[CHMINF-L] Review Articles - A Different Perspective

[Eugene Garfield]

The wide variation in the JIF of review journals tells you that thee is
also a wide variation in their quality. Critical reviews that bring new
insight to a field are one thing and simple bibliographical reviews
which make little interpretation are another.
I do not recall any studies of review articles that appear in non-review
journals. I doubt that their impacts achieve the heights of such
journals as Annual Review of Biochemistry, Chemical Reviews, etc. That's
worthy topic
for some young chemist or librarian to undertake.Eugene Garfield
 
__________________________________________________
Eugene Garfield, PhD. email:  garfield at codex.cis.upenn.edu 
home page: www.eugenegarfield.org
Tel: 215-243-2205 Fax 215-387-1266

  
-----Original Message-----
From: CHEMICAL INFORMATION SOURCES DISCUSSION LIST
[mailto:CHMINF-L at LISTSERV.INDIANA.EDU] On Behalf Of A. Ben Wagner
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2009 8:26 AM
To: CHMINF-L at LISTSERV.INDIANA.EDU
Subject: Re: [CHMINF-L] Review Articles - A Different Perspective

Everyone wins - sort of.  Since review articles as a class are cited 
significantly more, the journal impact factor(JIF) of the journal will
go up. 
And the author's h-index/total cites will almost certainly benefit.  Of 
course, carried to the extreme, if journal editors seeking ever higher 
impact factors and authors seeking ever higher h-indexes start writing
only 
review articles, there will be no individual studies published so that 
there can be review articles.

--Ben Wagner, Univ. at Buffalo

--On Friday, February 20, 2009 4:32 PM -0500 Michael White 
<michael.white at QUEENSU.CA> wrote:

> Hi colleagues...
>
> I know that the topic of review articles has been discussed before,
but
> here's a different perspective I wanted to share with you.
>
> I recently attended one of our chemistry department's regularly weekly
> seminars. The guest speaker, who was from a UK university, mentioned
in
> his introduction the benefits of writing review articles. He said that
> before he wrote his review article, which has been cited heavily, he
was
> just another "face in the audience" at meetings and conferences. After
he
> published it he got invitations to speak and numerous manuscripts to
> review. He encouraged the grad students in the audience to consider
> writing review articles even though they may not seem as exciting as
> original research.
>
> Any thoughts? Are review articles good for career development and
> networking opportunities?
>
> Cheers,
>
> --Mike White
>
> --
>
> <><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
> Michael White (BA, MLIS)
> Librarian for Research Services
> Engineering and Science Library
> Queen's University
> 93 University Avenue Kingston, Ontario, Canada  K7L 5C4
> 613.533.6785 / 613.533.2584 (Fax)
> michael.white at queensu.ca
>
> CHMINF-L Archives (also to join or leave CHMINF-L, etc.)
> http://listserv.indiana.edu/archives/chminf-l.html
> Search the CHMINF-L archives at:
> https://listserv.indiana.edu/cgi-bin/wa-iub.exe?S1=chminf-l
> Sponsors of CHMINF-L:
> http://www.indiana.edu/~libchem/chminfsupport.htm
>
>



--A. Ben Wagner, Sciences Librarian
University at Buffalo

CHMINF-L Archives (also to join or leave CHMINF-L, etc.)
http://listserv.indiana.edu/archives/chminf-l.html
Search the CHMINF-L archives at:
https://listserv.indiana.edu/cgi-bin/wa-iub.exe?S1=chminf-l
Sponsors of CHMINF-L:
http://www.indiana.edu/~libchem/chminfsupport.htm