A descriptive study of inaccuracy in article titles on bibliometrics published in biomedical journals

Benavent, Rafael Aleixandre; Montalt, Vicent; Valderrama‐Zurián, Juan Carlos

doi:10.1007/s11192-014-1296-5

Cited by 12 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…However, titles containing wit, acronyms, exclamations, questions, and metaphors often inaccurately describe a paper's content (Aleixandre‐Benavent et al. ) and may signal frivolity and lack of credibility (Francl ). Thus, such papers may have lower impact and be cited less, despite being downloaded more (Sagi and Yechiam ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Likely as a consequence, we have seen an increase in the usage of questions and of wit in scientific titlesmarketing strategies to attract readers rather than inform them of a paper's content (Ball 2009). However, titles containing wit, acronyms, exclamations, questions, and metaphors often inaccurately describe a paper's content (Aleixandre-Benavent et al 2014) and may signal frivolity and lack of credibility (Francl 2014). Thus, such papers may have lower impact and be cited less, despite being downloaded more (Sagi and Yechiam 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The relationship between manuscript title structure and success: editorial decisions and citation performance for an ecological journal

Fox

Burns

2015

Ecology and Evolution

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A poorly chosen article title may make a paper difficult to discover or discourage readership when discovered, reducing an article's impact. Yet, it is unclear how the structure of a manuscript's title influences readership and impact. We used manuscript tracking data for all manuscripts submitted to the journal Functional Ecology from 2004 to 2013 and citation data for papers published in this journal from 1987 to 2011 to examine how title features changed and whether a manuscript's title structure was predictive of success during the manuscript review process and/or impact (citation) after publication. Titles of manuscripts submitted to Functional Ecology became marginally longer (after controlling for other variables), broader in focus (less frequent inclusion of genus and species names), and included more humor and subtitles over the period of the study. Papers with subtitles were less likely to be rejected by editors both pre- and post-peer review, although both effects were small and the presence of subtitles in published papers was not predictive of citations. Papers with specific names of study organisms in their titles fared poorly during editorial (but not peer) review and, if published, were less well cited than papers whose titles did not include specific names. Papers with intermediate length titles were more successful during editorial review, although the effect was small and title word count was not predictive of citations. No features of titles were predictive of reviewer willingness to review papers or the length of time a paper was in peer review. We conclude that titles have changed in structure over time, but features of title structure have only small or no relationship with success during editorial review and post-publication impact. The title feature that was most predictive of manuscript success: papers whose titles emphasize broader conceptual or comparative issues fare better both pre- and post-publication than do papers with organism-specific titles.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The relationship between manuscript title structure and success: editorial decisions and citation performance for an ecological journal

Fox

Burns

2015

Ecology and Evolution

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“…However, a scientific paper also has descriptive and reflective contents. [1] Falahati et al, have observed that title length and subject of article are both relevant to article citations, but they did not find correlation between title length and citations, [3] implicating other factors from bibliometrics materials may be involved. Article citation may be influenced by research area, topics, words size, characters, punctuations etc.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Studies have shown that an article title length may have a positive, negative, our neutral influence on articles citations. [1,2,3] However, many factors may affect study's outcome. Importantly, sample size, statistical methods, journals or topics by which articles are retrieved, and time-spans are major factors.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example, popular journals with more attentions may cause a bias toward those in which articles title are in a pre-defined format by the journal. [1] Studies about this subject had different results due to different data selection, statistical analysis strategies. In a study on more than 9000 article from 22 different journals, authors conclude that articles in journals with higher impact factors tend to have large word counts in title and get more citations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Linear Regression Analysis of Title Word Count and Article Time Cited using R

Mohebbi¹,

Douzandegan²

2017

JSCIRES

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There is a common idea, that title variables like article title length would influence article citations. The aim of the present study was to investigating possible relationship between size of article title and number of article citations by minimizing scientometric variable biases. A dataset containing ~100,000 virological literatures was obtained from Web of Science InCite TM database from 1997 to 2016. Variables, Title size (TWC), Year (YoP), Source (JS), and Publisher were selected. In addition number of times article is cited 'Time Cited' (TC) was retrieved from Web of Science InCite TM . Linear regression analysis was performed between variables and TC using R for a possible prediction model for TC. Result has shown a robust standard error corrected linear regression with only 30.6% power of predictability. Furthermore, it was found that TC, YoP, and JS have meaningful potential in the linear model. Moreover, TC is negatively correlated with YoP, JS, and positively with TWC. As a result, size of article title, years passed since publication and the journal in which article accepted are good but not sufficient predictor of article citations. In addition, article is a multi-characteristic subject and other predictors can be supposed. However, we think that finding an efficient statistical linear predication model for TC, by increase of articles citation, is overwhelming.

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Inaccuracies in titles

Hartley

2015

Scientometrics

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A descriptive study of inaccuracy in article titles on bibliometrics published in biomedical journals

Cited by 12 publications

References 12 publications

The relationship between manuscript title structure and success: editorial decisions and citation performance for an ecological journal

The relationship between manuscript title structure and success: editorial decisions and citation performance for an ecological journal

Linear Regression Analysis of Title Word Count and Article Time Cited using R

Inaccuracies in titles

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