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Fragmented publishing: a large-scale study of health science

Author

Listed:
  • Tove Faber Frandsen

    (University of Southern Denmark)

  • Mette Brandt Eriksen

    (University of Southern Denmark)

  • David Mortan Grøne Hammer

    (University of Southern Denmark
    Goethe-Universität)

  • Janne Buck Christensen

    (South-West Jutland Hospital)

Abstract

Fragmented or multiple publishing is generally considered negative, as authors may inflate their number of articles through duplicate publications and salami publications. However, there are valid and defensible arguments for a single research study generating multiple publications. The existing literature confirm the existence of fragmented publishing; however, the extent of the phenomenon is questioned. The present study is a large-scale analysis within the health sciences of more than 50,000 studies and the resulting publications. The data allows us to analyze differences across subdisciplines as well as over time. The results show that the majority of the fragmented publications are journal articles. This study also shows that the extent of fragmented publishing is tied to subdisciplines. Increased as well as decreased fragmented publishing are found when we compare across the subdisciplines as the development is tied to subdisciplines. The implications are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Tove Faber Frandsen & Mette Brandt Eriksen & David Mortan Grøne Hammer & Janne Buck Christensen, 2019. "Fragmented publishing: a large-scale study of health science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 119(3), pages 1729-1743, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:119:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-019-03109-9
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-019-03109-9
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Daniele Fanelli & Vincent Larivière, 2016. "Researchers’ Individual Publication Rate Has Not Increased in a Century," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-12, March.
    2. Lutz Bornmann & Hans‐Dieter Daniel, 2007. "Multiple publication on a single research study: Does it pay? The influence of number of research articles on total citation counts in biomedicine," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 58(8), pages 1100-1107, June.
    3. Sergey Kolesnikov & Eriko Fukumoto & Barry Bozeman, 2018. "Researchers’ risk-smoothing publication strategies: Is productivity the enemy of impact?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(3), pages 1995-2017, September.
    4. Antonio García-Romero & José Manuel Estrada-Lorenzo, 2014. "A bibliometric analysis of plagiarism and self-plagiarism through Déjà vu," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 101(1), pages 381-396, October.
    5. Judit Bar-Ilan & Gali Halevi, 2018. "Temporal characteristics of retracted articles," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(3), pages 1771-1783, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Frode Eika Sandnes, 2021. "Everyone onboard? Participation ratios as a metric for research activity assessments within young universities," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(7), pages 6105-6113, July.

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