IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v116y2018i2d10.1007_s11192-018-2770-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An analysis of citation functions in the humanities and social sciences research from the perspective of problematic citation analysis assumptions

Author

Listed:
  • Chi-Shiou Lin

    (National Taiwan University
    National Taiwan University)

Abstract

Citation analyses are based on two questionable assumptions that significantly influence the value of citation count: the equal contribution assumption (i.e., each citation contributes equally to the citing paper) and the positive endorsement assumption (i.e., each citation is viewed as an endorsement from the citing paper to the cited work). This study employed a citation context analysis approach to examine the distributions of essential versus perfunctory citations as well as confirmative versus negational citations in humanities and social sciences (H&SS) research articles to determine to what extent the two problematic assumptions affect the validity of citation analyses in those fields. The sample comprises 360 articles representing six subject areas: Chinese literature, history, arts (i.e., the humanities subjects); sociology, economics, and psychology (i.e., the social sciences subjects). Excluding citations to primary sources—e.g., manuscripts, archival materials, monographs that were the subjects of study rather than information sources, a total of 25,617 in-text bibliographic citations were analyzed. The findings show that the distributions of citation functions for those six subject fields were all significantly different, meaning that disciplinary differences exist in H&SS citations. Also, for the H&SS fields, perfunctory citations may have inflated the contribution of the cited works much more than negational citations.

Suggested Citation

  • Chi-Shiou Lin, 2018. "An analysis of citation functions in the humanities and social sciences research from the perspective of problematic citation analysis assumptions," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(2), pages 797-813, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:116:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11192-018-2770-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-018-2770-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-018-2770-2
    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/s11192-018-2770-2?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. Terrence A. Brooks, 1985. "Private acts and public objects: An investigation of citer motivations," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 36(4), pages 223-229, July.
    2. Mu‐hsuan Huang & Yu‐wei Chang, 2008. "Characteristics of research output in social sciences and humanities: From a research evaluation perspective," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 59(11), pages 1819-1828, September.
    3. Antonio Ferrara & Andrea Bonaccorsi, 2016. "How robust is journal rating in Humanities and Social Sciences? Evidence from a large-scale, multi-method exercise," Research Evaluation, Oxford University Press, vol. 25(3), pages 279-291.
    4. Kassarjian, Harold H, 1977. "Content Analysis in Consumer Research," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 4(1), pages 8-18, June.
    5. Stremersch, Stefan & Camacho, Nuno & Vanneste, Sofie & Verniers, Isabel, 2015. "Unraveling scientific impact: Citation types in marketing journals," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 64-77.
    6. V. Cano, 1989. "Citation behavior: Classification, utility, and location," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 40(4), pages 284-290, July.
    7. Poovanalingam Murugesan & Michael J. Moravcsik, 1978. "Variation of the nature of citation measures with journals and scientific specialties," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 29(3), pages 141-147, May.
    8. Tanzila Ahmed & Ben Johnson & Charles Oppenheim & Catherine Peck, 2004. "Highly cited old papers and the reasons why they continue to be cited. Part II., The 1953 Watson and Crick article on the structure of DNA," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 61(2), pages 147-156, October.
    9. Günter Krampen & Ralf Becker & Ute Wahner & Leo Montada, 2007. "On the validity of citation counting in science evaluation: Content analyses of references and citations in psychological publications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 71(2), pages 191-202, May.
    10. Björn Hellqvist, 2010. "Referencing in the humanities and its implications for citation analysis," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(2), pages 310-318, February.
    11. Björn Hellqvist, 2010. "Referencing in the humanities and its implications for citation analysis," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(2), pages 310-318, February.
    12. Charles Oppenheim & Susan P. Renn, 1978. "Highly cited old papers and the reasons why they continue to be cited," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 29(5), pages 225-231, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Iman Tahamtan & Lutz Bornmann, 2019. "What do citation counts measure? An updated review of studies on citations in scientific documents published between 2006 and 2018," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(3), pages 1635-1684, December.
    2. Frederique Bordignon, 2022. "Critical citations in knowledge construction and citation analysis: from paradox to definition," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(2), pages 959-972, February.
    3. Dongqing Lyu & Xuanmin Ruan & Juan Xie & Ying Cheng, 2021. "The classification of citing motivations: a meta-synthesis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(4), pages 3243-3264, April.
    4. Kai Nishikawa, 2023. "How and why are citations between disciplines made? A citation context analysis focusing on natural sciences and social sciences and humanities," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(5), pages 2975-2997, May.
    5. Indra Budi & Yaniasih Yaniasih, 2023. "Understanding the meanings of citations using sentiment, role, and citation function classifications," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(1), pages 735-759, January.
    6. Mike Thelwall, 2019. "Are classic references cited first? An analysis of citation order within article sections," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 120(2), pages 723-731, August.
    7. Heng Huang & Donghua Zhu & Xuefeng Wang, 2022. "Evaluating scientific impact of publications: combining citation polarity and purpose," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(9), pages 5257-5281, September.
    8. Wei‐Ning Cheng & Christopher S. G. Khoo, 2021. "Information structures in sociology research papers: Modeling cause–effect and comparison relations in research objective and result statements," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 72(11), pages 1367-1385, November.

