Showing papers in "Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology in 2014"

Patterns of connections and movements in dual-map overlays: a new method of publication portfolio analysis

Abstract: Portfolio analysis of the publication profile of a unit of interest, ranging from individuals and organizations to a scientific field or interdisciplinary programs, aims to inform analysts and decision makers about the position of the unit, where it has been, and where it may go in a complex adaptive environment. A portfolio analysis may aim to identify the gap between the current position of an organization and a goal that it intends to achieve or identify competencies of multiple institutions. We introduce a new visual analytic method for analyzing, comparing, and contrasting characteristics of publication portfolios. The new method introduces a novel design of dual-map thematic overlays on global maps of science. Each publication portfolio can be added as one layer of dual-map overlays over 2 related, but distinct, global maps of science: one for citing journals and the other for cited journals. We demonstrate how the new design facilitates a portfolio analysis in terms of patterns emerging from the distributions of citation threads and the dynamics of trajectories as a function of space and time. We first demonstrate the analysis of portfolios defined on a single source article. Then we contrast publication portfolios of multiple comparable units of interest; namely, colleges in universities and corporate research organizations. We also include examples of overlays of scientific fields. We expect that our method will provide new insights to portfolio analysis.

Mendeley readership altmetrics for the social sciences and humanities: Research evaluation and knowledge flows

Abstract: Although there is evidence that counting the readers of an article in the social reference site, Mendeley, may help to capture its research impact, the extent to which this is true for different scientific fields is unknown. In this study, we compare Mendeley readership counts with citations for different social sciences and humanities disciplines. The overall correlation between Mendeley readership counts and citations for the social sciences was higher than for the humanities. Low and medium correlations between Mendeley bookmarks and citation counts in all the investigated disciplines suggest that these measures reflect different aspects of research impact. Mendeley data were also used to discover patterns of information flow between scientific fields. Comparing information flows based on Mendeley bookmarking data and cross-disciplinary citation analysis for the disciplines revealed substantial similarities and some differences. Thus, the evidence from this study suggests that Mendeley readership data could be used to help capture knowledge transfer across scientific disciplines, especially for people that read but do not author articles, as well as giving impact evidence at an earlier stage than is possible with citation counts.

Do blog citations correlate with a higher number of future citations? Research blogs as a potential source for alternative metrics

Abstract: Journal-based citations are an important source of data for impact indices. However, the impact of journal articles extends beyond formal scholarly discourse. Measuring online scholarly impact calls for new indices, complementary to the older ones. This article examines a possible alternative metric source, blog posts aggregated at ResearchBlogging.org, which discuss peer-reviewed articles and provide full bibliographic references. Articles reviewed in these blogs therefore receive “blog citations.” We hypothesized that articles receiving blog citations close to their publication time receive more journal citations later than the articles in the same journal published in the same year that did not receive such blog citations. Statistically significant evidence for articles published in 2009 and 2010 support this hypothesis for seven of 12 journals (58%) in 2009 and 13 of 19 journals (68%) in 2010. We suggest, based on these results, that blog citations can be used as an alternative metric source.

The Google scholar experiment: How to index false papers and manipulate bibliometric indicators

Abstract: Paper accepted for publication at the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. http://www.asis.org/jasist.html

Content-Based Citation Analysis: The Next Generation of Citation Analysis

Abstract: Traditional citation analysis has been widely applied to detect patterns of scientific collaboration, map the landscapes of scholarly disciplines, assess the impact of research outputs, and observe knowledge transfer across domains. It is, however, limited, as it assumes all citations are of similar value and weights each equally. Content-based citation analysis (CCA) addresses a citation’s value by interpreting each one based on its context at both the syntactic and semantic levels. This paper provides a comprehensive overview of CAA research in terms of its theoretical foundations, methodical approaches, and example applications. In addition, we highlight how increased computational capabilities and publicly available full-text resources have opened this area of research to vast possibilities, which enable deeper citation analysis, more accurate citation prediction, and increased knowledge discovery.

Determining if two documents are written by the same author

Abstract: Almost any conceivable authorship attribution problem can be reduced to one fundamental problem: whether a pair of (possibly short) documents were written by the same author. In this article, we offer an (almost) unsupervised method for solving this problem with surprisingly high accuracy. The main idea is to use repeated feature subsampling methods to determine if one document of the pair allows us to select the other from among a background set of “impostors” in a sufficiently robust manner.

