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Citation rates in mathematics: a study of variation by subdiscipline

Author

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  • Lawrence Smolinsky

    (Louisiana State University)

  • Aaron Lercher

    (Louisiana State University)

Abstract

Variation of citation counts by subdisciplines within a particular discipline is known but rarely systematically studied. This paper compares citation counts for award-winning mathematicians is different subdisciplines of mathematics. Mathematicians were selected for study in groups of rough equivalence with respect to peer evaluation, where this evaluation is given by the awarding of major prizes and grants: Guggenheim fellowships, Sloan fellowships, and National Science Foundation CAREER grants. We find a pattern in which mathematicians working in some subdisciplines have fewer citations than others who won the same award, and this pattern is consistent for all awards. So even after adjustment at the discipline level for different overall citation rates for disciplines, citation counts for different subdisciplines do not match peer evaluation. Demographic and hiring data for mathematics provides a context for a discussion of reasons and interpretations.

Suggested Citation

  • Lawrence Smolinsky & Aaron Lercher, 2012. "Citation rates in mathematics: a study of variation by subdiscipline," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 91(3), pages 911-924, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:91:y:2012:i:3:d:10.1007_s11192-012-0647-3
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-012-0647-3
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Lutz Bornmann & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2019. "Normalisation of citation impact in economics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 120(2), pages 841-884, August.
    2. Lawrence Smolinsky & Aaron Lercher & Andrew McDaniel, 2015. "Testing theories of preferential attachment in random networks of citations," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 66(10), pages 2132-2145, October.
    3. Qurat-ul Ain & Hira Riaz & Muhammad Tanvir Afzal, 2019. "Evaluation of h-index and its citation intensity based variants in the field of mathematics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 119(1), pages 187-211, April.
    4. Lindahl, Jonas, 2018. "Predicting research excellence at the individual level: The importance of publication rate, top journal publications, and top 10% publications in the case of early career mathematicians," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 518-533.
    5. Deise Deolindo Silva & Maria Cláudia Cabrini Grácio, 2021. "Dispersion measures for h-index: a study of the Brazilian researchers in the field of mathematics," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(3), pages 1983-2011, March.
    6. Lawrence Smolinsky & Daniel S. Sage & Aaron J. Lercher & Aaron Cao, 2021. "Citations versus expert opinions: citation analysis of featured reviews of the American Mathematical Society," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(5), pages 3853-3870, May.
    7. Walters, William H., 2014. "Do Article Influence scores overestimate the citation impact of social science journals in subfields that are related to higher-impact natural science disciplines?," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 421-430.
    8. Alfonso Ibáñez & Concha Bielza & Pedro Larrañaga, 2013. "Relationship among research collaboration, number of documents and number of citations: a case study in Spanish computer science production in 2000–2009," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 95(2), pages 689-716, May.

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