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Multiplicative versus fractional counting methods for co-authored publications. The case of the 500 universities in the Leiden Ranking

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  • Perianes-Rodriguez, Antonio
  • Ruiz-Castillo, Javier

Abstract

This paper studies the assignment of responsibility to the participants in the case of co-authored scientific publications. In the conceptual part, we establish that one shortcoming of the full counting method is its incompatibility with the use of additively decomposable citation impact indicators. In the empirical part of the paper, we study the consequences of adopting the address-line fractional or multiplicative counting methods. For this purpose, we use a Web of Science dataset consisting of 3.6 million articles published in the 2005–2008 period, and classified into 5119 clusters. Our research units are the 500 universities in the 2013 edition of the CWTS Leiden Ranking. Citation impact is measured using the Mean Normalized Citation Score, and the Top 10% indicators. The main findings are the following. Firstly, although a change of counting methods alters co-authorship and citation impact patterns, cardinal differences between co-authorship rates and between citation impact values are generally small. Nevertheless, such small differences generate considerable re-rankings between universities. Secondly, the universities that are more favored by the adoption of a fractional rather than a multiplicative approach are those with a large co-authorship rate for the citation distribution as a whole, a small co-authorship rate in the upper tail of this distribution, a large citation impact performance, and a large number of solo publications.

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  • Perianes-Rodriguez, Antonio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2015. "Multiplicative versus fractional counting methods for co-authored publications. The case of the 500 universities in the Leiden Ranking," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 974-989.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:infome:v:9:y:2015:i:4:p:974-989
    DOI: 10.1016/j.joi.2015.10.002
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    7. Li, Yunrong & Radicchi, Filippo & Castellano, Claudio & Ruiz-Castillo, Javier, 2013. "Quantitative evaluation of alternative field normalization procedures," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 746-755.
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    Cited by:

    1. Rodríguez-Navarro, Alonso & Brito, Ricardo, 2018. "Double rank analysis for research assessment," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 31-41.
    2. Tayyaba Rafique & Muhammad Usman Awan & Muhammad Shafiq & Khalid Mahmood, 2024. "Development of university ranking scale for higher education institutions," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 58(6), pages 5715-5735, December.
    3. Bouyssou, Denis & Marchant, Thierry, 2016. "Ranking authors using fractional counting of citations: An axiomatic approach," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 183-199.
    4. Ruiz-Castillo, Javier & Costas, Rodrigo, 2018. "Individual and field citation distributions in 29 broad scientific fields," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 868-892.
    5. Waltman, Ludo, 2016. "A review of the literature on citation impact indicators," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 365-391.
    6. Darrin J. Griffin & Zachary W. Arth & Samuel D. Hakim & Brian C. Britt & James N. Gilbreath & Mackenzie P. Pike & Andrew J. Laningham & Fareed Bordbar & Sage Hart & San Bolkan, 2021. "Collaborations in communication: Authorship credit allocation via a weighted fractional count procedure," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(5), pages 4355-4372, May.
    7. Antonio Perianes-Rodriguez & Javier Ruiz-Castillo, 2016. "A comparison of two ways of evaluating research units working in different scientific fields," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 106(2), pages 539-561, February.
    8. Janne-Tuomas Seppänen & Hanna Värri & Irene Ylönen, 2022. "Co-citation Percentile Rank and JYUcite: a new network-standardized output-level citation influence metric and its implementation using Dimensions API," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(6), pages 3523-3541, June.
    9. Waltman, Ludo & van Eck, Nees Jan, 2015. "Field-normalized citation impact indicators and the choice of an appropriate counting method," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 872-894.

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