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Counting and comparing publication output with and without equalizing and inflationary bias

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  • Hagen, Nils T.

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of inflationary and equalizing bias on publication output rankings. Any identifiable amount of bias in authorship accreditation was detrimental to accuracy when ranking a select group of leading Canadian aquaculture researchers. Bias arose when publication scores were calculated without taking into account information about multiple authorship and differential coauthor contributions. The ensuing biased equal credit scores, whether fractional or inflated, produced rankings that were fundamentally different from the ranking of harmonic estimates of actual credit calculated by using all relevant byline information in the source data. In conclusion, the results indicate that both fractional and inflated rankings are misleading, and suggest that accurate accreditation of coauthors is the key to reliable publication performance rankings.

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  • Hagen, Nils T., 2014. "Counting and comparing publication output with and without equalizing and inflationary bias," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 310-317.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:8:y:2014:i:2:p:310-317
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2014.01.003
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Mu-Hsuan Huang & Chi-Shiou Lin & Dar-Zen Chen, 2011. "Counting methods, country rank changes, and counting inflation in the assessment of national research productivity and impact," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(12), pages 2427-2436, December.
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    12. Fredrik Niclas Piro & Dag W. Aksnes & Kristoffer Rørstad, 2013. "A macro analysis of productivity differences across fields: Challenges in the measurement of scientific publishing," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(2), pages 307-320, February.
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    1. Hagen, Nils T., 2014. "Reversing the byline hierarchy: The effect of equalizing bias on the accreditation of primary, secondary and senior authors," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 618-627.
    2. Hagen, Nils T., 2015. "Contributory inequality alters assessment of academic output gap between comparable countries," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 629-641.
    3. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
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    7. William H. Walters & Esther Isabelle Wilder, 2015. "Worldwide contributors to the literature of library and information science: top authors, 2007–2012," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 103(1), pages 301-327, April.
    8. Rahman, Mohammad Tariqur & Regenstein, Joe Mac & Kassim, Noor Lide Abu & Haque, Nazmul, 2017. "The need to quantify authors’ relative intellectual contributions in a multi-author paper," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 275-281.
    9. João M. Fernandes, 2014. "Authorship trends in software engineering," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(1), pages 257-271, October.
    10. Korytkowski, Przemyslaw & Kulczycki, Emanuel, 2019. "Publication counting methods for a national research evaluation exercise," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 804-816.
    11. Pär Sundling, 2023. "Author contributions and allocation of authorship credit: testing the validity of different counting methods in the field of chemical biology," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(5), pages 2737-2762, May.

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