Classic articles on social work field in Social Science Citation Index: a bibliometric analysis

This study aimed to identify and analyze characteristics of classic articles published in the Web of Science social work subject category from 1856 to 2011. Articles that have been cited at least 50 times were assessed regarding publication outputs, distribution of outputs in journals, publications of authors, institutions, countries as well as citation life cycles of articles with the highest total citations since its publication up to 2011 and the highest citations in 2011. Five bibliometric indicators were used to evaluate source countries, institutions, and authors. Results showed that 721 of the most highly referenced articles, published between 1957 and 2008, had been cited at least 50 times. Child Abuse & Neglect and American Journal of Community Psychology published the most classic articles. USA produced 89 % of classic articles and also published the most number of single, internationally collaborative, first author, and corresponding author classic articles. The top 38 productive institutions were all located in the US. The University of Illinois was the most productive institution for the total classic articles while University of California, Los Angeles produced the most inter-institutionally collaborative articles and Arizona State University published the most single institution articles. Furthermore, a new indicator, Y-index was successfully applied to evaluate publication characteristics of authors and institutions. High percentage of authors had the same numbers of first author and corresponding author status of classic articles in social work field.     

China’s research in chemical engineering journals in Science Citation Index Expanded: a bibliometric analysis

This study was designed to evaluate China’s scientific output of chemical engineering in Science Citation Index Expanded in the Web of Science from 1992 to 2011. The document type, language, trend and collaboration patterns were analyzed, as well as the output of different journals. Distributions of article titles and abstracts, author keywords, KeyWords Plus of different periods, and the most cited articles were studied to figure out the research focuses and trends. Chinese Journal of Catalysis, Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, and Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering published most of Chinese articles in the area of chemical engineering. The Chemical Engineering Department of Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Tianjin University, and East China University of Science and Technology were the top four institutions that published most articles in China. This study showed that adsorption, photocatalysis and synthesis have been the hot points of research in the past two decades, while ionic liquid tends to be the new area of special interest in future. Pseudo-second order model for sorption processes is getting more and more popular with great influence since its publication. In addition, the ratio of institutional independent articles: nationally collaborative articles: internationally collaborative articles has been developed to compare different institutions’ publication characteristics.     

Comparison of independent research of China’s top universities using bibliometric indicators

The institutionally independent publications of Tsinghua University and Peking University were compared by two main indicators namely peak-year citations per publication and h-index, based on the data extracted from the Science Citation Index Expanded, Web of Science from 1974 to 2011. Analyzed aspects covered total publication outputs, annual production, impact, authorships, Web of Science categories, journals, and most cited articles. Results shows that the two universities were in the same scale based on the peak-year citations per publication, the h-index, and top cited articles with no less than 100 citations. Publication of the top three most productive Web of Science categories differed between these two universities. Tsinghua University published more articles in applied science and engineering fields, while Peking University had more basic science articles. In addition, article life was applied to compare the impact of the most cited articles and single author articles of the two universities.     

Bibliometric analysis of biological invasions research during the period of 1991 to 2007

The objective of this study is to conduct a bibliometric analysis of all biological invasions-related publications in the Science Citation Index (SCI) from 1991 to 2007. The indicator citation per publication (CPP) was used to evaluate the impact of articles, journals, and institutions. In the 3323 articles published in 521 journals, 7261 authors from 1905 institutions of 100 countries participated. As the most productive country of biological invasions research, the US will benefit from more collaboration between institutions, countries, and continents. In addition, analysis of keywords was applied to reveal research trends.     

Renewable energy research 1995–2009: a case study of wind power research in EU, Spain, Germany and Denmark

The paper reports the developments and citation patterns over three time periods of research on Renewable Energy generation and Wind Power 1995–2011 in EU, Spain, Germany and Denmark. Analyses are based on Web of Science and incorporate journal articles as well as conference proceeding papers. Scientometric indicators include publication collaboration ratios, top-player distribution as well as citedness and correspondence analyses of citing publications, relative citation impact, distributions of top-cited as well as top-citing institutions and publication sources and cluster analysis of citing title terms to map knowledge export areas. Findings show an increase in citation impact for Renewable Energy and Wind Power research albeit hampered by scarcely cited conference papers. Although EU maintains its global top position in producing Renewable Energy and Wind Power research the developments of EU and German world shares as well as citation impact are negative during the most recent 7 year period. During the same time the citation impact of Spain and Denmark increase and place both nations among the top-ranking countries in Wind Power research. Spain is the only EU country that increases its world production share from 2000. China is currently ranked three after EU and USA in research output, however with a very low citation impact. Spain, Denmark and Germany each demonstrates distinct collaboration patterns and publication source and citation distribution profiles. More than half the citations to EU Wind Power research are EU-self citations. An expected intensified EU collaboration in the Wind Energy field does not come about. The most productive research institutions in Denmark and Spain are also the most cited ones.     

