Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2015;104(3):827-840.
doi: 10.1007/s11192-015-1573-y. Epub 2015 Apr 1.

Citation success of different publication types: a case study on all references in psychology publications from the German-speaking countries (D-A-CH-L-L) in 2009, 2010, and 2011

Günter Krampen  1 , Peter Weiland  2 , Jürgen Wiesenhütter  2
Affiliations

Citation success of different publication types: a case study on all references in psychology publications from the German-speaking countries (D-A-CH-L-L) in 2009, 2010, and 2011

Günter Krampen et al. Scientometrics. 2015.

Abstract

Scientometric data on the citation success of different publication types and publication genres in psychology publications are presented. Data refer to references that are cited in these scientific publications and that are documented in PSYNDEX, the exhaustive database of psychology publications from the German-speaking countries either published in German or in English language. Firstly, data analyses refer to the references that are cited in publications of 2009 versus 2010 versus 2011. With reference to all cited references, the portion of journal articles ranges from 57 to 61 %, of books from 22 to 24 %, and of book chapters from 14 to 15 %, with a rather high stability across the three publication years analysed. Secondly, data analyses refer to the numbers of cited references from the German-speaking countries, which are also documented in PSYNDEX. These compose about 11 % of all cited references indicating that nearly 90 % of the references cited are of international and/or interdisciplinary publications not stemming from the German-speaking countries. The subsample shows the proportion of journal articles, books, and chapters, and these are very similar to the percentages identified for all references that are cited. Thirdly, analyses refer to document type, scientific genre, and psychological sub-discipline of the most frequently cited references in the psychology publications. The frequency of top-cited references of books and book chapters is almost equal to that of journal articles; two-thirds of the top-cited references are non-empirical publications, only one-third are empirical publications. Top-cited references stem particularly from clinical psychology, experimental psychology, as well as tests, testing and psychometrics. In summary, the results point to the fact that citation analyses, which are limited to journal papers, tend to neglect very high portions of references that are cited in scientific publications.

Keywords: Bibliometry; Citation analysis; Psychology; Publication genre; Publication success; Publication type; Scientometry.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Publication years of the most frequency cited references (f > 14) in psychology publication from the German-speaking countries in 2009, 2010, and 2011
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Aguillo IF. Is Google Scholar useful for bibliometrics? Scientometrics. 2012;91(2):343–351. doi: 10.1007/s11192-011-0582-8. - DOI
    1. Albarrán P, Crespo JA, Ortuño I, Ruiz-Castillo J. A comparison of the scientific performance of the U.S. and the European Union at the turn of the 21st century. Scientometrics. 2010;85(1):329–344. doi: 10.1007/s11192-010-0223-7. - DOI
    1. Alves AD, Yanasse HH, Soma NY. Benford’s law and articles of scientific journals: Comparison of JCR® and Scopus data. Scientometrics. 2014;98(1):173–184. doi: 10.1007/s11192-013-1030-8. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Beel J, Gipp B. Academic search engine spam and Google Scholar’s resilience against it. Journal of Electronic Publishing. 2010
    1. Bornmann L, Leydesdorff L, Krampen G. Which are the “best” cities for psychology research worldwide? Europe’s Journal of Psychology. 2012;8(4):535–546.

LinkOut - more resources