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Graduate Research In Education

About Journal Metrics

Journal metrics are used to determine rankings and relevancy of a journal. Information is usually based on citation counts, number of publications and sometimes acceptance rates. There are many places that include journal metrics information, and none of these sources are comprehensive. This guide includes the most common sources for journal ranking and metrics information.

Cabell's Directory

Cabell's contains many journals that are not indexed in JCR. Cabell's indicates whether the journal is peer-reviewed, provides acceptance rates, submission guidelines, whether or not the journal is indexed in JCR and/or ERIC, and other editorial information.

ODU subscribes to the following directories in the field of education:

  • Educational Curriculum & Methods
  • Educational Psychology & Administration
  • Education Technology & Library Science

Journal Citation Reports

About Journal Citation Reports

 

Impact Factors can be used to:

  • Identify journals in which to publish
  • Identify journals relevant to your research
  • Confirm the status of the journals in which you have published

 

Things to Know:

  • Not all journals have impact factors, especially in the field of education and other humanities. Only journals that are indexed in the Web of Knowledge have impact factors.
  • A journal only has one impact factor, but it may be listed in multiple categories.
  • An impact factor should not be looked at in isolation but in comparison to journals in that same category- impact factors vary across disciplines.

 

Definitions:

Journal Impact Factor: In Journal Citation Reports (JCR), the impact factor measures the importance of a journal by calculating the times its articles are cited. The calculation is based on citations to articles from the most recent two years divided by the total number of articles from the most recent two years.

5-Year Journal Impact Factor: In JCR, citations to articles from the most recent five years are divided by the total number of articles from the most recent five years.

Journal Immediacy Index: In JCR, citations to articles from the current year are divided by the total number of articles from the current year.

Journal Cited Half-Life: The median age of journal articles cited for the current Journal Citation Reports year.

Eigenfactor: Similar to the JCR Five-Year Impact Factor, but weeds out journal self-citations.

Article Influence: The Eigenfactor score is divided by the number of articles published in the journal. Measures the average individual article in the journal (as opposed to the journal as a whole).

Google Metrics

Google Metrics assigns an h5-index to journals. The h5-index is based on how many articles that journal has published and how many times articles have been cited. For example, a publication with five articles cited by, respectively, 17, 9, 6, 3, and 2 has an h-index of 3. Google Metrics provides a current snapshot of how a journal is doing but not a historical view. 

To search for a specific journal, click on Top 100 Publications and search in the box at the top of the screen.

Things to Know:

  • The metrics are based on information as of July 2018.
  • Certain items are excluded, including journals with fewer than 100 publications and publications without citations between 2011-2015.

For more information, see Google Scholar Metrics.

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