To calculate the credibility indicators of scientific publications within the Scopus database, several unique metrics are used, one of them is SNIP (Source Normalised Impact per Paper), which was analyzed in detail earlier. Today, we offer to consider the features of calculating and using the CiteScore indicator.
CiteScore: key features
CiteScore is an indicator for evaluating the level of citation of peer-reviewed materials. The metric is calculated as the ratio of the average number of citations to the published number of articles over 4 years. The four-year publication window was selected per the results of studies of the citation level, according to which a period of 3-4 years is optimal for analyzing the publication's impact indicators.
When calculating CiteScore, five types of peer-reviewed materials are considered: research articles, review articles, conference materials, informational articles, and book chapters. Previously, until 2020, this metric also considered other types of scientific materials, such as editorial notes. However, they have relatively low citation rates and contribute to artificially underestimating CiteScore results.
Materials that are currently being published and marked "Article in Press" are not considered when calculating CiteScore. The authors of the methodology explain this by the fact that when calculating scientometric indicators for such articles, the consistency condition will not be considered.
Using the CiteScore Tracker metric
To more quickly track the dynamics of publication success, the CiteScore Tracker metric was introduced. The methodology for calculating it is the same as for CiteScore, but the results are calculated every month of the current year, and not after its completion.
CiteScore Tracker can be considered the most up-to-date metric in the Scopus database because other indicators – SNIP and SJR – are updated only once a year. Why doesn't SNIP Tracker or SJR Tracker exist? First, this is because it is customary to record indicators annually. CiteScore Tracker is rather an exception to the rule.
Second, unlike other metrics, the CiteScore calculation methodology is developed exclusively by Elsevier. SNIP and SJR are calculated in partnership with CWTS and Scimago Research Group. Given that the Scopus scientometric database contains a large amount of materials, it takes a certain time to send data to partners who calculate other metrics. Therefore, there are currently no appropriate time resources for calculating SNIP and SJR metrics monthly.
It should also be considered that the CiteScore indicator is considered as one of the metrics whose non-compliance with regulatory indicators may affect the termination of indexing of the publication in the scientometric database Scopus due to "Metrics". In particular, when the journal has a considerably lower CiteScore compared to similar publications in its subject area.
Additional CiteScore metrics
CiteScore also has several derived metrics used by the Scopus database:
◉ CiteScore Percentile – a relative indicator of the journal's credibility in a particular field of knowledge, for example, an indicator of 98% means that the publication is included in the top 2%.
◉ CiteScore Quartile – derived from CiteScore Percentile, this metric also indicates the publication's influence in a particular field of research. There are four quartiles, where Q1 is the highest and Q4 is the lowest.
◉ CiteScore Rank and Rank Out Of – an absolute indicator of the journal's credibility in a particular field of knowledge, for example, the publication ranks 10th among 63 publications in one of the categories.
◉ Citations – the number of citations, in fact – the numerator of CiteScore.
◉ Documents – number of documents, CiteScore denominator.
The CiteScore metric and its derived metrics are located on the "Source Data" tab of the Scopus scientometric database.
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