Lopez-Illescas, C; de Moya-Anegon, F; Moed, HF Coverage and citation impact of oncological journals in the Web of Science and Scopus JOURNAL OF INFORMETRICS, 2 (4): 304-316 OCT 2008

[Eugene Garfield]

E-mail Address: carlopz at ugr.es; felix at ugr.es; moed at cwts.leidenuniv.nl 

Author(s): Lopez-Illescas, C (Lopez-Illescas, Carmen); de Moya-Anegon, F 
(de Moya-Anegon, Felix); Moed, HF (Moed, Henk F.) 

Title: Coverage and citation impact of oncological journals in the Web of 
Science and Scopus 

Source: JOURNAL OF INFORMETRICS, 2 (4): 304-316 OCT 2008 

Language: English 

Document Type: Article 

Author Keywords: Citation databases; Scopus; Web of science; Medical 
oncology; Journal coverage; Rankings 

Keywords Plus: BASIC RESEARCH; QUALITY 

Abstract: This paper reviews a number of studies comparing Thomson 
Scientific's Web of Science (WoS) and Elsevier's Scopus. It collates their 
journal coverage in an important medical subfield: oncology. It is found 
that all WoS-covered oncological journals (n = 126) are indexed in Scopus, 
but that Scopus covers many more journals (an additional n = 106). 
However, the latter group tends to have much lower impact factors than WoS 
covered journals. Among the top 25% of sources with the highest impact 
factors in Scopus, 94% is indexed in the WoS, and for the bottom 25% only 
6%. In short, in oncology the WoS is a genuine subset of Scopus, and tends 
to cover the best journals from it in terms of citation impact per paper. 
Although Scopus covers 90% more oncological journals compared to WoS, the 
average Scopus-based impact factor for journals indexed by both databases 
is only 2.6% higher than that based on WoS data. Results reflect 
fundamental differences in coverage policies: the WoS based on Eugene 
Garfield's concepts of covering a selective set of most frequently used 
(cited) journals; Scopus with broad coverage, more similar to large 
disciplinary literature databases. The paper also found that 'classical', 
WoS-based impact factors strongly correlate with a new, Scopus-based 
metric, SCImago JournalRank (SJR), one of a series of new indicators 
founded on earlier work by Pinski and Narin [Pinski, G., & Narin F. 
(1976). Citation influence for journal aggregates of scientific 
publications: Theory, with application to the literature of physics. 
Information Processing and Management, 12, 297 - 312] that weight 
citations according to the prestige of the citing journal (Spearman's rho 
= 0.93). Four lines of future research are proposed. (C) 2008 Elsevier 
Ltd. All rights reserved. 

Addresses: [Lopez-Illescas, Carmen] Univ Granada, Commun & Informat Sci 
Fac, Dept Lib & Informat Sci, SCImago Grp, E-18071 Granada, Spain; [Moed, 
Henk F.] Leiden Univ, Ctr Sci & Technol Studies CWTS, NL-2300 RA Leiden, 
Netherlands 

Reprint Address: Lopez-Illescas, C, Univ Granada, Commun & Informat Sci 
Fac, Dept Lib & Informat Sci, SCImago Grp, Campus Cartuja, E-18071 
Granada, Spain. 

E-mail Address: carlopz at ugr.es; felix at ugr.es; moed at cwts.leidenuniv.nl 

Cited Reference Count: 39 

Times Cited: 0 

Publisher: ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV 

Publisher Address: PO BOX 211, 1000 AE AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS 

ISSN: 1751-1577 

DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2008.08.001 

29-char Source Abbrev.: J INFORMETR 

ISO Source Abbrev.: J. Informetr. 

Source Item Page Count: 13 

Subject Category: Information Science & Library Science 

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