Metrics:

The New Black?

Kristen Fisher Ratan

NFAIS 2012

The web is getting personal

Can Web Metrics Indicate Research Impact?

Metrics:

The New Black?

Kristen Fisher Ratan

NFAIS 2012

Research Dissemination IS

Research Impact

•Citations •Web usage •Star Ratings •Social bookmarking •Community rating •Media/blog coverage •Commenting activity •and more…

Dissemination creates indicators of impact

Dissemination Publication

Article Level Metrics (ALMs)

ALMs: Two Traditional Use Cases

Author

Measure the impact and reach of their work

Benchmark article performance against others

Evaluate publication decisions to maximize the impact of their work

Understand readership

Communicate impact of research to employers, funders, potential collaborators

Researcher/Writer/Journalist

Gauge value of any article with post-publication peer review

Conduct custom searches that account for research impact

Collect relevant articles and organize based upon array of criteria

Gain insight into article’s impact within context of related research

Analyze trends/behaviors across a database of academic literature

Self-Metrics Research & Discovery

The Third? Meta-analysis using large

datasets of ALMs

Beyond the Article

1595 Tweets

Usage isn’t always indicative

Inside the Article

Powerpoint download feature inadvertently tracked sub-article usage

New feature may be able to track cut/paste activities

90%

To Measure is to Know

Let’s get tracking

• Cut/paste

• Figures opened, downloaded

• Links clicked

• Time spent on article page

• Supplemental info viewed

• Authors’ info viewed

• Pathways that info travels

• ALMs viewed and used

To understand true use of context

What Might Data Drive?

• Tenure and promotion

• Grants

• Reputation

• Discovery

• Prioritization

Attention: the new currency

$

Caveats and concerns

• Missed citation data

• Data sources aren’t reliable

• Digital addresses change

• Usage doesn’t mean useful

• Deliberate gaming

• Context

Next: Context-Mining

Thank You!

Kristen Fisher Ratan kratan@plos.org