tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post8513459684520306964..comments2024-03-02T00:44:55.128-08:00Comments on Pleiotropy: Is Eigenfactor really a good measure?Bjørn Østmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08859177313382114917noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4989966954446423670.post-40545714450944357572012-05-20T14:06:10.829-07:002012-05-20T14:06:10.829-07:00[Carl Bergstrom asked me to post this for him.]
T...[Carl Bergstrom asked me to post this for him.]<br /><br />Thanks for the writeup, Bjorn.<br /><br />The Eigenfactor score was developed as a tool for evaluating the total importance of a journal, analogous to total count of citations to that journal over a given period. Such a metric can be useful for a number of purposes, such as making collections decisions about which journals to purchase with a limited library budget. As you note, this metric scales with the size of a journal.<br /><br />However, the Eigenfactor score is not the proper metric for the purpose you discuss here: deciding which journal is the most prestigious. Individual authors or researchers interested in deciding where to send their work will be interested in the influence-per-paper that a given journal has. Another of the Eigenfactor metrics, the Article Influence score, serves this purpose and is analogous to the Thomson-Reuters' Impact Factor score. <br /><br />Article Influence scores for the PLoS family are <br /><br />PLoS Biology: 8.2112<br />PLoS Computation Biology: 2.9791<br />PLoS One: 1.941<br /><br />Thus if you use the proper Eigenfactor metric for comparing prestige (or equivalently, per-paper influence) you'll see that PLoS Biology is four times as prestigious as PLoS One. <br /><br />Best regards,<br />Carl Bergstrom<br />Eigenfactor.orgBjørn Østmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08859177313382114917noreply@blogger.com