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Impact factors: no totum pro parte by skewness of citation

2004; Oxford University Press; Volume: 61; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/j.cardiores.2003.11.023

1755-3245

Tobias Opthof,

Academic Writing and Publishing

with a high impact factor obtain this high value by frequent citation of only a limited number of their papers and, on the other hand, journals with low impact factors publish many papers that remain uncited [1].Thus, mere publication of a paper in a given journal cannot be regarded as a quality marker of that particular paper [2], it just means that the authors have 'succeeded in surviving' the review process of that journal.Seglen [3] has analyzed that 50% of the obtained citations are accumulated by only 15% of the contents of a journal.In addition, the most frequently cited 50% of the contents obtain almost all citations (90%).These numbers were based on an analysis of three biochemical journals (Biochimica Biophysica Acta, Biochemical Journal and Journal of Biochemical Chemistry) and have later been confirmed for two cardiovascular journals (Circulation Research and Cardiovascular Research) [4].Both analyses applied to recently published papers [3,4].It is not known whether these data vary over time and whether or not they depend on impact itself.