Anatomy of green open access

Abstract: Open access (OA) is free, unrestricted access to electronic versions of scholarly publications. For peer-reviewed journal articles, there are two main routes to OA: publishing in OA journals (gold OA) or archiving of article copies or manuscripts at other web locations (green OA). This study focuses on summarizing and extending current knowledge about green OA. A synthesis of previous studies indicates that green OA coverage of all published journal articles is approximately 12%, with substantial disciplinary variation. Typically, green OA copies become available after considerable time delays, partly caused by publisher-imposed embargo periods, and partly by author tendencies to archive manuscripts only periodically. Although green OA copies should ideally be archived in proper repositories, a large share is stored on home pages and similar locations, with no assurance of long-term preservation. Often such locations contain exact copies of published articles, which may infringe on the publisher's exclusive rights. The technical foundation for green OA uploading is becoming increasingly solid largely due to the rapid increase in the number of institutional repositories. The number of articles within the scope of OA mandates, which strongly influence the self-archival rate of articles, is nevertheless still low.

Patent overlay mapping: Visualizing technological distance

Abstract: We thank Kevin Boyack, Loet Leydesdorff, and Antoine Schoen for open and fruitful discussions about this paper. This research was undertaken largely at Georgia Tech drawing on support from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) through the Center for Nanotechnology in Society (Arizona State University; Award No. 0531194); and NSF Award No. 1064146 ("Revealing Innovation Pathways: Hybrid Science Maps for Technology Assessment and Foresight"). Part of this research was also undertaken in collaboration with the Center for Nanotechnology in Society, University of California Santa Barbara (NSF Awards No. 0938099 and No. 0531184). The findings and observations contained in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the US National Science Foundation.

F1000 recommendations as a new data source for research evaluation : A comparison with citations

Abstract: F1000 is a postpublication peer review service for biological and medical research. F1000 recommends important publications in the biomedical literature, and from this perspective F1000 could be an interesting tool for research evaluation. By linking the complete database of F1000 recommendations to the Web of Science bibliographic database, we are able to make a comprehensive comparison between F1000 recommendations and citations. We find that about 2% of the publications in the biomedical literature receive at least one F1000 recommendation. Recommended publications on average receive 1.30 recommendations, and more than 90% of the recommendations are given within half a year after a publication has appeared. There turns out to be a clear correlation between F1000 recommendations and citations. However, the correlation is relatively weak, at least weaker than the correlation between journal impact and citations. More research is needed to identify the main reasons for differences between recommendations and citations in assessing the impact of publications.

User engagement in online News: Under the scope of sentiment, interest, affect, and gaze

Abstract: Online content providers, such as news portals and social media platforms, constantly seek new ways to attract large shares of online attention by keeping their users engaged. A common challenge is to identify which aspects of online interaction influence user engagement the most. In this article, through an analysis of a news article collection obtained from Yahoo News US, we demonstrate that news articles exhibit considerable variation in terms of the sentimentality and polarity of their content, depending on factors such as news provider and genre. Moreover, through a laboratory study, we observe the effect of sentimentality and polarity of news and comments on a set of subjective and objective measures of engagement. In particular, we show that attention, affect, and gaze differ across news of varying interestingness. As part of our study, we also explore methods that exploit the sentiments expressed in user comments to reorder the lists of comments displayed in news pages. Our results indicate that user engagement can be anticipated predicted if we account for the sentimentality and polarity of the content as well as other factors that drive attention and inspire human curiosity.

“Making my own luck”: Serendipity strategies and how to support them in digital information environments

Abstract: Serendipity occurs when unexpected circumstances and an “aha” moment of insight result in a valuable, unanticipated outcome. Designing digital information environments to support serendipity can not only provide users with new knowledge, but also propel them in directions they might not otherwise have traveled in—surprising and delighting them along the way. As serendipity involves unexpected circumstances it cannot be directly controlled, but it can be potentially influenced. However, to the best of our knowledge, no previous work has focused on providing a rich empirical understanding of how it might be influenced. We interviewed 14 creative professionals to identify their self-reported strategies aimed at increasing the likelihood of serendipity. These strategies form a framework for examining ways existing digital environments support serendipity and for considering how future environments can create opportunities for it. This is a new way of thinking about how to design for serendipity; by supporting the strategies found to increase its likelihood rather than attempting to support serendipity as a discrete phenomenon, digital environments not only have the potential to help users experience serendipity but also encourage them to adopt the strategies necessary to experience it more often.