    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. Frederique Bordignon, 2020. "Self-correction of science: a comparative study of negative citations and post-publication peer review," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 124(2), pages 1225-1239, August.
    2. Frederique Bordignon, 2022. "Critical citations in knowledge construction and citation analysis: from paradox to definition," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(2), pages 959-972, February.
    3. Dongqing Lyu & Xuanmin Ruan & Juan Xie & Ying Cheng, 2021. "The classification of citing motivations: a meta-synthesis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(4), pages 3243-3264, April.
    4. Stremersch, S. & Camacho, N.M.A. & Vanneste, S. & Verniers, I.W.J., 2014. "Unraveling Scientific Impact," ERIM Report Series Research in Management ERS-2014-014-MKT, Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
    5. Stremersch, Stefan & Camacho, Nuno & Vanneste, Sofie & Verniers, Isabel, 2015. "Unraveling scientific impact: Citation types in marketing journals," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 64-77.
    6. Eugenio Petrovich, 2018. "Accumulation of knowledge in para-scientific areas: the case of analytic philosophy," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(2), pages 1123-1151, August.
    7. Tahamtan, Iman & Bornmann, Lutz, 2018. "Core elements in the process of citing publications: Conceptual overview of the literature," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 203-216.
    8. Daniela Filippo & Rafael Aleixandre-Benavent & Elías Sanz-Casado, 2020. "Toward a classification of Spanish scholarly journals in social sciences and humanities considering their impact and visibility," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(2), pages 1709-1732, November.
    9. Ponomariov, Branco & Toivanen, Hannes, 2014. "Knowledge flows and bases in emerging economy innovation systems: Brazilian research 2005–2009," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 588-596.
    10. Dangzhi Zhao & Andreas Strotmann, 2020. "Telescopic and panoramic views of library and information science research 2011–2018: a comparison of four weighting schemes for author co-citation analysis," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 124(1), pages 255-270, July.
    11. Teresa H. Jones & Claire Donovan & Steve Hanney, 2012. "Tracing the wider impacts of biomedical research: a literature search to develop a novel citation categorisation technique," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 93(1), pages 125-134, October.
    12. Nigel Harwood, 2008. "Publication outlets and their effect on academic writers’ citations," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 77(2), pages 253-265, November.
    13. Naif Radi Aljohani & Ayman Fayoumi & Saeed-Ul Hassan, 2021. "An in-text citation classification predictive model for a scholarly search system," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(7), pages 5509-5529, July.
    14. Björn Hammarfelt, 2011. "Interdisciplinarity and the intellectual base of literature studies: citation analysis of highly cited monographs," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 86(3), pages 705-725, March.
    15. Kim Kapseon, 2004. "The motivation for citing specific references by social scientists in Korea: The phenomenon of co-existing references," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 59(1), pages 79-93, January.
    16. Beril T. Arik & Engin Arik, 2017. "“Second Language Writing” Publications in Web of Science: A Bibliometric Analysis," Publications, MDPI, vol. 5(1), pages 1-12, March.
    17. Martorell Cunil, Onofre & Otero González, Luis & Durán Santomil, Pablo & Mulet Forteza, Carlos, 2023. "How to accomplish a highly cited paper in the tourism, leisure and hospitality field," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    18. Andrea Bonaccorsi & Cinzia Daraio & Stefano Fantoni & Viola Folli & Marco Leonetti & Giancarlo Ruocco, 2017. "Do social sciences and humanities behave like life and hard sciences?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 112(1), pages 607-653, July.
    19. Anne-Wil Harzing & Satu Alakangas & David Adams, 2014. "hIa: an individual annual h-index to accommodate disciplinary and career length differences," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 99(3), pages 811-821, June.
    20. Tanzila Ahmed & Ben Johnson & Charles Oppenheim & Catherine Peck, 2004. "Highly cited old papers and the reasons why they continue to be cited. Part II., The 1953 Watson and Crick article on the structure of DNA," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 61(2), pages 147-156, October.

    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:116:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11192-018-2770-2. 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.