On indexing in the Web of Science and predicting journal impact factor. Xiu-fang WU, Qiang FU, Ronald ROUSSEAU/ J Zhejiang Univ Sci B,2008, 9(7):582-590. DOI:10.1631/jzus.B0840001

[Helen(Yuehong) ZHANG]

We discuss what document types account for the calculation of the journal 
impact factor (JIF) as published in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR). 
Based on a brief review of articles discussing how to predict JIFs and 
taking data differences between the Web of Science (WoS) and the JCR into 
account, we make our own predictions. Using data by cited-reference 
searching for Thomson Scientific’s WoS, we predict 2007 impact factors 
(IFs) for several journals, such as Nature, Science, Learned Publishing and 
some Library and Information Sciences journals. Based on our colleagues’ 
experiences we expect our predictions to be lower bounds for the official 
journal impact factors. We explain why it is useful to derive one’s own 
journal impact factor.