Open‐access repositories worldwide, 2005–2012: Past growth, current characteristics, and future possibilities

Abstract: This paper reviews the worldwide growth of open-access (OA) repositories, December 2005 to December 2012, using data collected by the OpenDOAR project. It shows that initial repository development was focused on North America, Western Europe and Australasia, particularly the USA, UK, Germany and Australia. Soon after, Japan increased its repository numbers. Since 2010, other geographical areas and countries have seen repository growth, including East Asia (especially Taiwan), South America (especially Brazil) and Eastern Europe (especially Poland). During the whole period, countries such as France, Italy and Spain have maintained steady growth, whereas countries such as China and Russia have experienced relatively low levels of growth. Globally, repositories are predominantly institutional, multidisciplinary and English-language-based. They typically use open-source OAI-compliant repository software but remain immature in terms of explicit licensing arrangements. Whilst the size of repositories is difficult to assess accurately, the available data indicate that a small number of large repositories and a large number of small repositories make up the repository landscape. These trends and characteristics are analyzed using Innovation Diffusion Theory (IDT) building on previous studies. IDT is shown to provide a useful explanatory framework for understanding repository adoption at various levels: global, national, organizational and individual. Major factors affecting both the initial development of repositories and their take up by users are identified, including IT infrastructure, language, cultural factors, policy initiatives, awareness-raising activity and usage mandates. It is argued that mandates in particular are likely to play a crucial role in determining future repository development.

Determining the factors that influence college students' adoption of smartphones

Abstract: This study examines smartphone adoption behavior among American college students by combining all components of innovation diffusion theory (IDT), the technology acceptance model (TAM), the value-based adoption model (VAM), and the social influence (SI) model. Data indicate that the smartphone adoption rates are beyond the early majority and are now approaching the late majority. The findings of analysis of variance tests revealed that all variables of TAM, VAM, and SI varied across the adopter groups: The current adopter's mean values of the variables were the highest, followed by those of potential and nonadoption groups. Multinomial logistic regression (MLR) analyses revealed that perceived value and affiliation mainly determine the different perceptions of adoption groups. Smartphone adoption, however, was relatively unaffected by perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. Perceived popularity, perceived price, and ethnicity played a role in distinctive determinants between current adopters and nonadopters. The results imply that adopters perceive smartphones as not only a worthwhile device in which to invest money but also a symbolic device to signal their affiliation and timely technology adoption. Another intriguing finding is the differences of interest in contents between current adopters and nonadopters. Social interactions via social networking services, acquisition for lifestyle, information seeking, and entertainment via gaming were the main applications of interest.

Beyond quality and accessibility: Source selection in consumer health information searching

Abstract: A systematic understanding of factors and criteria that affect consumers' selection of sources for health information is necessary for the design of effective health information services and information systems. However, current studies have overly focused on source attributes as indicators for 2 criteria, source quality and accessibility, and overlooked the role of other factors and criteria that help determine source selection. To fill this gap, guided by decision-making theories and the cognitive perspective to information search, we interviewed 30 participants about their reasons for using a wide range of sources for health information. Additionally, we asked each of them to report a critical incident in which sources were selected to fulfill a specific information need. Based on the analysis of the transcripts, 5 categories of factors were identified as influential to source selection: source-related factors, user-related factors, user-source relationships, characteristics of the problematic situation, and social influences. In addition, about a dozen criteria that mediate the influence of the factors on source-selection decisions were identified, including accessibility, quality, usability, interactivity, relevance, usefulness, familiarity, affection, anonymity, and appropriateness. These results significantly expanded the current understanding of the nature of costs and benefits involved in source-selection decisions, and strongly indicated that a personalized approach is needed for information services and information systems to provide effective access to health information sources for consumers.

A bibliometric study of highly cited reviews in the Science Citation Index expanded

Abstract: ® (Thomson Reuters) subject areas, citation life cycles, and publications by Nobel Prize winners Six indicators, total publications, independent publications, collaborative publications, first-author publications, corresponding-author publications, and single-author publications were applied to evaluate publication of institutions and countries Among the highly cited reviews, 33% were single-author, 61% were single- institution, and 83% were single-country reviews The United States ranked top for all 6 indicators The G7 (United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Canada, France, Japan, and Italy) countries were the site of almost all the highly cited reviews The top 12 most productive institutions were all located in the United States with Harvard University (Cambridge, MA) the leader The top 3 most productive journals were Chemi- cal Reviews, Nature, and the Annual Review of Bio- chemistry In addition, the impact of the reviews was analyzed by total citations from publication to 2011, citations in 2011, and citation in publication year

