Citation Analysis: Home

Citation Analysis involves using quantative data derived from the use of citations (bibliographies, works cited, or reference pages in books, articles, or other publications) to analyze the scholarly impact of a researcher, a group of researchers, or a publication.

Citation analysis can be as simple as counting the number of times a person or group has been cited by others, a ratio of their citations to their output, or some other mathematical function that relates their citation counts to other measures.

Citation analysis is a quantitative measurement that cannot give a full picture of a researcher or journal's scholarly impact.

For individuals, many factors may influence their citation rates and measurements, including:

• What format the researcher publishes in (books, journal articles, patents, white papers, etc.)
• The discipline of the researcher and its citation practices
• The type of publications produced (creative writing, review articles, book reviews, etc.)
• Whether self-citation is taken into consideration

For journals, additional considerations may affect the impact factor:

• Language of publication
• Type of articles published (letters to the editor, review articles, etc.)
• Publication schedule
• Number of articles published per year, especially changes in number of articles due to publication changes

Citation analysis should always be used with other quantitative and qualitative measures when evaluating the scholarly worth of a journal or researcher.

Some further reading is available here:

In this guide you will find:

1. General Information about citation analysis measures for individual authors
2. Information about using the Web of Science Databases for author citation analysis
3. Information about using Google Scholar for author citation analysis
4. Information about citation analysis for Journals