Highly cited non-journal publications in political science,economics and psychology: a first exploration

In this study we show that it is possible to identify top-cited publications other than Web of Science (WoS) publications, particularly non-journal publications, within fields in the social and behavioral sciences. We analyzed references in publications that were themselves highly cited, with at least one European address. Books represent between 62 (psychology) and 81% (political science) of the non-WoS references, journal articles 15–24%. Books (economics, political science) and manuals (psychology) account for the most highly cited publications. Between 50 (psychology, political science) and 71% (economics) of the top-ranked most cited publications originated from the US versus between 18 (economics) and 38% (psychology) from Europe. Finally, it is discussed how the methods and procedures of the study can be optimized.     

A bibliometric analysis of research on proteomics in Science Citation Index Expanded

A bibliometric analysis was conducted to evaluate the global scientific output of proteomics research in the Science Citation Index Expanded from 1995 to 2010. The document types, languages, journals, categories, countries, and institutions were analyzed to obtain publication patterns. Research focuses and trends were revealed by a word cluster method related to author keywords, title, abstract, and KeyWords Plus. Bradford’s Law and the correlation between keywords and institutions were identified to look deeper into the nature works. Proteomics and Journal of Proteome Research published the most articles in proteomics research. The researchers focused on the categories of biochemical research methods, and biochemistry and molecular biology. The USA and Harvard University were the most productive country and institution, respectively, while China was the fastest-growing country due to the support by Chinese government. The distribution of author keywords provided the important clues of hot issues. Results showed that mass spectrometry and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis had been the most frequently used research methods in the past 16 years; and cancer proteomics had a strong potential in the near future. Furthermore, biologists contributed significantly to proteomics research, and were more likely to co-operate with medical scientists.     

High-impact papers presented in the subject category of water resources in the essential science indicators database of the institute for scientific information

The Essential Science Indicators (ESI) database is widely used to evaluate institutions and researchers. The objective of this study was to analyze trends and characteristics of papers in the subject category of water resources in the ESI database of the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI). Distributions of document type, language of publication, scientific output, and publication of journals are reported in this article. Five indicators (the number and ranking of total papers, first-author papers, corresponding-author papers, independent papers, and collaborative papers) were applied to evaluate country, institute, and author performances. In addition, the numbers of authors cited, numbers of institutes cited, numbers of countries cited, and numbers of subject areas cited were also used to evaluate ESI papers. Results showed that 265 papers, all written in English, were listed in 27 journals in the field of water resources. A review paper was more likely to be included in the ESI than a research paper. Journal of Hydrology published the most papers. The USA and UK were the two leading nations. ESI papers published in the US were more likely to involve inter-institutional collaboration than papers published in the UK. The University of Arizona was the most productive institute. Some papers that were almost excluded from the ESI database appear to have consistently received annual high frequencies of citation. Perhaps the 10 year criterion for inclusion in the ESI should be reassessed.     

Current performance and future trends in health care sciences and services research

Health care sciences and services research (HCSSR) has come to the fore in recent years and related research literature increased rapidly over the last few decades. The main purpose of this study is to describe the global progress and to determine the current trends on HCSSR by using a scientometrics approach to survey related literature in the Web of Science database from 1900 to 2012. The document types, languages, publication patterns, subject categories, journals, geographic and institutional distributions, top cited articles, and the distribution of keywords were thoroughly examined. The results show that HCSSR has increased rapidly over the past 20 years, most notably in the last decade. In total, there are currently 128,728 research articles in 156 journals listed in 39 WoS subject categories. The top 20 most productive countries, and institutions were analyzed in detail, and 11 frequently cited papers and research foci were identified based on citation analysis. HCSSR spans many disciplines and focuses mainly on public, environmental & occupational health and education educational research. Medical Care, Academic Medicine, Health Affairs and Journal of School Health are the core journals with both high quantity and quality. High-income countries make up the leading nations, especially G7 countries. Meanwhile, “emerging economies” are also increasingly engaging this field. American and Canadian institutions have made greater advances in productions, citations, and cooperation, with stronger and better development prospects overall. The hot topics include internet use and decision making in health care, palliative care and end of life research, health status and quality of life, quality of healthcare and patient’s satisfaction, medical education, and health communication. Also, most researchers tend to study health care sciences based on the topics of quality-of-life assessment, and their interest in quality-of-life measures has increased. Increasing attention has been paid to the developing countries, especially “emerging economies” like China. Although health research has made much progress, many questions still remain unanswered and there are few assessments of how well research systems carry out their essential functions. Hence, there is currently an urgent need for timely establishment of an effective health research system.     