Brazilian Bibliometric Coauthorship Networks

Abstract: The Brazilian Lattes Platform is an important academic/ resume data set that registers all academic activities of researchers associated with different major knowledge areas. The academic information collected in this data set is used to evaluate, analyze, and document the scientific production of research groups. Information about the interactions between Brazilian researchers in the form of coauthorships, however, has not been analyzed. In this article, we identified and characterized Brazilian academic coauthorship networks of researchers registered in the Lattes Platform using topological properties of graphs. For this purpose, we explored (a) strategies to develop a large Lattes curricula vitae data set, (b) an algorithm for identifying automatic coauthorships based on bibliographic information, and (c) topological metrics to investigate interactions among researchers. This study characterized coauthorship networks to gain an in-depth understanding of the network structures and dynamics (social behavior) among researchers in all available major Brazilian knowledge areas. In this study, we evaluated information from a total of 1, 131, 912 researchers associated with the eight major Brazilian knowledge areas: agricultural sciences; biological sciences; exact and earth sciences; humanities; applied social sciences; health sciences; engineering; and linguistics, letters, and arts.

Mutual redundancies in interhuman communication systems: Steps toward a calculus of processing meaning

Abstract: The study of interhuman communication requires a more complex framework than Claude E. Shannon's (1948) mathematical theory of communication because "information" is defined in the latter case as meaningless uncertainty. Assuming that meaning cannot be communicated, we extend Shannon's theory by defining mutual redundancy as a positional counterpart of the relational communication of information. Mutual redundancy indicates the surplus of meanings that can be provided to the exchanges in reflexive communications. The information is redundant because it is based on "pure sets" (i.e., without subtraction of mutual information in the overlaps). We show that in the three-dimensional case (e.g., of a triple helix of university-industry-government relations), mutual redundancy is equal to mutual information (Rxyz = Txyz); but when the dimensionality is even, the sign is different. We generalize to the measurement in N dimensions and proceed to the interpretation. Using Niklas Luhmann's (1984-1995) social systems theory and/or Anthony Giddens's (1979, 1984) structuration theory, mutual redundancy can be provided with an interpretation in the sociological case: Different meaning-processing structures code and decode with other algorithms. A surplus of ("absent") options can then be generated that add to the redundancy. Luhmann's "functional (sub)systems" of expectations or Giddens's "rule-resource sets" are positioned mutually, but coupled operationally in events or "instantiated" in actions. Shannon-type information is generated by the mediation, but the "structures" are (re-)positioned toward one another as sets of (potentially counterfactual) expectations. The structural differences among the coding and decoding algorithms provide a source of additional options in reflexive and anticipatory communications.

Improving query expansion using WordNet

Abstract: This study proposes a new way of using WordNet for query expansion (QE). We choose candidate expansion terms from a set of pseudo-relevant documents; however, the usefulness of these terms is measured based on their definitions provided in a hand-crafted lexical resource such as WordNet. Experiments with a number of standard TREC collections WordNet-based that this method outperforms existing WordNet-based methods. It also compares favorably with established QE methods such as KLD and RM3. Leveraging earlier work in which a combination of QE methods was found to outperform each individual method (as well as other well-known QE methods), we next propose a combination-based QE method that takes into account three different aspects of a candidate expansion term's usefulness: (a) its distribution in the pseudo-relevant documents and in the target corpus, (b) its statistical association with query terms, and (c) its semantic relation with the query, as determined by the overlap between the WordNet definitions of the term and query terms. This combination of diverse sources of information appears to work well on a number of test collections, viz., TREC123, TREC5, TREC678, TREC robust (new), and TREC910 collections, and yields significant improvements over competing methods on most of these collections.

The communicative ecology of Web 2.0 at work: Social networking in the workspace

Abstract: Social media have transformed social interactions and now look set to transform workplace communications. In this exploratory study, we investigate how employees use and get value from a variety of social networking technologies. The context of this research is 4 software firms located in China. Notwithstanding differences in corporate attitudes toward social networking, we identify common themes in the way Web 2.0 technologies are leveraged as value is created by employees at all levels. We draw on the communication ecology framework to analyze the application of various technologies. We inductively develop 5 propositions that describe how social networking technologies contribute directly to horizontal and vertical communication in organizations, and ultimately to individual, team, and organizational performance. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Measuring excellence in Russia: Highly cited papers, leading institutions, patterns of national and international collaboration

