Research Impact

The h-index attempts to measure the cumulative impact of an individual researcher’s publications, using both the number of publications and the number of citations.

Method of calculation

H-Index = number of papers (h) with a citation number ≥ h

Advantages

• Useful for comparing impact within specific disciplines or areas of research
• Useful for comparing impact of researchers with similar career lengths

Disadvantages

• Not an accurate measure for early-career researchers
• Not appropriate for comparing impact across disciplines
• Does not provide context for citations
• Can vary based on which citations are included in the calculation data. For example, it is common for a researcher to have two different h-indexes in Web of Science and Google Scholar.

Tools for measuring

Method of calculation

 i10-Index = number of publications with at least 10 citations

Advantages

• Easy and free to calculate

Disadvantages

• Used only in Google Scholar

Tools for measuring

Proprietary analysis provided by Clarivate, this provides information about an author and their impact across time. 

Advantages

• Images that can be edited and captured
• Can display productivity over time

Disadvantages

• Must claim profile to edit it
• Combining multiple profiles/names/affiliations can be difficult.

Tools for measuring

Authors can also utilize metrics about the articles they have published or the journals they have published in like:

• NIH iCite Relative Citation Ratio (RCR)
• Total number of citations for an author
• Yearly average of citations for a body of work.

Check out the other tabs in this guide to learn more about different levels of metrics.