[Factors affecting citations: a comparison between Chinese and English journals in ecology].
Citations to journal papers in eight ecological journals at home and abroad were analyzed to identify key contributing factors and compare the difference between the selected Chinese and English journals. The results indicated that the annual average citations of English journals were much higher than those of Chinese journals. Percentage of single-authored papers was also higher in English journals than in Chinese journals. Co-authored papers accounted for a large proportion of papers published in all journals, indicating the significance of collaboration in modern ecological research. A positive correlation was observed between the number of authors and citation rate, but the relationship was weak in general. On an average, papers in English journals were longer than those in Chinese journals, and the annual average citations increased with paper length. By tracking the citation dynamics of papers, we found that the most cited papers in English journals had higher increasing citation rates. This suggested that they had a stronger persistence effect than those in Chinese journals. These results will provide some useful guidance for authors and editors in ecology.
Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China. xiaohong@iae.ac.cn
Hong
H
Xiao
Fei
F
Yuan
Jian-Guo
JG
Wu
D002681:China; D004463:Ecology; D055811:Journal Impact Factor; D010506:Periodicals as Topic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011643:Publishing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*