IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v129y2024i11d10.1007_s11192-024-05176-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The use of ChatGPT for identifying disruptive papers in science: a first exploration

Author

Listed:
  • Lutz Bornmann

    (Administrative Headquarters of the Max Planck Society)

  • Lingfei Wu

    (University of Pittsburgh)

  • Christoph Ettl

    (Administrative Headquarters of the Max Planck Society)

Abstract

ChatGPT has arrived in quantitative research evaluation. With the exploration in this Letter to the Editor, we would like to widen the spectrum of the possible use of ChatGPT in bibliometrics by applying it to identify disruptive papers. The identification of disruptive papers using publication and citation counts has become a popular topic in scientometrics. The disadvantage of the quantitative approach is its complexity in the computation. The use of ChatGPT might be an easy to use alternative.

Suggested Citation

  • Lutz Bornmann & Lingfei Wu & Christoph Ettl, 2024. "The use of ChatGPT for identifying disruptive papers in science: a first exploration," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(11), pages 7161-7165, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:129:y:2024:i:11:d:10.1007_s11192-024-05176-z
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-024-05176-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-024-05176-z
    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/s11192-024-05176-z?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. Yiling Lin & Carl Benedikt Frey & Lingfei Wu, 2022. "Remote Collaboration Fuses Fewer Breakthrough Ideas," Papers 2206.01878, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2023.
    2. Yiling Lin & Carl Benedikt Frey & Lingfei Wu, 2023. "Remote collaboration fuses fewer breakthrough ideas," Nature, Nature, vol. 623(7989), pages 987-991, November.
    3. Lingfei Wu & Dashun Wang & James A. Evans, 2019. "Large teams develop and small teams disrupt science and technology," Nature, Nature, vol. 566(7744), pages 378-382, February.
    4. Lutz Bornmann & Benedetto Lepori, 2024. "The use of ChatGPT to find similar institutions for institutional benchmarking," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(6), pages 3593-3598, June.
    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. Manuel Goyanes & Carlos Lopezosa & Valeriano Piñeiro-Naval, 2025. "The use of artificial intelligence (AI) in research: a review of author guidelines in leading journals across eight social science disciplines," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(7), pages 3725-3741, July.

    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. Lutz Bornmann & Russell J. Funk, 2025. "Popper’s probability calculus and the decline of scientific disruptiveness," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(8), pages 4801-4807, August.
    2. Christian Leibel & Lutz Bornmann, 2024. "Specification uncertainty: what the disruption index tells us about the (hidden) multiverse of bibliometric indicators," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 129(12), pages 7971-7979, December.
    3. Seungmin Lee & Jeong-Dong Lee & Youwei He, 2025. "Exaptation: unveiling the potential for technological innovation," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(7), pages 3483-3503, July.
    4. Yang, Alex J., 2024. "On the temporal diversity of knowledge in science," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(4).
    5. Hongkan Chen & Lutz Bornmann & Yi Bu, 2025. "Hot streaks and disruptiveness in the career of scientists: is there an association between both phenomena?," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 12(1), pages 1-15, December.
    6. Yang, Wenlong & Wang, Yang, 2024. "Exploring team creativity: The nexus between freshness and experience," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(4).
    7. Jianhua Hou & Bili Zheng & Hao Li & Wenjing Li, 2025. "Evolution and impact of the science of science: from theoretical analysis to digital-AI driven research," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 12(1), pages 1-9, December.
    8. Mingze Zhang & Lili Wang & Zexia Li, 2025. "The impact of team compositions on disruptive and novel research in large-scale research infrastructures," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(5), pages 2987-3011, May.
    9. Petersen, Alexander Michael & Arroyave, Felber J. & Pammolli, Fabio, 2025. "The disruption index suffers from citation inflation: Re-analysis of temporal CD trend and relationship with team size reveal discrepancies," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1).
    10. Rodrigo Barbosa & Mayara Barbosa & Amalia Raquel Pérez-Nebra & Esther Villajos & Fernando González-Ladrón-de-Guevara, 2025. "A half-century perspective of entrepreneur’s well-being: comparing academic and global entrepreneurship monitor trends," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 12(1), pages 1-15, December.
    11. Burdett, Ashley & Etheridge, Ben & Tang, Li & Wang, Yikai, 2024. "Worker productivity during Covid-19 and adaptation to working from home," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    12. Macher, Jeffrey T. & Rutzer, Christian & Weder, Rolf, 2024. "Is there a secular decline in disruptive patents? Correcting for measurement bias," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(5).
    13. Lu Zhang & Jiaying Gong & Yu Yang & Jing Li, 2025. "Cities in global and sustainable scientific collaboration network: unveiling cooperation centers," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 12(1), pages 1-17, December.
    14. Houqiang Yu & Yian Liang & Yinghua Xie, 2024. "Predicting Scientific Breakthroughs Based on Structural Dynamic of Citation Cascades," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 12(11), pages 1-18, June.
    15. Ren, Linlin & Guo, Lei & Yu, Hui & Guo, Feng & Wang, Xinhua & Han, Xiaohui, 2025. "Collaborating with top scientists may not improve paper novelty: A causal analysis based on the propensity score matching method," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1).
    16. Liyue Chen & Jielan Ding & Donghuan Song & Zihao Qu, 2025. "Exploring scientific contributions through citation context and division of labor," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(5), pages 2901-2921, May.
    17. Yasuyuki TODO, 2025. "Reconsidering Supply Chains and Industrial Policy from the Economic Security Perspective," Policy Discussion Papers 25005, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    18. Hoekman, Jarno & Rake, Bastian, 2024. "Geography of authorship: How geography shapes authorship attribution in big team science," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(2).
    19. Michele Pezzoni & Fabiana Visentin, 2024. "Gender bias in team formation: the case of the European Science Foundation’s grants," Science and Public Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 51(2), pages 247-260.
    20. Cinzia Daraio & Simone Di Leo & Loet Leydesdorff, 2022. "Using the Leiden Rankings as a Heuristics: Evidence from Italian universities in the European landscape," LEM Papers Series 2022/08, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.

    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:spr:scient:v:129:y:2024:i:11:d:10.1007_s11192-024-05176-z. 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.