Characterizing a scientific elite (B): publication and citation patterns of the most highly cited scientists in environmental science and ecology

Science is principally driven by the efforts of a vanishingly small fraction of researchers publishing the majority of scientific research and garnering the majority of citations. Despite this well-established trend, knowledge of exactly how many articles these researchers publish, how highly they are cited, and how they achieved their distinctive accomplishments is meager. This article examines the publication and citation patterns of the world’s most highly cited environmental scientists and ecologists, inquiring into their levels of scientific productivity and visibility, examining relationships between scientific productivity and quality within their research programs, and considering how different publication strategies contribute to these distinctive successes. Generally speaking, highly cited researchers are also highly productive, publishing on average well over 100 articles each. Furthermore, articles published by this group are more highly cited on average than articles published in premier generalist journal like Nature and Science, and their citation to publication ratios are more equitably distributed than is typical. Research specialization and primacy of authorship are important determinants of citation frequency, while geographic differences and collaborative propensity matter less. The article closes with a set of suggestions for those wishing to increase the use of their research by the scientific community.     

Independent publications from Serbia in the Science Citation Index Expanded: a bibliometric analysis

This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of articles from the Republic of Serbia in the period 2006–2012 that are indexed in the Thomson Reuters SCI-EXPANDED database. The Republic of Serbia is a small country in Europe with about seven million citizens that became an independent country in 2006. Since 2006, Serbian science has achieved some recognition. Analysis included 14,293 articles with authors all from Serbia. Distribution of published articles in the Web of Science categories, journals, scientific-research institutions and researchers were analysed. Most cited independent research articles from Serbia were also analysed. The Y-index indicator for rating the productivity of researchers and institutions was used. This indicator takes into account the contribution of the researcher to the published results. The results showed that the productivity of articles from Serbia is significant compared to neighbouring Serbian countries, taking into account the number of researchers in these countries, their GDPs and the percentages of GDPs spent on research.     

15 Years of Small: Research Trends in Nanosafety

In the field of nano‐ and microscale science and technology, Small has become one of the worldwide leading journals since its initiation 15 years ago. Among all the topics covered in Small, “nanosafety” has received growing interest over the years, which accounts for a large proportion of the total publications of Small. Herein, inspired by its coming Special Issue “Rethinking Nanosafety,” a general bibliometric overview of the nanosafety studies that have been published in Small is presented. Using the data derived from the Web of Science Core Collection, the annual publication growth, most influential countries/institutions as well as the visualized collaborations between different countries and institutions based on CiteSpace software are presented. A special emphasis on the impact of the previous Special Issue from Small that is related to nanosafety research is given and the research trend from the most highly cited papers during last 15 years is analyzed. Lastly, future research directions are also proposed.     

Difficulties and challenges of Chinese scientific journals: Statistical analysis of Chinese literatures using Chinese Science Bulletin as example

Using statistical method, the author analyzed the citation rate of articles published in Chinese Science Bulletin (CSB) between 1995 and 1999 in Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) databases. Results indicated that: 1. Majority of authors who published in CSB were Chinese; 2. The articles were basically cited by the authors themselves in the first year after publication; 3. The peak of total citation rate appeared in the third year after publication and the peak of non-self-citation rate was further delayed. There are relatively high self-citation rates of articles from CSB and most of these citations are from Chinese scientific journals. This indicates that our citation environment is limited to a closed circle. The author, therefore, proposed a strategy for changing the current conditions of Chinese scientific journals to raise their influence. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Bibliometric analysis of tsunami research

The use of the bibilometric analytical technique for examining tsunami research does not exist in the literature. The objective of the study was to perform a bibliometric analysis of all tsunami-related publications in the Science Citation Index (SCI). Analyzed parameters included document type, language of publication, publication output, authorship, publication patterns, distribution of subject category, distribution of author keywords, country of publication, most-frequently cited article, and document distribution after the Indonesia tsunami. The US and Japan produced 53% of the total output where the seven major industrial countries accounted for the majority of the total production. English was the dominant language, comprising 95% of articles. A simulation model was applied to describe the relationship between the number of authors and the number of articles, the number of journals and the number of articles, and the percentage of total articles and the number of times a certain keyword was used. Moreover the tsunami publication patterns in the first 8 months after the Indonesia tsunami occurred on 26 December 2004 indicated a high percentage of non-article publications and more documents being published in journals with higher impact factors.     

