Citations, Impact Factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence

Chia-Lin Chang, Michael McAleer and Les Oxley

No EI2013-09, Econometric Institute Research Papers from Erasmus University Rotterdam, Erasmus School of Economics (ESE), Econometric Institute

Abstract: This paper examines the issue of coercive journal self citations and the practical usefulness of two recent journal performance metrics, namely the Eigenfactor score, which may be interpreted as measuring “Journal Influence”, and the Article Influence score, using the Thomson Reuters ISI Web of Science (hereafter ISI) data for 2009 for the 200 most highly cited journals in each of the Sciences and Social Sciences. The paper also compares the two new bibliometric measures with two existing ISI metrics, namely Total Citations and the 5-year Impact Factor (5YIF) (including journal self citations) of a journal. It is shown that the Sciences and Social Sciences are different in terms of the strength of the relationship of journal performance metrics, although the actual relationships are very similar. Moreover, the journal influence and article influence journal performance metrics are shown to be closely related empirically to the two existing ISI metrics, and hence add little in practical usefulness to what is already known, except for eliminating the pressure arising from coercive journal self citations. These empirical results are compared with existing results in the bibliometrics literature.

Keywords: 5-year impact factor (5YIF); article influence; coercive journal self citations; eigenfactor; journal influence; journal performance metrics; research assessment measures; total citations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-sog
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (33)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Coercive journal self citations, impact factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence (2013)
Working Paper: Coercive Journal Self-citations, Impact Factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence (2013)
Working Paper: Coercive Journal Self Citations, Impact Factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence (2013)
Working Paper: Coercive Journal Self Citations, Impact Factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence (2013)
Working Paper: Coercive Journal Self Citations, Impact Factor, Journal Influence and Article Influence (2013)
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