Abstract: In this study, we discover Russian “centers of excellence” and explore patterns of their collaboration with each other and with foreign partners. Highly cited papers serve as a proxy for “excellence” and coauthored papers as a measure of collaborative efforts. We find that currently research institutes (of the Russian Academy of Sciences as well as others) remain the key players despite recent government initiatives to stimulate university science. The contribution of the commercial sector to high-impact research is negligible. More than 90% of Russian highly cited papers involve international collaboration, and Russian institutions often do not play a dominant role. Partnership with U.S., German, U.K., and French scientists increases markedly the probability of a Russian paper becoming highly cited. Patterns of national (“intranational”) collaboration in world-class research differ significantly across different types of organizations; the strongest ties are between three nuclear/particle physics centers. Finally, we draw a coauthorship map to visualize collaboration between Russian centers of excellence.

The information journey of marketing professionals: Incorporating work task-driven information seeking, information judgments, information use, and information sharing

Abstract: Marketing professionals’ work activities are heavily reliant on access to and the use of large amounts of quality information This study aims to examine the information journey experienced by marketing professionals, including task-driven information seeking, information judgments, information use, and information sharing, from a more contextualized and holistic viewpoint The information journey presents a more comprehensive picture of user–information interaction than is usually offered in the literature Using a diary method and post-diary in-depth interviews, data consisting of 1,198 diary entries relating to 101 real work tasks were collected over a period of 5 work days The data were used to ascertain characteristics of the stages of marketing professionals’ information journeys as well as the relationships between them Five stages of the information journey, including determining the need for work task-generated information, seeking such information, judging and evaluating the information found, making sense of and using the obtained information, and sharing the obtained or assembled information, were identified The information journey also encompassed types of gaps and gap-bridge techniques that occurred during information seeking and use Based on the empirical findings, an information journey model was developed The implications for information systems design solutions that enable different stages of the information journey to be linked together are also discussed

Archaeology of a digitization

Abstract: This study proposes an archaeology as a means of exploring the practices by which digitally encoded resources are generated, circulated, and received. The discussion grapples with the ambiguous relationship between digitizations and their exemplars in the well-known database, Early English Books Online (EEBO), and suggests ways in which digitizations might be analyzed as witnesses of current perceptions about the past and used accordingly in scholarly research. The article therefore offers a critical reading of EEBO and its digitizations as part of a broader effort to investigate the role of digitally encoded resources in the transmission of ideas and the production of cultural heritage.

An arts-informed study of information using the draw-and-write technique

Abstract: There are untold conceptions of information in information science, and yet the nature of information remains obscure and contested. This article contributes something new to the conversation as the first arts-informed, visual, empirical study of information utilizing the drawand-write technique. To approach the concept of information afresh, graduate students at a North American iSchool were asked to respond to the question “What is information?” by drawing on a 4- by 4-inch piece of paper, called an iSquare. One hundred thirty-seven iSquares were produced and then analyzed using compositional interpretation combined with a theoretical framework of graphic representations. The findings indicate how students visualize information, what was drawn, and associations between the iSquares and prior renderings of information based on words. In the iSquares, information appears most often as pictures of people, artifacts, landscapes, and patterns. There are also many link diagrams, grouping diagrams, symbols, and written text, each with distinct qualities. Methodological reflections address the relationship between visual and textual data, and the sample for the study is critiqued. A discussion presents new directions for theory and research on information, namely, the iSquares as a thinking tool, visual stories of information, and the contradictions of information. Ideas are also provided on the use of arts-informed, visual methods and the draw-and-write technique in the classroom.

Are all literature citations equally important? Automatic citation strength estimation and its applications

Abstract: Literature citation analysis plays a very important role in bibliometrics and scientometrics, such as the Science Citation Index (SCI) impact factor, h-index. Existing citation analysis methods assume that all citations in a paper are equally important, and they simply count the number of citations. Here we argue that the citations in a paper are not equally important and some citations are more important than the others. We use a strength value to assess the importance of each citation and propose to use the regression method with a few useful features for automatically estimating the strength value of each citation. Evaluation results on a manually labeled data set in the computer science field show that the estimated values can achieve good correlation with human-labeled values. We further apply the estimated citation strength values for evaluating paper influence and author influence, and the preliminary evaluation results demonstrate the usefulness of the citation strength values.

