Scientometrics comprises a significant number of indicators that help assess the productivity of a researcher, a scientific journal, the ranking of a higher education institution, a scientific organisation, etc. It also allows us to track the pace of development of individual scientific fields and science as a whole, as well as to formulate strategies for future research. Today we will discuss the key scientometrics indicators for researchers and their characteristics.
Citation Index
Science Citation Index (SCI) is one of the main scientometrics indicators, created by Eugene Garfield in 1964. It reflects the total number of citations of scientific articles indexed in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. This indicator allows for the assessment of researchers’ productivity and the significance of their work. The SCI is used on an ongoing basis by the international scientific community and is calculated by counting the total number of citations to publications in scientific journals over a specific period of time.
Average citation rate
Average citation rate is a metric reflecting the average number of citations per academic publication by an author, academic journal, institution or higher education institution. It reflects the quality of published material and allows for an assessment of a researcher’s productivity. This indicator is calculated as the ratio of the total number of citations received to the total number of publications.
Hirsch index
The Hirsch index (h-index) is one of the most influential scientometrics indicators for an author, helping to assess their influence and productivity. It was introduced in 2005 by physicist Jorge Eduardo Hirsch of the University of California, San Diego. A researcher’s productivity is measured by the number of published articles, and their influence by the number of citations. The higher the Hirsch index, the greater the researcher’s contribution to the development of science is considered to be.
The metric is actively used by universities and research institutions to evaluate scientific activity. It is also worth noting that various national and international rankings use this metric to compile lists of leading scientists, research institutions, higher education establishments, etc.
If researchers have the same number of publications and citations, the scientist with the higher h-index is considered more influential.
g-index
In 2006, researcher Leo Egg proposed the g-index as an improved version of the Hirsch index to provide a more accurate measure of the total number of citations of scientific papers.
This indicator can be calculated as follows: if scientific publications are sorted by the number of citations in descending order, the g-index will be the largest number g for which the sum of citations of the g most cited articles is at least g². For example, a g-index value of 10 indicates the presence of at least 10 publications which, together, have received at least 100 citations.
Unlike the Hirsch index, the g-index focuses specifically on the impact of highly cited publications, even if the author’s other works have fewer or no citations.
e-index
The e-index was proposed by researcher Chun-Ting Zhang in 2009. This scientometrics indicator complements the h-index and takes into account only “redundant” citations, i.e. those required to form the minimum value for calculating the Hirsch index.
This metric allows for the comparison of researchers with the same Hirsch index value but different numbers of citations. However, its application is limited due to the small number of researchers with a negligible number of publications or citations.
i10-index
i10-index is a fairly popular scientometrics metric developed by Google in 2011. It is widely used on the Google Scholar platform and reflects the number of an author’s publications, each of which has at least 10 citations. For example, the i10-index is 7 if 7 of an author’s works have been cited at least 10 times.
Its value is automatically updated on the platform when search engines detect new links to works available in open access. The main advantage of this metric is the simplicity of the calculations. The disadvantage, however, is that it is less effective for assessing the work of early-career researchers with a small number of citations who have not yet reached the h=10 threshold for their publications.
The field of scientometrics continues to develop rapidly. There is a significant number of tools enabling all members of the academic community to track their performance and the value of their contribution to the advancement of science. Every researcher should strategically plan to improve their scientometrics indicators. This will pave the way for career progression, increase the chances of securing research funding, and help build professional networks, etc.
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