Egghe L. "A rationale for the Hirsch-index rank-order distribution and a comparison with the impact factor rank-order distribution" Published online JASIST April 20, 2009

[Eugene Garfield]

AUTHOR : EGGHE  L.
Universiteit Hasselt (UHasselt), Campus Diepenbeek, Agoralaan, B-3590 
Diepenbeek, Belgium
 
email: Leo Egghe (leo.egghe at uhasselt.be) 

TITLE : A  rationale for the Hirsch-index rank-order distribution and a 
comparison with the impact factor rank-order distribution

SOURCE : JASIST 
Received: 8 April 2009; Revised: ; Accepted: 20 April 2009
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) 

10.1002/asi.21121  About DOI

Pages: 2142-2144


Universiteit Hasselt (UHasselt), Campus Diepenbeek, Agoralaan, B-3590 
Diepenbeek, Belgium
 

Index Terms 
citation analysis • author productivity • analytic models • impact factor • 
Lotka's law 


Abstract 
We present a rationale for the Hirsch-index rank-order distribution and 
prove that it is a power law (hence a straight line in the log-log scale). 
This is confirmed by experimental data of Pyykkö and by data produced in 
this article on 206 mathematics journals. This distribution is of a 
completely different nature than the impact factor (IF) rank-order 
distribution which (as proved in a previous article) is S-shaped. This is 
also confirmed by our example. Only in the log-log scale of the h-index 
distribution do we notice a concave deviation of the straight line for 
higher ranks. This phenomenon is discussed. 


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FULL TEXT AVAILABLE AT :

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/122441670/abstract

Published Online:  5 Jun 2009

DOI: 10.1002/asi.21121