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Journal self-citation rates in ecological sciences

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  • Jochen Krauss

    (University of Zürich
    Population Ecology)

Abstract

Impact factors are a widely accepted means for the assessment of journal quality. However, journal editors have possibilities to influence the impact factor of their journals, for example, by requesting authors to cite additional papers published recently in that journal thus increasing the self-citation rate. I calculated self-citation rates of journals ranked in the Journal Citation Reports of ISI in the subject category “Ecology” (n = 107). On average, self citation was responsible for 16.2 ± 1.3% (mean ± SE) of the impact factor in 2004. The self-citation rates decrease with increasing journal impact, but even high impact journals show large variation. Six journals suspected to request for additional citations showed high self-citation rates, which increased over the last seven years. To avoid further deliberate increases in self-citation rates, I suggest to take journal-specific self-citation rates into account for journal rankings.

Suggested Citation

  • Jochen Krauss, 2007. "Journal self-citation rates in ecological sciences," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 73(1), pages 79-89, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:73:y:2007:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-007-1727-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-007-1727-7
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Mathieu Leblond, 2012. "Author self-citations in the field of ecology," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 91(3), pages 943-953, June.
    2. Castro e Silva, Manuela & Teixeira, Aurora A.C., 2011. "A bibliometric account of the evolution of EE in the last two decades: Is ecological economics (becoming) a post-normal science?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(5), pages 849-862, March.
    3. 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.
    4. Guang Yu & Dong-Hui Yang & Wang Liang, 2010. "Reliability-based citation impact factor and the manipulation of impact factor," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 83(1), pages 259-270, April.
    5. João Carlos Nabout & Fabrício Barreto Teresa & Karine Borges Machado & Vitor Hugo Mendonça Prado & Luis Mauricio Bini & José Alexandre Felizola Diniz-Filho, 2018. "Do traditional scientometric indicators predict social media activity on scientific knowledge? An analysis of the ecological literature," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 115(2), pages 1007-1015, May.
    6. Dong-Hui Yang & Xin Li & Xiaoxia Sun & Jie Wan, 2016. "Detecting impact factor manipulation with data mining techniques," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 109(3), pages 1989-2005, December.
    7. Taşkın, Zehra & Doğan, Güleda & Kulczycki, Emanuel & Zuccala, Alesia Ann, 2021. "Self-Citation Patterns of Journals Indexed in the Journal Citation Reports," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4).
    8. Tehmina Amjad & Ying Ding & Ali Daud & Jian Xu & Vincent Malic, 2015. "Topic-based heterogeneous rank," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 104(1), pages 313-334, July.
    9. Daniel Teodorescu & Tudorel Andrei, 2014. "An examination of “citation circles” for social sciences journals in Eastern European countries," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 99(2), pages 209-231, May.

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