IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v126y2021i3d10.1007_s11192-021-03862-w.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Comparison of self-citation patterns in WoS and Scopus databases based on national scientific production in Slovenia (1996–2020)

Author

Listed:
  • Gordana Budimir

    (University of Ljubljana)

  • Sophia Rahimeh

    (Texas A&M University)

  • Sameh Tamimi

    (Wichita State University)

  • Primož Južnič

    (University of Ljubljana)

Abstract

Comparative studies of Web of Science and Scopus databases relate mainly to journal coverage and citation indicators. The aim of this study is to compare self-citation patterns in these databases. 25 years of scientific production (1996–2020) in Slovenia was analyzed. To offset limitations and errors of deriving data directly from databases, we used the COBISS/SciMet portal, which systematically collects records of citations with various authors identifiers for the total national scientific production. Both databases were harmonized according to the Frascati/OECD classification scheme of research fields. Self-citations were determined by comparing author identifiers rather than their names. Scopus shows better results in self-citation counts. This is mainly due to its higher coverage of local academic journals published in Slovenia and other regional journals, mostly in Humanities, where a fifth of all documents received about 3% more self-citations. In Engineering & Technology and Social Sciences, about 4% and 3% of all documents received approximately 2% more self-citations. However, these differences cause less than 3% more self-citations per researchers and two databases did not substantially differ in the relative citation ranking of researchers. Also, similar patterns of faster ageing of self-citations, rather than citations, were found in both databases, indicating a similar diminishing impact of self-citations on citations over time for all fields.

