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How robust are journal rankings based on the impact factor? Evidence from the economic sciences

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  • Seiler, Christian
  • Wohlrabe, Klaus

Abstract

It is well-known that the distribution of citations to articles in a journal is skewed. We ask whether journal rankings based on the impact factor are robust with respect to this fact. We exclude the most cited paper, the top 5 and 10 cited papers for 100 economics journals and recalculate the impact factor. Afterwards we compare the resulting rankings with the original ones from 2012. Our results show that the rankings are relatively robust. This holds both for the 2-year and the 5-year impact factor.

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  • Seiler, Christian & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2014. "How robust are journal rankings based on the impact factor? Evidence from the economic sciences," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 904-911.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:8:y:2014:i:4:p:904-911
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2014.09.001
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    1. Loet Leydesdorff & Tobias Opthof, 2010. "Scopus's source normalized impact per paper (SNIP) versus a journal impact factor based on fractional counting of citations," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(11), pages 2365-2369, November.
    2. David I. Stern, 2013. "Uncertainty Measures for Economics Journal Impact Factors," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 51(1), pages 173-189, March.
    3. Henk F. Moed & Lisa Colledge & Jan Reedijk & Felix Moya-Anegon & Vicente Guerrero-Bote & Andrew Plume & Mayur Amin, 2012. "Citation-based metrics are appropriate tools in journal assessment provided that they are accurate and used in an informed way," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 92(2), pages 367-376, August.
    4. Chen, Kuan-Ming & Jen, Tsung-Hau & Wu, Margaret, 2014. "Estimating the accuracies of journal impact factor through bootstrap," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 181-196.
    5. Per O. Seglen, 1992. "The skewness of science," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 43(9), pages 628-638, October.
    6. Seiler, Christian & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2014. "How robust are journal rankings based on the impact factor? Evidence from the economic sciences," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 904-911.
    7. Wall Howard J, 2009. "Don't Get Skewed Over by Journal Rankings," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-12, August.
    8. Jerome K. Vanclay, 2012. "Impact factor: outdated artefact or stepping-stone to journal certification?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 92(2), pages 211-238, August.
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Vera Sommer & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2017. "Citations, journal ranking and multiple authorships reconsidered: evidence from almost one million articles," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(11), pages 809-814, June.
    2. Seiler, Christian & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2014. "How robust are journal rankings based on the impact factor? Evidence from the economic sciences," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(4), pages 904-911.
    3. Lando, Tommaso & Bertoli-Barsotti, Lucio, 2017. "Measuring the citation impact of journals with generalized Lorenz curves," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(3), pages 689-703.
    4. Klaus Wohlrabe & Lutz Bornmann, 2022. "Alphabetized co-authorship in economics reconsidered," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(5), pages 2173-2193, May.
    5. Nuredini, Kaltrina & Peters, Isabella, 2015. "Economic and Business Studies Journals and Readership Information from Mendeley," EconStor Conference Papers 110467, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    6. Benjamin M. Abdel-Karim & Nicolas Pfeuffer & Oliver Hinz, 2021. "Machine learning in information systems - a bibliographic review and open research issues," Electronic Markets, Springer;IIM University of St. Gallen, vol. 31(3), pages 643-670, September.
    7. Justus Haucap & Johannes Muck, 2015. "What drives the relevance and reputation of economics journals? An update from a survey among economists," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 103(3), pages 849-877, June.
    8. Klaus Wohlrabe & Constantin Bürgi, 2021. "What is the benefit from publishing a working paper in a journal in terms of citations? Evidence from economics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(6), pages 4701-4714, June.
    9. Justus Meyer & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2018. "Standing on the shoulder of giants: the aspect of free-riding in RePEc rankings," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 25(4), pages 223-228, February.
    10. Johan Lyhagen & Per Ahlgren, 2020. "Uncertainty and the ranking of economics journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(3), pages 2545-2560, December.
    11. Constantin Bürgi & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2022. "The influence of Covid-19 on publications in economics: bibliometric evidence from five working paper series," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(9), pages 5175-5189, September.
    12. Lucio Bertoli-Barsotti & Tommaso Lando, 2017. "A theoretical model of the relationship between the h-index and other simple citation indicators," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 111(3), pages 1415-1448, June.
    13. Saarela, Mirka & Kärkkäinen, Tommi & Lahtonen, Tommi & Rossi, Tuomo, 2016. "Expert-based versus citation-based ranking of scholarly and scientific publication channels," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 693-718.
    14. Constantin Bürgi & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2021. "Working Papers, Journal Articles, and Citations: An Empirical Analysis for the Top Five Journals in Economics," ifo Schnelldienst, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 74(02), pages 51-54, February.
    15. Yurij L. Katchanov & Yulia V. Markova, 2017. "The “space of physics journals”: topological structure and the Journal Impact Factor," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(1), pages 313-333, October.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Impact factor; Ranking; Skewness; Economics journals;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A12 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Other Disciplines
    • A14 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Sociology of Economics

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