scholarly journals Using the H-Index to Measure Research Performance in Higher Education:  A Case Study of Library and Information Science Faculty in New Zealand and Australia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Amber Tyson

<p>As academia increasingly turns to bibliometric tools to assess research impact, the question of which indicator provides the best measure of research quality is highly debated. Much emphasis has been placed on the value of the h-index, a new bibliometric tool proposed in 2005 which has quickly found favour in the scientific community. One of the first applications of the h-index was carried out by Kelly and Jennions (2006), who found a number of variables could influence the h-index scores of ecologists and evolutionary biologists. To test these findings, this study calculated the h-index scores of New Zealand and Australian researchers teaching in the field of library and information science (LIS). Publication and citation counts were generated using the Web of Science (WoS), where a number of limitations with using the database to calculate h-index scores were identified. We then considered the effect that gender, country of residence, institutional affiliation, and scientific age had on the h-index scores of LIS researchers in New Zealand and Australia. The study found a positive relationship between scientific age and h-index scores, indicating that the length of a scientist's career should be considered when using the h-index. However, analysis also showed that gender, country of residence, and institutional affiliation had no influence on h-index scores.</p>

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Amber Tyson

<p>As academia increasingly turns to bibliometric tools to assess research impact, the question of which indicator provides the best measure of research quality is highly debated. Much emphasis has been placed on the value of the h-index, a new bibliometric tool proposed in 2005 which has quickly found favour in the scientific community. One of the first applications of the h-index was carried out by Kelly and Jennions (2006), who found a number of variables could influence the h-index scores of ecologists and evolutionary biologists. To test these findings, this study calculated the h-index scores of New Zealand and Australian researchers teaching in the field of library and information science (LIS). Publication and citation counts were generated using the Web of Science (WoS), where a number of limitations with using the database to calculate h-index scores were identified. We then considered the effect that gender, country of residence, institutional affiliation, and scientific age had on the h-index scores of LIS researchers in New Zealand and Australia. The study found a positive relationship between scientific age and h-index scores, indicating that the length of a scientist's career should be considered when using the h-index. However, analysis also showed that gender, country of residence, and institutional affiliation had no influence on h-index scores.</p>


2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (5) ◽  
pp. 608-618 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rita Marcella ◽  
Hayley Lockerbie ◽  
Lyndsay Bloice ◽  
Caroline Hood ◽  
Flora Barton

Early- and mid-career researchers will shape the future of library and information science (LIS) research and it is crucial they be well placed to engage with the research impact agenda. Their understanding of research impact may influence their capacity to be returned to research excellence framework (REF), the UK’s research quality assessment tool, as well as their ability to access research funding. This article reports the findings of a qualitative study exploring how the research impact agenda is influencing early- and mid-career researcher behaviour. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 early- and mid-career researchers. While enthusiastic about creating lasting impact, participants lack effective institutional support to maximise their own research impact. Participants demonstrate uncertainty about what REF impact is. The authors conclude that while there is evidence LIS academics engage with practice to maximise impact, they lack support in building impact and the discipline needs to do more to create opportunities for the academy and the profession to coalesce to identify objects for and deliver impactful research.


Author(s):  
Kim M. Thompson ◽  
Kasey Garrison ◽  
Carolina Santelices-Werchez ◽  
Paulina Arellano-Rojas ◽  
Danilo Reyes-Lillo

Ensuring access to published research is increasingly important for demonstrating research impact, supporting wide readership, creating interest in collaboration, and making way for funding opportunities. This article provides a bibliometric analysis of publications from 2007-2016 in the Web of Science (WOS) database to update understanding of recent international library science research as a means of discussing research impact and scientific collaboration. The methodology is a descriptive analysis of publications retrieved from the WOS database using keywords “library science” and WOS-generated subject descriptor “Information Science & Library Science.”  Analysis focused on descriptive data related to our research questions including representation of countries, languages, and journals. The findings reveal that most publications are published by researchers with institutional affiliations in the United States and in English. Library and information science research continues to be strong in collaboration, but international and interdisciplinary collaborations are still low in this sample. The dataset reflects that co- and multi-authored publications have the highest WOS citation counts, reinforcing the value of scholarly collaboration. This research provides a baseline to chart future growth in Library Science research publications and collaborations.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (3) ◽  
pp. 143-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ifeanyi Jonas Ezema ◽  
Cyprian I. Ugwu

Purpose Since the development of web 2.0, there has been a paradigm shift in methods of knowledge sharing. This has equally impacted on techniques of research evaluation. Many scholars have argued that the social utilization of research is hardly reflected in the traditional methods of research evaluation. The purpose of this paper is to determine the research impact of Library and Information Science (LIS) journals using Web of Science (WoS), Scopus and Google Scholar (GS) and then examine whether there is a correlation between their citations and altmetric attentions. Design/methodology/approach This paper is an attempt to contribute to this discussion with focus on the field of LIS. This paper adopted descriptive informatics to analyze LIS journals. The paper extracted citation data from WoS, Scopus and GS, and altmetric attentions from 85 LIS journals indexed by WoS. Further, 18 journals with high altmetric attention were identified, while 9 of these maintained consistent presence in the three databases used. Findings Findings show that of these databases, citation data from GS was found to have a high correlation with altmetric attention, while the other two databases maintained moderate correlations with altmetric attention. The paper also found a positive but non-significant correlation between citation scores and altmetric attention in the nine journals that maintained consistent presence in the three databases. Practical implications The findings of this paper will be useful to librarians in selection of relevant journals for their libraries and also will assist authors in the choice of publication outlets for their papers particularly when considering journals that have visibility and research impact. Originality/value The originality of the paper lies on empirical evidences from the citation and altmetric data extracted from the databases used for the paper.


2019 ◽  
Vol 120 (1/2) ◽  
pp. 119-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole A. Cooke

Purpose This paper aims to suggest that classroom instructors should reflect and revise their pedagogy to lead a classroom designed to produce future information professionals who will be prepared to serve their communities in a radical way. Design/methodology/approach The paper reviews the literature related to radical and humanizing pedagogies and then features an auto ethnographic case study which details how the author implemented some of the strategies. Findings Formal study of pedagogy can improve the library and information science (LIS) teaching and learning process. Practical implications Examining pedagogy in a formal way yields concrete suggestions for improving classroom management and content delivery. Social implications Using a radical pedagogy can improve relationships between teachers and learners, and learners will be able to model the classroom strategies in their own professional practice. Originality/value The study builds upon current examples of radical practice in the field and examines how such practices can be instilled even earlier in LIS graduate classrooms.


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-17
Author(s):  
Jian Qin

AbstractPurposeThis paper compares the paradigmatic differences between knowledge organization (KO) in library and information science and knowledge representation (KR) in AI to show the convergence in KO and KR methods and applications.MethodologyThe literature review and comparative analysis of KO and KR paradigms is the primary method used in this paper.FindingsA key difference between KO and KR lays in the purpose of KO is to organize knowledge into certain structure for standardizing and/or normalizing the vocabulary of concepts and relations, while KR is problem-solving oriented. Differences between KO and KR are discussed based on the goal, methods, and functions.Research limitationsThis is only a preliminary research with a case study as proof of concept.Practical implicationsThe paper articulates on the opportunities in applying KR and other AI methods and techniques to enhance the functions of KO.Originality/value:Ontologies and linked data as the evidence of the convergence of KO and KR paradigms provide theoretical and methodological support to innovate KO in the AI era.


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