How are new citation-based journal indicators adding to the bibliometric toolbox?

TL;DR

This paper compares new citation-based journal indicators with traditional metrics, analyzing their ability to measure different dimensions of influence, stability over time, and their interrelations within citation networks.

Contribution

It provides a comparative analysis of emerging and traditional journal indicators, highlighting their correlations, robustness, and the dimensions of size and impact they measure.

Findings

New indicators often measure different aspects of citation networks.

H-index combines size and impact, serving as a reach indicator.

PageRank relates mainly to size but interacts with centrality measures.

Abstract

The launching of Scopus and Google Scholar, and methodological developments in Social Network Analysis have made many more indicators for evaluating journals available than the traditional Impact Factor, Cited Half-life, and Immediacy Index of the ISI. In this study, these new indicators are compared with one another and with the older ones. Do the various indicators measure new dimensions of the citation networks, or are they highly correlated among them? Are they robust and relatively stable over time? Two main dimensions are distinguished -- size and impact -- which together shape influence. The H-index combines the two dimensions and can also be considered as an indicator of reach (like Indegree). PageRank is mainly an indicator of size, but has important interactions with centrality measures. The Scimago Journal Ranking (SJR) indicator provides an alternative to the Journal Impact Factor, but the computation is less easy.