SELF‐CITATIONS IN SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE
| Date | 01 April 1977 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb026644 |
| Pages | 251-265 |
| Published date | 01 April 1977 |
| Author | RENATA TAGLIACOZZO |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
THE
Journal of
Documentation
VOLUME 33 NUMBER 4 DECEMBER 1977
SELF-CITATIONS IN SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE
RENATA TAGLIACOZZO
Mental Health Research Institute, The University of Michigan
The purpose of the present investigation was to determine to what extent
authors of scientific articles cite their previous publications and what are the
principal distinguishing features of this particular type of citation. We have
analysed the bibliographies of a group of articles from the areas of plant
physiology and neurobiology, and have examined the relationship of the
self-citations to some characteristics of the articles in which they occurred.
We found self-citations to be more recent and to be cited more frequently in
the text of the citing articles than citations of other authors. The extent of
self-citing did not appear to be related to the number of co-authors and to
the bibliography
size
of the citing
articles,
or to their authors' productivity.
INTRODUCTION
THE GROWING diffusion of citation analysis as a methodology for the study
of scientific communication and of the structure of knowledge has given rise to
a host of interesting problems concerning the properties of citation networks and
their dependence upon the citing practices of the various disciplines. One of the
problems concerns the inadequacy of treating citation data as masses of un-
differentiated units. As Martyn points out, citations are '... the record of a number
of events which have the same external appearance, but which are members of
different families...'1 While for some purposes it is legitimate to aggregate the
various families, for other purposes it is not. If one considers the range of applica-
tions of citation analysis, from searching the literature to tracing the influences of
one body of literature on another, from mapping the relationships between
scientific areas to assessing the value of particular research works, one realizes
the importance of identifying types, properties, and interrelations of the com-
ponents of citation networks.
A particular type of relationship, in a citation network, is that which links
papers having one or more authors in common. The term 'self-citation' is com-
monly applied to this type of citation. Other forms of relationships between
citing and cited article, however, have been given the same name. Reference to
articles published in the same journal in which the citing article appears has been
Journal
of
Documentation,
Vol. 33, No. 4, December 1977, pp. 251-265
251
To continue reading
Request your trial