BIBLIOMETRICS
Presented by
Asha. P
Research Scholar
DOS in Library and Information Science
Research supervisor
Dr.Y.Venkatesha
Associate professor
DOS in Library and Information Science
Introduction
Bibliometrics is a set of methods used to study or
measure texts and information. Citation analysis and
content analysis are commonly used in bibliometric
methods. While bibliometric methods are most often used
in the field of library and information science.
Bibliometrics uses mathematical and statistical
methods to analyse and measure the output of scientific
publications. Modern bibliometrics has been largely
inspired by Derek de Solla Price and the seminal work
was carried out by him in the middle of the last century.
The origin of the name ‘Bibliometrics’
The terms Bibliometrics and Scientometrics were almost
simultaneously introduced by Pritchard and Nalimov and
Mulchenko in 1969. While Pritchard explained the term
Bibliometrics as “the application of mathematical and
statistical methods to books and other media of
communication”. Nalimov and Mulchenko defined
scientometrics as “the application of quantitative methods
which are dealing with the analysis of science viewed as an
information process”. According to these interpretations the
speciality of scientometrics is restricted to the measurement of
science communication, whereas bibliometrics is designed to
deal with more general information processes.
Definitions of bibliometrics
Pritchard said that bibliometrics is the
application of mathematics and statistical methods to
books and other media of communication.
According to Hulme the purpose of statistical
bibliography to shade light on the processes of written
communication and the nature and course development
of a discipline, by means of counting and analyzing the
various faces of written communications.
According to Sengupta the bibliometrics is
the organization of classification and quantitative
evaluation of publication patterns of all macro and
micro communications along with their authorship by
mathematical and statistical applications and
calculations.
Components of Bibliometrics
Present-day bibliometric research is aimed at the following three
main target-groups that clearly determine topics and sub-areas of
“contemporary bibliometrics”.
(i) Bibliometrics for bibliometricians (Methodology)
This is the domain of basic bibliometric research and is
traditionally funded by the usual grants. Methodological research is
conducted mainly in this domain.
(ii) Bibliometrics for scientific disciplines (Scientific information)
The researchers in scientific disciplines form the bigger, but also
the most diverse interest-group in bibliometrics. Due to their primary
scientific orientation, their interests are strongly related to their
speciality. This domain may be considered an extension of science
information.
(iii) Bibliometrics for science policy and management (science
policy)
This is the domain of research evaluation, at present the
most important topic in the field. Here the national, regional,
and institutional structures of science and their comparative
presentation are in the foreground.
Bibliometric Indicators
Bibliometric indicator is a device based on some
information mechanism (usually bibliographic information)
and is a conceptual tool for facilitating futuristic projection
and assessment of existing state and status of an intellectual
activity. In narrow specific sense a bibliometric indicator is a
measure or an index or a statistic (preferably objective) to the
impact or quantity of publications as documentary products.
These are related to literature indicators, publication
indicators, science indicators etc.
Direct bibliometric indicators
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Direct indicators are those which use the bibliographic data available
in a straight forward way from the documents. These are:
The number of authors per paper or the collaborators.
The no of pages or no of lines in a paper or a document.
The proportion of the text matter and the supporting matters and the
illustrative matters.
The no of references or the reference size.
All such quantitative data are directly available from the document.
Derived Indicators
Derived indicators are those which cannot be calculated
directly from the documents but are to be prepared or
calculated after some manipulation using the features and
items implicit in the documents. These include:
• Citation counts and all the indicators derived from citation
data together with co citational indicators.
• Indicators calculated from the word frequency counts in the
documents and their derivatives together with indicator based
on co-word analysis.
• Subject categorization of the micro-documents.
• All the indicators based on ranking procedure of journals,
countries, authors, etc based on productivity counts, reference
count, citation counts etc.
Assigned indicators
Assigned indicators are somewhat extraneous and are
attributed by other based on bibliographic features or
assessment of thought contents of so called qualities of the
documents or bibliographic items. Some of these are:
• Indicators based on peer judgement.
• Some of the indicators based on use of documents
• Indicators based on analysis of scattering.
• Subject classification of the documents.
Non-bibliometric indicators
Non-bibliometric indicators are based on data
which are not available or can not be derived from the
document description or the documents. They are not
at all bibliographic items as such. They are not also
assigned characteristics based on some features or
aspects of the documents.
Purpose of bibliometric indicators
Many of the bibliometric indicators are just
intellectual exercises, they can’t be used purposefully.
Many of bibliometric indicators are contextual. The
ratio of articles published in national journals and the
foreign journals may give an idea of international
research activities of a developing country.
Laws of Bibliometrics
Laws in bibliometrics are:
Lotka's law of scientific productivity : Lotka's Law
describes the frequency of publication by authors in a given
field.
Bradford's law of scatter: Bradford's Law serves as a
general guideline to librarians in determining the number of
core journals in any given field.
Zipf's law of word occurrence: Zipf's Law is often used to
predict the frequency of words within a text. The Law states
that in a relatively lengthy text.
Application of Bibliometrics
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To identify research trends and growth of knowledge.
To estimate comprehensiveness of secondary periodicals.
To identify users of different subjects.
To identify authorship and its trends in documents on various subjects.
To forecast past, present and future publishing trends.
To identify core periodicals in different disciplines.
To formulate an accurate weeding and stacking policy.
To formulate an accurate need based acquisition policy within the
limited budgetary provision.
 To initiate effective multilevel network system.
 To predict productivity of publishers, individual authors, organizations
and countries.
 To develop norms of standardization.
Limitations of bibliometrics
Bibliometrics may be gaining in importance and popularity
because they are objective and relatively easy to calculate and
understand but they still have a number of limitations including:
 Bibliometrics were initially based on the model of publishing
articles in peer-reviewed journals. This is not the norm for many
disciplines particularly in the arts, humanities and social sciences.
 Citation patterns vary from subject to subject.
 Only a tiny proportion of published research is covered by
resources.
 Self-citations can be distort in metrics.
 Review articles tend to be more highly cited than standard articles.
 Citations to a paper may not reflect its quality.
 Metrics do not tend to account for the age of a researcher.
Conclusion
Bibliometrics is a major sub-discipline of quantitative
research. This is a tool used by the library and information
science professionals for studying the communication
processes, information flows, and others for better
understanding and effective management and dissemination
of information.
Bibliometric techniques are being used for a variety of
purposes like determination of various scientific indicators,
evaluation of scientific output, selection of journals for
libraries and even forecasting the potential of a particular
field.
THANK YOU ONE AND ALL