Thelwall M. "Methods for reporting on the targets of links from national systems of university Web sites" Information Processing & Management 40(1):125-144 January 2004

[Eugene Garfield]

Mike Thelwall : m.thelwall at wlv.ac.uk



TITLE    Methods for reporting on the targets of links from national
         systems of university Web sites
AUTHOR   Thelwall M
JOURNAL  INFORMATION PROCESSING & MANAGEMENT 40 (1): 125-144 JAN 2004

Document type: Article     Language: English     Cited References: 46
Times Cited: 0      Explanation

Abstract:
Whilst hyperlinks within Web sites may be primarily created for navigation
purposes, those between sites are a rich source of information about the
content and use of the Web. As a result there is a need to derive
descriptive statistics about them, both to help understand the underlying
communication processes and so that policy makers can gain insights into
the use of online information by those located within their constituency.
It is known, however, that using the individual Web link source page as the
basic unit of counting is problematical because of the number and size of
link anomalies. The challenge addressed in this paper is that of developing
methods to assess techniques for counting links from groups of large
university Web sites (site outlinks). Two methods to assess the reliability
of link counts are developed and applied to judge which of seven advanced
document models are most appropriate in each case. The most generally
applicable method used is an internal consistency test based upon a highly
simplified model of Web linking behaviour. The data used comes from crawls
of UK, Australian and New Zealand universities. The standard domain
advanced Web document model emerges as the logical choice for comparison
purposes within this set. Some descriptive statistics concerning Top Level
Domain link targets are given and it is demonstrated that the choice of
model can affect the final results. (C) 2002 Elsevier Ltd. All rights
reserved.

Author Keywords:
Web links, scholarly communication, linking models

KeyWords Plus:
WORLD-WIDE-WEB, IMPACT FACTORS, INTERNET, COMMUNICATION, INFORMATION,
QUERIES, ONLINE, GENRES

Addresses:
Thelwall M, Wolverhampton Univ, Sch Comp & Informat Technol, Wulfruna St,
Wolverhampton WV1 1SB, England
Wolverhampton Univ, Sch Comp & Informat Technol, Wolverhampton WV1 1SB,
England

Publisher:
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD, THE BOULEVARD, LANGFORD LANE, KIDLINGTON,
OXFORD OX5 1GB, ENGLAND

IDS Number:
759LC

ISSN:
0306-4573


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 ED GUARDIAN                                                           2001
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 THELWALL M            IN PRESS J INFORMATI                            2002
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