Towards a comprehensive model of the cognitive process and mechanisms of individual sensemaking

Abstract: This review introduces a comprehensive model of the cognitive process and mechanisms of individual sensemaking to provide a theoretical basis for: empirical studies that improve our understanding of the cognitive process and mechanisms of sensemaking and integration of results of such studies; education in critical thinking and sensemaking skills; the design of sensemaking assistant tools that support and guide users. The paper reviews and extends existing sensemaking models with ideas from learning and cognition. It reviews literature on sensemaking models in human-computer interaction (HCI), cognitive system engineering, organizational communication, and library and information sciences (LIS), learning theories, cognitive psychology, and task-based information seeking. The model resulting from this synthesis moves to a stronger basis for explaining sensemaking behaviors and conceptual changes. The model illustrates the iterative processes of sensemaking, extends existing models that focus on activities by integrating cognitive mechanisms and the creation of instantiated structure elements of knowledge, and different types of conceptual change to show a complete picture of the cognitive processes of sensemaking. The processes and cognitive mechanisms identified provide better foundations for knowledge creation, organization, and sharing practices and a stronger basis for design of sensemaking assistant systems and tools.

Interdisciplinarity at the journal and specialty level: The changing knowledge bases of the journal cognitive science

Abstract: Using the referencing patterns in articles in Cognitive Science over three decades, we analyze the knowledge base of this literature in terms of its changing disciplinary composition. Three periods are distinguished: (A) construction of the interdisciplinary space in the 1980s, (B) development of an interdisciplinary orientation in the 1990s, and (C) reintegration into “cognitive psychology” in the 2000s. The fluidity and fuzziness of the interdisciplinary delineations in the different visualizations can be reduced and clarified using factor analysis. We also explore newly available routines (“CorText”) to analyze this development in terms of “tubes” using an alluvial map and compare the results with an animation (using “Visone”). The historical specificity of this development can be compared with the development of “artificial intelligence” into an integrated specialty during this same period. Interdisciplinarity should be defined differently at the level of journals and of specialties.

Using internet groups in situations of information poverty: topics and information needs

Abstract: This study explores the use of online newsgroups and discussion groups by people in situations of information poverty. Through a qualitative content analysis of 200 posts from across Internet groups, we identify topics and information needs expressed by people who feel they have no other sources of support available to them. We uncover various health, wellbeing, social and identity issues which are not only crucial to the lives of the people posting, but which they are unwilling to risk revealing elsewhere – offering evidence that these online environments provide an outlet for the expression of needs in situations of critical and hidden information need. To enable this analysis, we first describe our method for reliably identifying situations of information poverty in messages posted to these groups and our coding approach. Our work contributes to the study of both information seeking within the context of information poverty and the use of Internet groups as sources of information and support, bridging the two by exploring the manifestation of information poverty in this particular online setting.

E-books versus print books: Readers' choices and preferences across contexts

Abstract: With electronic book (e-book) sales and readership rising, are e-books positioned to replace print books? This study examines the preference for e-books and print books in the contexts of reading purpose, reading situation, and contextual variables such as age, gender, education level, race/ethnicity, income, community type, and Internet use. In addition, this study aims to identify factors that contribute to e-book adoption. Participants were a nationally representative sample of 2,986 people in the United States from the Reading Habits Survey, conducted by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project (http://pewinternet.org/Shared-Content/Data-Sets/2011/December-2011--Reading-Habits.aspx). While the results of this study support the notion that e-books have firmly established a place in people's lives, due to their convenience of access, e-books are not yet positioned to replace print books. Both print books and e-books have unique attributes and serve irreplaceable functions to meet people's reading needs, which may vary by individual demographic, contextual, and situational factors. At this point, the leading significant predictors of e-book adoption are the number of books read, the individual's income, the occurrence and frequency of reading for research topics of interest, and the individual's Internet use, followed by other variables such as race/ethnicity, reading for work/school, age, and education.

Acknowledgments in scientific publications: Presence in Spanish science and text patterns across disciplines

Abstract: The Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (CSO2008-06310) and the Spanish National Research Council (JAE predoctoral grant).

The wisdom of citing scientists

Abstract: This Brief Communication discusses the benefits of citation analysis in research evaluation based on Galton's “Wisdom of Crowds” (1907). Citations are based on the assessment of many which is why they can be considered to have some credibility. However, we show that citations are incomplete assessments and that one cannot assume that a high number of citations correlates with a high level of usefulness. Only when one knows that a rarely cited paper has been widely read is it possible to say—strictly speaking—that it was obviously of little use for further research. Using a comparison with “like” data, we try to determine that cited reference analysis allows for a more meaningful analysis of bibliometric data than times-cited analysis.