Author impact

EVALUATING AND ACCREDITING YOUR RESEARCH

There are several different metrics which are used to measure and evaluate the calibre of the author(s) that published.

Scientific production is measured and evaluated based on a series of criteria relating to the quantity of works published and the number of times that these works have been cited. Among these criteria it is helpful to highlight:

  • the number of works you have published
  • the total number of citations you have received
  • the average number of citations per work you have published
  • the number of significant works you have published
  • the number of citations received by the most frequently-cited works you have published
So you can have real-time information about your scientific production, GEP Library has prepared some queries with the information we think you may be interested in. You can Access your scientific production, and also the scientific production of your research group thorugh the following link.

Metrics for authors

H-index of an author

This is one of the most important indicators when evaluating the scientific productivity of any researcher. First proposed by Jorge Hirsch at the University of California in 2005, this indicator facilitates calculations of the most outstanding authors within a scientific topic area, based on the number of citations that their publications have received.

The h-index can be defined as the balance between the number of publications that an author has produced and the number of citations received. The calculations factor in production from that author's entire academic career, which means that more recent authors and researchers generally have a lower h-index. It is important to highlight the fact that this index can only be used to provide information within a given discipline: it does not allow for comparisons to be made between researchers from different subject areas.

In order to calculate the h-index, a list is created of all of the publications that an author has produced and these publications are then ranked in descending order according to the number of citations that each one of has received. The point at which the number within that order matches the number of citations received by the publication constitutes the author’s h-index.

Some portals, databases and scientific information platforms, such as Web Of Science and Scopus, include the H-Index of authors.

How to find the H-Index of an author in Web Of Science?

  • Select the specific author search
  • Run a search to locate all of the publications by the author in question. Remember that the author may have worked at different academic institutions throughout his or her career and may have had different author names during the course of his or her professional life.
  • Once you have located the publications, choose the Create citation report option.Within this citation report you will be able to see a statistical and graphic breakdown of data relating to the author and his or her H-Index.

How to find the h-index of an author in the Scopus database?

  • Run an Author Search to locate all of the publications by the author in question.
  • Once you have located that author’s scientific production, choose the View Citation Overview option which will provide you with a statistical report including data relating to the author and his or her H-Index.

The H-Index of researchers on Google Scholar

Google Scholar https://scholar.google.com/ allows any individual that has created a personal profile to monitor the citations received by their documents.

In the citation information provided within the Google Scholar author profile, the total number of citations received will be shown, as will citations received in the previous 5 years.

Information that is relevant to the h-index is calculated based on the data that Google Scholar handles with relation to the number of publications produced and the number of citations received. Users may also access the so-called i10-index which lists publications that have been cited at least 10 times in addition to displaying the number of publications that have been cited at least 10 times in the previous 5 years.