IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/infome/v19y2025i2s1751157725000112.html

New paper-by-paper classification for Scopus based on references reclassified by the origin of the papers citing them

Author

Listed:
  • Álvarez-Llorente, Jesús M.
  • Guerrero-Bote, Vicente P.
  • Moya-Anegón, Félix

Abstract

A reference-based classification system for individual Scopus publications is presented which takes into account the categories of the papers citing those references instead of the journals in which those cited papers are published. It supports multiple assignments of up to 5 categories within the Scopus ASJC structure, but eliminates the Multidisciplinary Area and the miscellaneous categories, and it allows for the reclassification of a greater number of publications (potentially 100%) than traditional reference-based systems. Twelve variants of the system were obtained by adjusting different parameters, which were applied to the more than 3.2 million citable papers from the active Scientific Journals in 2020 indexed in Scopus. The results were analyzed and compared with other classification systems such as the original journal-based Scopus ASJC, the 2 generation-reference based M3-AWC-0.8 (Álvarez-Llorente et al., 2024), and the corresponding authors' assignment based AAC (Álvarez-Llorente et al., 2023). The different variants obtained of the classification give results that improve those used as references in multiple scientometric fields. The variation called U1-F-0.8 seems especially promising due to its restraint in assigning multiple categories, consistency with reference classifications and the fact of applying normalization processes to avoid the overinfluence of articles that have a greater number of references.

Suggested Citation

  • Álvarez-Llorente, Jesús M. & Guerrero-Bote, Vicente P. & Moya-Anegón, Félix, 2025. "New paper-by-paper classification for Scopus based on references reclassified by the origin of the papers citing them," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:19:y:2025:i:2:s1751157725000112
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2025.101647
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1751157725000112
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.joi.2025.101647?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

