Uncitedness

Uncitedness is operationally defined as papers which have not been cited at all in the citation indexes five years after their publication. Uncitedness is lowest in the sciences, higher in the social sciences and highest in the arts and humanities. Schwartz (1997) found that the rate of uncitedness in Library and Information Science was 72%. Does this mean that almost 2/3 of the papers published in this field are superfluous? (Not to mention the many papers not selected to the Social Sciences Citation Index?).

Paper may have important functions even they are not cited. Book reviews, for example, may be widely read and used, but are seldom cited.

Literature:

Garfield, E. (1973).Uncitedness III. The importance of not being cited. Current Contents, 16(8), 5-6. Available at:  http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/essays/V1p413y1962-73.pdf

Garfield, E. (1998). I had a dream . . . About uncitedness. The Scientist, 12(14), 10. http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/commentaries/tsv12(14)p10y19980706.pdf

Ghosh, J. S. (1975). Uncitedness of articles in Nature, a multidisciplinary scientific journal. Information Processing & Management, 11(5-7), 165-169.

Ghosh, J. S. & Neufeld, M. L. (1974). Uncitedness of articles in Journal-of-American-Chemical-Society. Information Storage and Retrieval, 10, 365-369.

Hamilton, D. (1990). Publishing by -- and for? -- the Numbers. Science, 250:1331-2, Available: http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/commentaries/tsv12(14)p10y19980706.pdf

Hamilton, D. (1991). Research Papers: Who's Uncited Now? Science, 251:25. Available: http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/commentaries/tsv12(14)p10y19980706.pdf

Schwartz, C. A. (1997). The rise and fall of uncitedness. College & Research Libraries, 58(1), 19-29.

Sengupta, I. N. & Henzler, R. G. (1991). Citedness and uncitedness of cancer articles. Scientometrics, 22(2), 283-296.

Stern, R. E. (1990). Uncitedness in the biochemical literature. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 41(3), 193-196.

Szavakovats, E. (1994). Non-indexed eponymal citedness (NIEC) - 1st fact-finding examination of a phenomenon of scientific literature. Journal of Information Science, 20(1), 55-70.

van Dalen, H. P. & Henkens, K. (2005). Signals in science - On the importance of signaling in gaining attention in science. Scientometrics, 64(2), 209-233.

van Leeuwen, T. N. & Moed, H. F. (2005). Characteristics of Journal Impact Factors: The effects of uncitedness and citation distribution on the understanding of journal impact factors. Scientometrics, 63(2), 357-371.

See also: Bibliographic reference; Research evaluation

Birger Hjørland

Last edited: 02-08-2006

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