Bibliometric indices: defining academic productivity and citation rates of researchers, departments and journals

Abstract

There has been an increasing focus on academic productivity for the purposes of promotion and funding within departments and institutions but also for comparison of individuals, institutions, specialties, and journals. A number of quantitative indices are used to investigate and compare academic productivity. These include various calculations attempting to analyze the number and citations of publications in order to capture both the quality and quantity of publications, such as the h index, the e index, impact factor, and Eigenfactor score. The indices have varying advantages and limitations and thus a basic knowledge is required in order to understand their potential utility within academic medicine. This article describes the various bibliometric indices and discusses recent applications of these metrics within the neurological sciences.

Gender disparities are present in academic rank and leadership positions despite overall equivalence in research productivity indices among senior members of American Head and Neck Society (AHNS) Fellowship Faculty

“…Several analyses have examined the use of this bibliometric in multiple medical specialties and have shown an increase in this measure with increasing academic rank . To factor in the duration of an individual's academic career, the m‐index takes into consideration years of productivity and can be calculated from the h‐index . More recently, the relative citation ratio (RCR) was developed by the Office of Portfolio Analysis at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and represents a citation‐based measure of scientific influence …”

“…[8][9][10][11][12] To factor in the duration of an individual's academic career, the m-index takes into consideration years of productivity and can be calculated from the h-index. 13,14 More recently, the relative citation ratio (RCR) was developed by the Office of Portfolio Analysis at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and represents a citation-based measure of scientific influence. [15][16][17][18] These bibliometric analyses can provide information about not only individual academic surgeons but also national trends in various medical fields.…”

The most mentioned neurointervention articles in online media: a bibliometric analysis of the top 101 articles with the highest altmetric attention scores

“…Various bibliometric indices are now used to analyze the quantity and quality of scholarly research 1. The number of citations is the most widely used indicator of the impact of individual research articles 2.…”

A new approach to the analysis and evaluation of the research output of countries and institutions

“…Wildgaard et al (2014) reviewed 108 of them. Some of those bibliometric indicators have been used to define academic productivity in terms of citation rates not only of individuals but also of whole departments (Garner et al, 2018). Arguably, the h-index (Hirsh, 2005) and the g-index (Egghe, 2006) are the most widely used today to assess individual scientific productions.…”