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Vicente P. Guerrero-Bote & Felipe Zapico-Alonso & María Eugenia Espinosa-Calvo & Rocío Gómez-Crisóstomo & Félix Moya-Anegón, 2007. "Import-export of knowledge between scientific subject categories: The iceberg hypothesis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 71(3), pages 423-441, June.
    2. Wang, Qi & Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "Large-scale analysis of the accuracy of the journal classification systems of Web of Science and Scopus," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 347-364.
    3. Aleksander Aristovnik & Dejan Ravšelj & Lan Umek, 2020. "A Bibliometric Analysis of COVID-19 across Science and Social Science Research Landscape," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-30, November.
    4. Lovro Šubelj & Nees Jan van Eck & Ludo Waltman, 2016. "Clustering Scientific Publications Based on Citation Relations: A Systematic Comparison of Different Methods," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(4), pages 1-23, April.
    5. Ludo Waltman & Nees Jan van Eck, 2012. "A new methodology for constructing a publication‐level classification system of science," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2378-2392, December.
    6. Kevin W. Boyack & Richard Klavans, 2010. "Co‐citation analysis, bibliographic coupling, and direct citation: Which citation approach represents the research front most accurately?," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(12), pages 2389-2404, December.
    7. Richard Klavans & Kevin W. Boyack, 2006. "Quantitative evaluation of large maps of science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 68(3), pages 475-499, September.
    8. Benjamin M. Althouse & Jevin D. West & Carl T. Bergstrom & Theodore Bergstrom, 2009. "Differences in impact factor across fields and over time," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 60(1), pages 27-34, January.
    9. Jiandong Zhang & Zhesi Shen, 2024. "Analyzing journal category assignment using a paper-level classification system: multidisciplinary sciences journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(10), pages 5963-5978, October.
    10. Mike Thelwall & Stephen Pinfield, 2024. "The accuracy of field classifications for journals in Scopus," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(2), pages 1097-1117, February.
    11. Jesús M. Álvarez-Llorente & Vicente P. Guerrero-Bote & Félix Moya-Anegón, 2024. "New fractional classifications of papers based on two generations of references and on the ASJC scopus scheme," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(6), pages 3493-3515, June.
    12. Kevin W. Boyack & Henry Small & Richard Klavans, 2013. "Improving the accuracy of co‐citation clustering using full text," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(9), pages 1759-1767, September.
    13. Kevin W. Boyack & Richard Klavans, 2010. "Co-citation analysis, bibliographic coupling, and direct citation: Which citation approach represents the research front most accurately?," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(12), pages 2389-2404, December.
    14. Lin Zhang & Frizo Janssens & Liming Liang & Wolfgang Glänzel, 2010. "Journal cross-citation analysis for validation and improvement of journal-based subject classification in bibliometric research," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 82(3), pages 687-706, March.
    15. Ludo Waltman & Nees Jan Eck, 2012. "A new methodology for constructing a publication-level classification system of science," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2378-2392, December.
    16. Lin Zhang & Beibei Sun & Fei Shu & Ying Huang, 2022. "Comparing paper level classifications across different methods and systems: an investigation of Nature publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(12), pages 7633-7651, December.
    17. Bárbara S. Lancho-Barrantes & Vicente P. Guerrero-Bote & Félix Moya-Anegón, 2010. "The iceberg hypothesis revisited," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 85(2), pages 443-461, November.
    18. Frizo Janssens & Wolfgang Glänzel & Bart Moor, 2008. "A hybrid mapping of information science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 75(3), pages 607-631, June.
    19. Kevin W. Boyack & Henry Small & Richard Klavans, 2013. "Improving the accuracy of co-citation clustering using full text," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(9), pages 1759-1767, September.
    20. Shu, Fei & Julien, Charles-Antoine & Zhang, Lin & Qiu, Junping & Zhang, Jing & Larivière, Vincent, 2019. "Comparing journal and paper level classifications of science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 202-225.
    21. Kevin W Boyack & David Newman & Russell J Duhon & Richard Klavans & Michael Patek & Joseph R Biberstine & Bob Schijvenaars & André Skupin & Nianli Ma & Katy Börner, 2011. "Clustering More than Two Million Biomedical Publications: Comparing the Accuracies of Nine Text-Based Similarity Approaches," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 6(3), pages 1-11, March.
    22. W. Glänzel & A. Schubert & U. Schoepflin & H. J. Czerwon, 1999. "An item-by-item subject classification of papers published in journals covered by the SSCI database using reference analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 46(3), pages 431-441, November.
    23. W. Glänzel & A. Schubert & H. -J. Czerwon, 1999. "An item-by-item subject classification of papers published in multidisciplinary and general journals using reference analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 44(3), pages 427-439, March.
    24. Henri A. Schildt & Juha T. Mattsson, 2006. "A dense network sub-grouping algorithm for co-citation analysis and its implementation in the software tool Sitkis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 67(1), pages 143-163, April.
    25. Henri A. Schildt & Juha T. Mattsson, 2006. "A dense network sub-grouping algorithm for co-citation analysis and its implementation in the software tool Sitkis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 67(1), pages 143-163, April.
    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. Sitaram Devarakonda & Dmitriy Korobskiy & Tandy Warnow & George Chacko, 2020. "Viewing computer science through citation analysis: Salton and Bergmark Redux," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(1), pages 271-287, October.
    2. Jesús M. Álvarez-Llorente & Vicente P. Guerrero-Bote & Félix Moya-Anegón, 2024. "New fractional classifications of papers based on two generations of references and on the ASJC scopus scheme," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(6), pages 3493-3515, June.
    3. Yun, Jinhyuk, 2022. "Generalization of bibliographic coupling and co-citation using the node split network," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2).
    4. Sjögårde, Peter & Ahlgren, Per, 2018. "Granularity of algorithmically constructed publication-level classifications of research publications: Identification of topics," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 133-152.
    5. Urdiales, Cristina & Guzmán, Eduardo, 2024. "An automatic and association-based procedure for hierarchical publication subject categorization," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1).
    6. Wang, Qi & Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "Large-scale analysis of the accuracy of the journal classification systems of Web of Science and Scopus," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 347-364.
    7. Qianqian Xie & Ludo Waltman, 2025. "A comparison of citation-based clustering and topic modeling for science mapping," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(5), pages 2497-2522, May.
    8. Michel Zitt, 2015. "Meso-level retrieval: IR-bibliometrics interplay and hybrid citation-words methods in scientific fields delineation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 102(3), pages 2223-2245, March.
    9. Gabriele Sampagnaro, 2023. "Keyword occurrences and journal specialization," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(10), pages 5629-5645, October.
    10. Gómez-Núñez, Antonio J. & Batagelj, Vladimir & Vargas-Quesada, Benjamín & Moya-Anegón, Félix & Chinchilla-Rodríguez, Zaida, 2014. "Optimizing SCImago Journal & Country Rank classification by community detection," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 369-383.
    11. Fei Shu & Yue Ma & Junping Qiu & Vincent Larivière, 2020. "Classifications of science and their effects on bibliometric evaluations," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(3), pages 2727-2744, December.
    12. Paul Donner, 2021. "Validation of the Astro dataset clustering solutions with external data," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(2), pages 1619-1645, February.
    13. Lin Zhang & Beibei Sun & Fei Shu & Ying Huang, 2022. "Comparing paper level classifications across different methods and systems: an investigation of Nature publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(12), pages 7633-7651, December.
    14. Li, Menghui & Yang, Liying & Zhang, Huina & Shen, Zhesi & Wu, Chensheng & Wu, Jinshan, 2017. "Do mathematicians, economists and biomedical scientists trace large topics more strongly than physicists?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 598-607.
    15. Bornmann, Lutz & Haunschild, Robin, 2022. "Empirical analysis of recent temporal dynamics of research fields: Annual publications in chemistry and related areas as an example," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2).
    16. Matthias Held & Grit Laudel & Jochen Gläser, 2021. "Challenges to the validity of topic reconstruction," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(5), pages 4511-4536, May.
    17. Lovro Šubelj & Nees Jan van Eck & Ludo Waltman, 2016. "Clustering Scientific Publications Based on Citation Relations: A Systematic Comparison of Different Methods," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(4), pages 1-23, April.
    18. Leydesdorff, Loet & Bornmann, Lutz & Zhou, Ping, 2016. "Construction of a pragmatic base line for journal classifications and maps based on aggregated journal-journal citation relations," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 902-918.
    19. Muñoz-Écija, Teresa & Vargas-Quesada, Benjamín & Chinchilla Rodríguez, Zaida, 2019. "Coping with methods for delineating emerging fields: Nanoscience and nanotechnology as a case study," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(4).
    20. Xu, Shuo & Hao, Liyuan & An, Xin & Yang, Guancan & Wang, Feifei, 2019. "Emerging research topics detection with multiple machine learning models," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(4).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:eee:infome:v:19:y:2025:i:2:s1751157725000112. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/joi .

    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.