Papers of possible interest to SIG Metrics

[Eugene Garfield]

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TITLE:          Cognitive and Social Structure of the Elite Collaboration
                Network of Astrophysics: A Case Study on Shifting Network Structures
                (Article, English)
AUTHOR:         Heidler, R
SOURCE:         MINERVA 49 (4). DEC 2011. p.461-488 SPRINGER, DORDRECHT

SEARCH TERM(S):  MERTON RK          AM SOCIOL REV          22:635   1957

KEYWORDS:       Scientific networks; Cognitive structure; Co-authorship
                network; Astrophysics; Scientific collaboration; Elite
                network; Social network analysis; Epistemic culture;
                Scientific disciplines; Dark energy
KEYWORDS+:       SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION; ASTRONOMY; SCIENCE;
                COAUTHORSHIP; SPECIALTIES; SUPERNOVAE; PATTERNS; PHYSICS;
                ENERGY

ABSTRACT:       Scientific collaboration can only be understood along the
epistemic and cognitive grounding of scientific disciplines. New scientific discoveries in astrophysics led to a major restructuring of the elite network of astrophysics. To study the interplay of the epistemic grounding and the social network structure of a discipline, a mixed-methods approach is necessary. It combines scientometrics, quantitative network analysis and visualization tools with a qualitative network analysis approach. The centre of the international collaboration network of astrophysics is demarcated by identifying the 225 most productive astrophysicists. For the years 1998-1999 and 2001-2006 four co- authorship networks are constructed comprehending each a two year period.
A visualization of the longitudinal network data gives first hints on the structural development of the network. The network of 2005-2006 is analyzed in depth. Based on cohesion analysis tools for network analysis, two main cores and three smaller ones are identified. Scientists in each core and additionally in structurally interesting positions are identified and 17 qualitative expert interviews are conducted with them.
The visualization of the network of 2005-2006 is used in the interviews as a stimulus for the interviewees. An analysis of the three most often used keywords of the 225 astrophysicists is included and combined with the other data. The triangulation of these approaches shows that major epistemic changes in astrophysics, e.g. the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe, together with technical and organizational innovations, leads to a restructuring of the network of the discipline.
The importance of a combination of qualitative and quantitative network analysis tools for the understanding of the interplay of cognitive and social structure in the sociology of science is substantiated.

AUTHOR ADDRESS: R Heidler, Lehrstuhl Soziol Org, Gaussstr 20, D-42097
                Wuppertal, Germany

 
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TITLE:          What factors determine citation counts of publications in
                chemistry besides their quality? (Article, English)
AUTHOR:         Bornmann, L; Schier, H; Marx, W; Daniel, HD
SOURCE:         JOURNAL OF INFORMETRICS 6 (1). JAN 2012. p.11-18
                ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV, AMSTERDAM

SEARCH TERM(S):  MERTON RK          SCIENCE               159:56    1968;
                 GARFIELD E  rauth; SCIENTIST  rwork;
                 CITATION*  item_title,keyword

KEYWORDS:       Chemistry; Citation counts; Scientific quality; Single
                publication h index
KEYWORDS+:       H-INDEX; IMPACT FACTOR; SCIENTIFIC-RESEARCH; ANGEWANDTE-
                CHEMIE; SCIENCE; JOURNALS; PERFORMANCE; INDICATORS;
                FREQUENCY; BEHAVIOR

ABSTRACT:       A number of bibliometric studies point out that citation
counts are a function of many variables besides scientific quality. In this paper our aim is to investigate these factors that usually impact the number of citation counts, using an extensive data set from the field of chemistry. The data set contains roughly 2000 manuscripts that were submitted to the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition (AC-IE) as short communications, reviewed by external reviewers, and either published in AC-IE or, if not accepted for publication by AC-IE, published elsewhere. As the reviewers' ratings of the importance of the manuscripts' results are also available to us, we can examine the extent to which certain factors that previous studies demonstrated to be generally correlated with citation counts increase the impact of papers, controlling for the quality of the manuscripts (as measured by reviewers'
ratings of the importance of the findings) in the statistical analysis.
As the results show, besides being associated with quality, citation counts are correlated with the citation performance of the cited references, the language of the publishing journal, the chemical subfield, and the reputation of the authors. In this study no statistically significant correlation was found between citation counts and number of authors. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

AUTHOR ADDRESS: L Bornmann, Max Planck Soc, Hofgartenstr 8, D-80539 Munich,
                Germany

 
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