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The h-index, the citation rating, impact factors and the aspiring researcher

2013; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 22; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.3109/09638237.2013.850153

1360-0567

Til Wykes, Sonya Lipczynska, Martin Guha,

scientometrics and bibliometrics research

FormerLibrarian, King’s College London Institute of Psychiatry, London, UKInnumerable scientific experiments have clearly demonstrated that all living creatures, fromthe amoeba upwards, will, if offered achoice between rewards and penalties, choose the pathwhich brings rewards. Laboratory rats, when they learn that pressing a pedal produces afoodpellet, happily go on pressing, and bring up their offspring to do the same. Though theiroutward behaviour may sometimes bely it, university academics are even brighter thanWistar white rats, and therefore adapt themselves even more promptly to any system thatbrings them rewards.Clearly, some impartial method has to be used for selecting academics for appointment,for promotion, and, most especially, for the distribution of research funding. Without onethere is a very strong risk of nepotism and favouritism, leading to unsuitable appointments.This was found, for example, in the early Victorian era. The civil service had to be expandedconsiderably inorder to find suitable postsforall theFitzroyfamily–the illegitimatechildrenof the previous monarch. By the time of the Crimean war, the resulting chaos had become soobviousthat following up earlier suggestions by Bentham (1822, reprinted 1993), Northcoteand Trevelyan (1853) set up a system of competitive examination, based on the classicalChinese model. As there was no obvious method of proving that an expert in, say, botanywas “better” than an expert in history, the examination was based on a knowledge of classicalliterature. This had the disadvantage, as Parkinson (1958) pointed out, that there was a riskthat someone might use an impersonator at the exam, and when subsequently sent out to,say, reorganise the economy of Central India, would prove unable to write Greek versewhen the occasion arose. The old system still lingered on in various quarters – HumphreyLyttleton’s description of his selection as an officer in the Grenadier Guards provides a con-vincing explanation of why the British army tends to lose all its battles in the first few years ofany war (Lyttleton, 1954).Various other selection systems have been devised, though, with Dean Swift (Swift,1704, reprinted 1909), it is sometimes unclear “whether they dealt in pearls or meal,