Suggested Citation

  • Gordana Budimir & Sophia Rahimeh & Sameh Tamimi & Primož Južnič, 2021. "Comparison of self-citation patterns in WoS and Scopus databases based on national scientific production in Slovenia (1996–2020)," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(3), pages 2249-2267, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:126:y:2021:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-021-03862-w
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-021-03862-w
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-021-03862-w
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11192-021-03862-w?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lokman I. Meho & Yvonne Rogers, 2008. "Citation counting, citation ranking, and h‐index of human‐computer interaction researchers: A comparison of Scopus and Web of Science," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 59(11), pages 1711-1726, September.
    2. Anne-Wil Harzing, 2015. "Health warning: might contain multiple personalities—the problem of homonyms in Thomson Reuters Essential Science Indicators," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 105(3), pages 2259-2270, December.
    3. Rok Blagus & Brane L. Leskošek & Janez Stare, 2015. "Comparison of bibliometric measures for assessing relative importance of researchers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 105(3), pages 1743-1762, December.
    4. Henk F. Moed & Valentina Markusova & Mark Akoev, 2018. "Trends in Russian research output indexed in Scopus and Web of Science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(2), pages 1153-1180, August.
    5. Vincent Larivière & Benoit Macaluso, 2011. "Improving the coverage of social science and humanities researchers' output: The case of the Érudit journal platform," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(12), pages 2437-2442, December.
    6. Rodrigo Costas & Thed N. Leeuwen & María Bordons, 2010. "Self-citations at the meso and individual levels: effects of different calculation methods," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 82(3), pages 517-537, March.
    7. Anne-Wil Harzing & Satu Alakangas, 2016. "Google Scholar, Scopus and the Web of Science: a longitudinal and cross-disciplinary comparison," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 106(2), pages 787-804, February.
    8. Silvio Peroni & Paolo Ciancarini & Aldo Gangemi & Andrea Giovanni Nuzzolese & Francesco Poggi & Valentina Presutti, 2020. "The practice of self-citations: a longitudinal study," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(1), pages 253-282, April.
    9. Philippe Mongeon & Adèle Paul-Hus, 2016. "The journal coverage of Web of Science and Scopus: a comparative analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 106(1), pages 213-228, January.
    10. Tomaz Bartol & Gordana Budimir & Doris Dekleva-Smrekar & Miro Pusnik & Primoz Juznic, 2014. "Assessment of research fields in Scopus and Web of Science in the view of national research evaluation in Slovenia," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 98(2), pages 1491-1504, February.
    11. Francisco González-Sala & Julia Osca-Lluch & Julia Haba-Osca, 2019. "Are journal and author self-citations a visibility strategy?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 119(3), pages 1345-1364, June.
    12. Ameni Kacem & Justin W. Flatt & Philipp Mayr, 2020. "Tracking self-citations in academic publishing," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(2), pages 1157-1165, May.
    13. Martín-Martín, Alberto & Orduna-Malea, Enrique & Thelwall, Mike & Delgado López-Cózar, Emilio, 2018. "Google Scholar, Web of Science, and Scopus: A systematic comparison of citations in 252 subject categories," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 1160-1177.
    14. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
    15. Trin Thananusak, 2019. "Science Mapping of the Knowledge Base on Sustainable Entrepreneurship, 1996–2019," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(13), pages 1-20, June.
    16. Loet Leydesdorff & Paul Wouters & Lutz Bornmann, 2016. "Professional and citizen bibliometrics: complementarities and ambivalences in the development and use of indicators—a state-of-the-art report," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(3), pages 2129-2150, December.
    17. Bar-Ilan, Judit & Levene, Mark & Lin, Ayelet, 2007. "Some measures for comparing citation databases," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 26-34.
    18. Vincent Larivière & Benoit Macaluso, 2011. "Improving the coverage of social science and humanities researchers' output: The case of the Érudit journal platform," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 62(12), pages 2437-2442, December.
    19. Camil Demetrescu & Andrea Ribichini & Marco Schaerf, 2018. "Accuracy of author names in bibliographic data sources: an Italian case study," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(3), pages 1777-1791, December.
    20. Franceschini, Fiorenzo & Maisano, Domenico & Mastrogiacomo, Luca, 2016. "Empirical analysis and classification of database errors in Scopus and Web of Science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 933-953.
    21. Truyken L. B. Ossenblok & Tim C. E. Engels & Gunnar Sivertsen, 2012. "The representation of the social sciences and humanities in the Web of Science--a comparison of publication patterns and incentive structures in Flanders and Norway (2005--9)," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(4), pages 280-290, September.
    22. Marek Kosmulski, 2020. "Nobel laureates are not hot," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(1), pages 487-495, April.
    23. Stojan Pečlin & Primož Južnič & Rok Blagus & Mojca Čižek Sajko & Janez Stare, 2012. "Effects of international collaboration and status of journal on impact of papers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 93(3), pages 937-948, December.
    24. Dag W. Aksnes, 2003. "A macro study of self-citation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 56(2), pages 235-246, February.
    25. Wolfgang Glänzel & Koenraad Debackere & Bart Thijs & András Schubert, 2006. "A concise review on the role of author self-citations in information science, bibliometrics and science policy," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 67(2), pages 263-277, May.
    26. Justin W. Flatt & Alessandro Blasimme & Effy Vayena, 2017. "Improving the Measurement of Scientific Success by Reporting a Self-Citation Index," Publications, MDPI, vol. 5(3), pages 1-6, August.
    27. Dejan Pajić, 2015. "Globalization of the social sciences in Eastern Europe: genuine breakthrough or a slippery slope of the research evaluation practice?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 102(3), pages 2131-2150, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
    2. Raminta Pranckutė, 2021. "Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus: The Titans of Bibliographic Information in Today’s Academic World," Publications, MDPI, vol. 9(1), pages 1-59, March.
    3. Hui Li & Weishu Liu, 2020. "Same same but different: self-citations identified through Scopus and Web of Science Core Collection," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 124(3), pages 2723-2732, September.
    4. Abramo, Giovanni & D'Angelo, Ciriaco Andrea & Grilli, Leonardo, 2021. "The effects of citation-based research evaluation schemes on self-citation behavior," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4).
    5. Gerson Pech & Catarina Delgado, 2020. "Percentile and stochastic-based approach to the comparison of the number of citations of articles indexed in different bibliographic databases," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(1), pages 223-252, April.
    6. Gerson Pech & Catarina Delgado, 2020. "Assessing the publication impact using citation data from both Scopus and WoS databases: an approach validated in 15 research fields," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(2), pages 909-924, November.
    7. Shir Aviv-Reuven & Ariel Rosenfeld, 2023. "A logical set theory approach to journal subject classification analysis: intra-system irregularities and inter-system discrepancies in Web of Science and Scopus," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(1), pages 157-175, January.
    8. Tatiana Marina & Ivan Sterligov, 2021. "Prevalence of potentially predatory publishing in Scopus on the country level," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(6), pages 5019-5077, June.
    9. Parul Khurana & Kiran Sharma, 2022. "Impact of h-index on author’s rankings: an improvement to the h-index for lower-ranked authors," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(8), pages 4483-4498, August.
    10. Michael Gusenbauer, 2022. "Search where you will find most: Comparing the disciplinary coverage of 56 bibliographic databases," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(5), pages 2683-2745, May.
    11. Dag W. Aksnes & Liv Langfeldt & Paul Wouters, 2019. "Citations, Citation Indicators, and Research Quality: An Overview of Basic Concepts and Theories," SAGE Open, , vol. 9(1), pages 21582440198, February.
    12. Junwen Zhu & Weishu Liu, 2020. "A tale of two databases: the use of Web of Science and Scopus in academic papers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(1), pages 321-335, April.
    13. Copiello, Sergio, 2019. "Peer and neighborhood effects: Citation analysis using a spatial autoregressive model and pseudo-spatial data," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 238-254.
    14. Mansour Haghighat & Javad Hayatdavoudi, 2021. "How hot are hot papers? The issue of prolificacy and self-citation stacking," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(1), pages 565-578, January.
    15. Martin Szomszor & David A. Pendlebury & Jonathan Adams, 2020. "How much is too much? The difference between research influence and self-citation excess," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 123(2), pages 1119-1147, May.
    16. Eitan Frachtenberg, 2022. "Multifactor Citation Analysis over Five Years: A Case Study of SIGMETRICS Papers," Publications, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-16, December.
    17. Vivek Kumar Singh & Prashasti Singh & Mousumi Karmakar & Jacqueline Leta & Philipp Mayr, 2021. "The journal coverage of Web of Science, Scopus and Dimensions: A comparative analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(6), pages 5113-5142, June.
    18. Eliseo Reategui & Alause Pires & Michel Carniato & Sergio Roberto Kieling Franco, 2020. "Evaluation of Brazilian research output in education: confronting international and national contexts," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(1), pages 427-444, October.
    19. Weisheng Chiu & Thomas Chun Man Fan & Sang-Back Nam & Ping-Hung Sun, 2021. "Knowledge Mapping and Sustainable Development of eSports Research: A Bibliometric and Visualized Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(18), pages 1-17, September.
    20. Martin-Martin, Alberto & Orduna-Malea, Enrique & Harzing, Anne-Wil & Delgado López-Cózar, Emilio, 2017. "Can we use Google Scholar to identify highly-cited documents?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 152-163.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:126:y:2021:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-021-03862-w. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.