On the validity of citation counting in science evaluation: Content analyses of references and citations in psychological publications.

Autor/inn/en	Krampen, Günter; Becker, Ralf; Wahner, Ute; Montada, Leo
Titel	On the validity of citation counting in science evaluation: Content analyses of references and citations in psychological publications.
Quelle	In: Scientometrics, (2007) 2, S.191-202 PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0138-9130
DOI	10.1007/s11192-007-1659-2
Schlagwörter	Journal Article; Citation Analysis; Citation Counting; Publication Language; Publication Type
Abstract	Abstract In reference to the increasing significance of citation counting in evaluations of scientists and science institutes as well as in science historiography, it is analyzed empirically what is cited in which frequency and what types of citations in scientific texts are used. Content analyses refer to numbers of references, self-references, publication language of references cited, publication types of references cited, and type of citation within the texts. Validity of citation counting is empirically analyzed with reference to random samples of English and German journal articles as well as German textbooks, encyclopedias, and test-manuals from psychology. Results show that 25% of all citations are perfunctory, more than 50% of references are journal articles and up to 40% are books and book-chapters, 10% are self-references. Differences between publications from various psychological sub-disciplines, publication languages, and types of publication are weak. Thus, validity of evaluative citation counting is limited because at least one quarter refers to perfunctory citations exhibiting a very low information utility level and by the fact that existing citation-databases refer to journal articles only.
Erfasst von	OLC
Update	2023/2/05