Challenges of OA in the Next
Frontier: ALM & Research Impact
Assessment
Jennifer Lin
Product Manager, PLOS
PLOS Publication Growth Rate
Freely available to all
At moment of publication
Free to access, Free to re-use
DATA SHOWN: PLOS ONE
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How do I find relevant research?
Information Overload is Filter
Failure
Effective discovery, navigation, and
management of content is crucial
THE NEXT FRONTIER FOR OA
PLOS
The Measurement Dilemma
Measurement of research
Researchers work within a diverse ecosystem of
channels to share, comment, critique new
• article access,
research:
•
•
•
•
Publication
scholarly and nonscholarly citations,
blog and news coverage,
social network sharing
research community conversations
Dissemination
ALMs
Article-Level Metrics captures this activity and measures it
in a transparent and comprehensive manner.
What do researchers do with articles?
100%
22.2%
Article-Level Metrics
from November 8, 2012
for 63,771 PLOS Papers
0.3%
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Engagement with PLOS ONE articles
Analysis of 37,267 PLOS ONE articles by Martin Fenner
Engagement with all PLOS articles
Proportion of articles covered by source
Metrics for 63,771 PLOS articles published until November 8, 2012
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PLOS ALM Suite
Usage
Citations
PLOS: views
PDF downloads
XML downloads
PMC: views
PDF downloads
PubMed Central
CrossRef
Scopus
Web of Science
Social
Network
CiteULike
Connotea
Mendeley
Twitter
Facebook
Blogs &
Media
Nature Blogs
Research Blogging
Wikipedia
PLOS
Comments
ALM Article Example
Article-Level Metrics:
• Diverse and efficient measurement
• Increased diversity without losing traditional
value
• Accelerated measurement response
• Easier to own and manage
• Flexibly accommodates varied uses
ALMs allow you to “dig into the
aspect of impact you want to explore”
-Heather Joseph, SPARC
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Article-Level Metrics are a better filter for
discovery and evaluation
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ALMs on the Journals
- Display
ALM Article Example
ALMs on the Journals
- Signposts
Tito RY, Knights D, Metcalf J, Obregon-Tito AJ, Cleeland L, et al. (2012)
Insights from Characterizing Extinct Human Gut Microbiomes. PLOS
ONE 7(12): e51146. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0051146
Integration of ALMs into discovery and
evaluation is work in progress
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ALMs reveal what articles are used
Doris Duke Foundation funded PLOS articles
Rectangle size correlates with total views (HTML and PDF) from PLOS website. Color intensity
correlates with number of Scopus citations.
Article Usage and Citations by Subject Category
ALMs reveal where articles are used
Alzheimer‘s Association funded PLOS articles
Geolocation of 410 authors for 84 articles
ALMs reveal how
articles are used
ALMs reveal a view of impact
ex: academic homepage
Quickly Expanding Utilization
Researchers use ALMs in various ways to track and
communicate the progress of their work*:
With Whom?
* Author survey, July 2012
University administrators, funding organizations
(program managers), research collaborators, public
relations departments & other promotion outlets
How?
Formally:
• Curriculum Vitae
• grant & funding applications
• research assessments
• progress & merit report
• research reports
Informally:
• blogs,
• presentations,
• twitter
• web postings, conversations
• personal article management tools
Use Article-Level Metrics for hiring,
tenure, promotion decisions?
?
How?
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Publisher adoption is growing
Many publishers have joined PLOS in displaying article-level
metrics on their journal article, including:
And many more forthcoming…
How do we fully realize the potential of
ALMs?
BUILD COMMUNITY
- access to ALMs (make data standard, freely
available)
- ALM tools
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Getting started as a librarian
Collect and track altmetrics
• For research articles published at your university
• For research of interest
• Display altmetrics on author bios
Tell publishers that you want Article-Level Metrics for every
published research article
Tell ALM data sources that their data should be CC-0
Join the #altmetrics and altmetrics Google Group discussions
Join community discussions to build standards for ALM data
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Getting started as an institutional
repository & university press
Collect and display altmetrics for the articles you publish
Work with an altmetrics service provider or install an
Open Source altmetrics application
Take into account cost, technical expertise, but also who
owns the data
Join the #altmetrics and altmetrics Google Group
discussions
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For Further Information…
• Give us your feedback, join our ALM email list
(alm@plos.org)
• PLOS ALM informational site: http://article-levelmetrics.plos.org/
• PLOS API and developer information:
http://api.plos.org/alm/using-the-alm-api/
http://code.google.com/p/alt-metrics/
• Scholarly research on ALMs & altmetrics
PLOS ONE Collection: http://altmetrics.org/plosone/
Follow us on Twitter:
@plosalm