Bibliometrics and Research Evaluation: Uses and Abuses

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Yves Gingras (Université du Québec à Montréal) Michael Buckland (Professor Emeritus and Co-Director, Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative, University of California, Berkeley)

Bibliometrics and Research Evaluation

Uses and Abuses

Yves Gingras (Université du Québec à Montréal), Michael Buckland (Professor Emeritus and Co-Director, Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative, University of California, Berkeley), Jonathan Furner (UCLA) , Markus Krajewski (Professor of Media Studies, University of Basel)

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English

MIT Press
07 October 2016

Coding theory & cryptology; Research methods: general; Organisation & management of education

Series: History and Foundations of Information Science

"Why bibliometrics is useful for understanding the global dynamics of science but generate perverse effects when applied inappropriately in research evaluation and university rankings.

The research evaluation market is booming. ""Ranking,"" ""metrics,"" ""h-index,"" and ""impact factors"" are reigning buzzwords. Government and research administrators want to evaluate everything-teachers, professors, training programs, universities-using quantitative indicators. Among the tools used to measure ""research excellence,"" bibliometrics-aggregate data on publications and citations-has become dominant. Bibliometrics is hailed as an ""objective"" measure of research quality, a quantitative measure more useful than ""subjective"" and intuitive evaluation methods such as peer review that have been used since scientific papers were first published in the seventeenth century. In this book, Yves Gingras offers a spirited argument against an unquestioning reliance on bibliometrics as an indicator of research quality. Gingras shows that bibliometric rankings have no real scientific validity, rarely measuring what they pretend to.

Although the study of publication and citation patterns, at the proper scales, can yield insights on the global dynamics of science over time, ill-defined quantitative indicators often generate perverse and unintended effects on the direction of research. Moreover, abuse of bibliometrics occurs when data is manipulated to boost rankings. Gingras looks at the politics of evaluation and argues that using numbers can be a way to control scientists and diminish their autonomy in the evaluation process. Proposing precise criteria for establishing the validity of indicators at a given scale of analysis, Gingras questions why universities are so eager to let invalid indicators influence their research strategy."

By: Yves Gingras (Université du Québec à Montréal)
Series edited by: Michael Buckland (Professor Emeritus and Co-Director Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative University of California Berkeley), Jonathan Furner (UCLA), Markus Krajewski (Professor of Media Studies, University of Basel)
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 16mm
Weight: 318g
ISBN: 9780262035125
ISBN 10: 026203512X
Series: History and Foundations of Information Science
Pages: 136
Publication Date: 07 October 2016
Recommended Age: From 18 years
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Yves Gingras is Professor and Canada Research Chair in History and Sociology of Science, Department of History, at Universite du Quebec Montreal.