Cargando…

Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals

BACKGROUND: Journal impact factor (IF) is linked to the probability of a paper being cited and is progressively becoming incorporated into researchers' curricula vitae. Furthermore, the decision as to which journal a given study should be submitted, may well be based on the trend in the journal...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: López-Abente, Gonzalo, Muñoz-Tinoco, Concha
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2005
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC555948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15777471
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-5-24
_version_ 1782122573092356096
author López-Abente, Gonzalo
Muñoz-Tinoco, Concha
author_facet López-Abente, Gonzalo
Muñoz-Tinoco, Concha
author_sort López-Abente, Gonzalo
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Journal impact factor (IF) is linked to the probability of a paper being cited and is progressively becoming incorporated into researchers' curricula vitae. Furthermore, the decision as to which journal a given study should be submitted, may well be based on the trend in the journal's overall quality. This study sought to assess time trends in journal IF in the field of public, environmental and occupational health. METHODS: We used the IFs of 80 public health journals that were registered by the Science Citation Index from 1992 through 2003 and had been listed for a minimum period of the previous 3 years. Impact factor time trends were assessed using a linear regression model, in which the dependent variable was IF and the independent variable, the year. The slope of the model and its statistical significance were taken as the indicator of annual change. RESULTS: The IF range for the journals covered went from 0.18 to 5.2 in 2003. Although there was no statistical association between annual change and mean IF, most of the fastest growing journals registered mean IFs in excess of 1.5, and some represented emerging areas of public health research. Graphs displaying IF trends are shown. CONCLUSION: In view of the delay between the publication of IFs and that of any given paper, knowing the trend in IF is essential in order to make a correct choice of journal.
format Text
id pubmed-555948
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2005
publisher BioMed Central
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-5559482005-04-03 Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals López-Abente, Gonzalo Muñoz-Tinoco, Concha BMC Public Health Research Article BACKGROUND: Journal impact factor (IF) is linked to the probability of a paper being cited and is progressively becoming incorporated into researchers' curricula vitae. Furthermore, the decision as to which journal a given study should be submitted, may well be based on the trend in the journal's overall quality. This study sought to assess time trends in journal IF in the field of public, environmental and occupational health. METHODS: We used the IFs of 80 public health journals that were registered by the Science Citation Index from 1992 through 2003 and had been listed for a minimum period of the previous 3 years. Impact factor time trends were assessed using a linear regression model, in which the dependent variable was IF and the independent variable, the year. The slope of the model and its statistical significance were taken as the indicator of annual change. RESULTS: The IF range for the journals covered went from 0.18 to 5.2 in 2003. Although there was no statistical association between annual change and mean IF, most of the fastest growing journals registered mean IFs in excess of 1.5, and some represented emerging areas of public health research. Graphs displaying IF trends are shown. CONCLUSION: In view of the delay between the publication of IFs and that of any given paper, knowing the trend in IF is essential in order to make a correct choice of journal. BioMed Central 2005-03-18 /pmc/articles/PMC555948/ /pubmed/15777471 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-5-24 Text en Copyright © 2005 López-Abente and Muñoz-Tinoco; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0) ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
López-Abente, Gonzalo
Muñoz-Tinoco, Concha
Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title_full Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title_fullStr Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title_full_unstemmed Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title_short Time trends in the impact factor of Public Health journals
title_sort time trends in the impact factor of public health journals
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC555948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15777471
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-5-24
work_keys_str_mv AT lopezabentegonzalo timetrendsintheimpactfactorofpublichealthjournals
AT munoztinococoncha timetrendsintheimpactfactorofpublichealthjournals