Use of citation per publication as an indicator to evaluate contingent valuation research

This is the first article using bibliometrics to study the field of contingent valuation research. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the contingent valuation research performance based on all the related articles in SCI and SSCI databases from 1991 to 2005. An indicator named citation per publication (CPP) was presented in this study to assess the impact of article output per year, different countries, institutes, and authors from the worldwide. Publication per institute (PPI) in a country was used to be an indicator to compare institute’s research performance by country. Citation analysis was made to select the most frequently cited articles since publication to 2005 of each year. A citation model was applied to describe the relationship between the cumulative number of citations and article life. The results indicate that with the increase article output per year, the CPP decreased slightly since 1997. The USA produced 55% of all pertinent articles. Institutes from the UK had a higher PPI. The most prolific institutes and authors, and the most frequently cited articles per year were all listed. In addition, a citation model was successfully applied to evaluate performance of each year, and the most frequently cited articles of each year were also compared by the model.     

A bibliometric analysis of the performance of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Water Research</Emphasis>

This paper presents a detailed chronological survey of papers published in the journal titled Water Research which started publication since 1967. This current investigation reviews publication patterns between 1967 and 2008. An analysis of the research performance according to publication output, distribution of words in article title, author keywords, and keywords plus. Performances of countries, institutes, and authors, including total, single, collaborative, first author, and corresponding author publications were analyzed. The most-frequently cited articles each year and the articles of the highest impact in 2008 were also reported. Results showed that “activated sludge” was the most frequently used author keyword, followed by “adsorption,” and “drinking water.” Authors from 114 different countries/territories published in the journal, with the most articles submitted by authors from the USA.     

Progress in global parallel computing research: a bibliometric approach

This study adopts a bibliometric approach to analyze the progress in global parallel computing research from the related literature in the Science Citation Index Expanded database from 1958 to 2011. By investigating the characteristics of annual publication outputs, we find that parallel computing has recently experienced increasing attention again after its first rapid development in the 1990s, and the research in this field is entering into a new phase. The distribution of publications indicates that the seven major industrial countries (G7), with USA ranking top, are identified as the most productive and influential countries in this domain. Author keywords were analyzed by comparison, and we conclude that the study focus of parallel computing has shifted from hardware to software, with parallel application and programming based on MPI, GPUs and multicores being the research tendencies; grid computing and cloud computing dominate the distributed computing area due to their heterogeneous and scalable structures; and, furthermore, the processors of parallel machines are heading for a diverse development. The citing-cited matrix brings into light the intense interactions among the disciplines of computer science, engineering, mathematics and physics. The mutual interactions between the four disciplines have increased gradually and reflect the subject characteristics in influence content.     

Mapping research collaborations in the business and management field in Malaysia, 1980–2010

This paper examines research collaborations in the field of business and management in Malaysia, a fast-developing economy in Southeast Asia. The country aims to become a developed nation by the year 2020, guided by its well-charted Wawasan 2020 or Vision 2020 program. Research and development are important agenda items within this program. Rarely, however, have studies investigated the research collaborations of researchers based in Malaysia from the network perspective. After a manual author disambiguation process, we examined the network of 285 business and management researchers at the individual, institutional, and international levels. Author collaborations per paper almost doubled between 2001 and 2010 compared to the period 1980–1990. The popularity of researchers and the strength and diversity of their ties with other researchers had significant effects on their research performance. Furthermore, geographical proximity still mattered in intra-national collaborations. Malaysian institutions more often collaborated intra-institutionally or with foreign partners than with other institutions within Malaysia. The country’s five research universities are among the top-most productive of all institutions in Malaysia. Malaysia’s top international partners are all developed countries, including the US, Australia, Japan, the UK, and Canada. Surprisingly, Malaysia has had relatively little collaboration with ASEAN nations, of which it is a prominent member and which has an important agenda of educational cooperation within its member states. Internationally co-authored articles have been cited almost three times more than locally co-authored articles. Based on these results, we suggest an effective co-authorship strategy.     

Scientific publishing in West Africa: comparing Benin with Ghana and Senegal

We compared scientific indicators related to Benin, Senegal and Ghana. We collected data from Web of Science and used bibliometric indicators like annual production, language and type of publication, citable and cited documents, citations, h-index, field share, specialization index, and international collaboration rate. Results show that Benin performs well regarding the percentage of citable and cited documents, the share of production and the specialization index in the fields of Natural sciences and Agricultural sciences; it occupies the median position with respect to the production and the specialization index in the fields of Engineering and technology on the one hand and Medical and health sciences on the other hand, behind Ghana and ahead Senegal. It lays however behind Ghana and Senegal with respect to the total output, citations per citable or cited documents, h-index, the share of production and specialization index in the fields of Social science and Humanities; it has the highest international collaboration rate. The study revealed that the three countries cooperated less, and only if a third western country intervened. It pointed out the role of Western countries in driving collaboration among developing countries.