ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 1

Yaşar Tonta, Yurdagül Ünal & Umut AlDepartment of Information Management

Hacettepe UniversityAnkara, Turkey

{tonta, yurdagul, umutal}@hacettepe.edu.tr

The Research Impact of Open Access Journal Articles

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 2

Outline

Some definitionsOpen AccessResearch impactThe nature of scientific disciplines

MethodologyFindingsConclusion

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 3

Related Terms

Open Access: “Free …[online, full-text] access” to scientific publications

Research impact: Number of times that each article is cited in literature

Hard/soft; urban/rural; convergent/divergent scientific disciplines

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 4

The Nature of Scientific Disciplines

HardUrbanConvergent

SoftRural

Divergent

Physics AnthropologyBiology

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 5

Research Questions

Does the research impact of OA articlesdiffer across the fields in sciences, social sciences, and arts and humanities?

If it does, do OA articles in hard, urban and convergent fields receive more citations (hence higher research impact) than those in soft, rural, and divergent ones?

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 6

DOAJ journals Journal selection criteria Nine disciplinesSample

Methodology

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 7

The Nature of Scientific Disciplines

PhysicsMathematicsChem. Eng.

PsychologySociology

Anthropology

EconomicsEnv. Sci.Biology

hard, urban, convergent soft, rural, divergent

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 8

Sample

Subjects# of journals in the sample # of total articles sample rate

Physics 6 2,543 1.2

Mathematics 16 1,092 2.7

Chemical Engineering 3 818 3.7

Economics 2 113 26.5

Environmental Sciences 3 247 12.1

Biology 7 690 4.3

Psychology 4 271 11.1

Sociology 3 97 30.9

Anthropology 2 111 27.0

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 9

Scopus

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 10

Descriptive Statistics

270 articles were cited 761 timesArticles with zero citations = 95 (35%)Average number of citations

Biology 6.4Economics 5.1Psychology 0.9Sociology 0.8

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 11

Distribution of Citations by Subjects N=761

hard, urban, convergent soft, rural, divergent

95

44

63

154

63

192

28 24

98

0

30

60

90

120

150

180

210

Physics Mathematics ChemicalEngineering

Economics EnvironmentalSciences

Biology Psychology Sociology Anthropology

subjects

N

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 12

Self-citation Rates

hard, urban, convergent soft, rural, divergent

43

46

40

14

30

23

7

21

40

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

Physics Mathematics ChemicalEngineering

Economics EnvironmentalSciences

Biology Psychology Sociology Anthropology

subjects

%

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 13

Obsolescence for OA Articles

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

year

%

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 14

Half-life for OA Articles

2 yearsPhysicsMathematicsBiologyPsychology

3 yearsChemical EngineeringEconomicsEnvironmental SciencesSociologyAnthropology

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 15

Conclusion

Citation characteristics vary among disciplinesCitation behavior differs from self-archiving behaviorOA articles in hard, urban and convergent fields do not necessarily have higher research impactOA articles in Biology, Economics and Anthropology received more citations

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 16

Further Research

A more representative study with a larger sample size needs to be carried outThe relationship between research impact and self-archiving behavior should be investigated

ELPUB 2007, the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, 13-15 June 2007, Vienna, Austria - 17

Yaşar Tonta, Yurdagül Ünal & Umut AlDepartment of Information Management

Hacettepe UniversityAnkara, Turkey

{tonta, yurdagul, umutal}@hacettepe.edu.tr

The Research Impact of Open Access Journal Articles