altmetrics 2015 jan

Altmetrics: the movement, the tools, and the implications

Kimberley R. Barker, MLIS Andrea H. Denton, MILS

January 27, 2015

Defining altmetrics J. Priem (@jasonpriem), I like the term

#articlelevelmetrics, but it fails to imply *diversity* of measures. Lately, Im liking altmetrics., 4:28 AM - 29 Sep 10, Tweet

the creation and study of new metrics based on the Social Web for analyzing, and informing scholarship.

http://altmetrics.org/about/

Awareness, not promotion!

Why should you care?

Br J Sports Med doi:10.1136/bjsports-2013-092417

Before altmetrics

Traditional products and measures of academic success

Publications

Conference presentations/posters

Committee work

Number of times your work was cited

Impact Factor and journal rank

H-index

From metrics to altmetrics

Measures

Traditional

Research Products

Trad

itio

nal

- Article - Chapter - Books

Times Cited Impact Factor + Rank

H-index

From metrics to altmetrics

Measures

Traditional New

Research Products

Trad

itio

nal

- Article - Chapter - Books

Times Cited Impact Factor +

Rank H-index

Page Views Downloads

The definition of scholarly output is changing

NSF Publications broadened to Products of Research As of Jan 2013 citable and accessible including but not limited to publications, data sets, software, patents, and copyrights."

From metrics to altmetrics

Measures

Traditional New

Research Products

Tr

adit

ion

al

- Article - Chapter - Books

Times Cited Impact Factor +

Rank H-index

Page Views

N

ew

- Datasets - Blog post - More

None

Downloads

Reblogs

Examples of additional scholarly output/professional contributions

Blogs

Invited Interviews

Twitter

Facebook

Reddit

Datasets

Patents

Software

Copyrights

More examples of altmeasuring

Downloads and page views

Track-backs

Tweets and retweets

Links from review services (e.g. Facultyof1000)

Sharing, social bookmarking

Other forces at work

Increasing requirements for open data

Foundation funding (e.g. Gates)

Government funding

Big data

Predatory publishing

Tools

Journal-level tools

Each publisher does it a slightly different way

BMC Medicine

Wiley

Circulation (AHA via Highwire)

BMC Neuroscience via SpringerLink

Early tools for non-traditional products

Measured web views and downloads

Google Analytics

Bit.ly

Spring Metrics

Leading tools for altmetrics

Evolved to address non-traditional scholarship as well as traditional outputs

ImpactStory

Altmetric.com

PlumX

Impactstory

Impactstory is a place to learn and share all the ways your research is making a difference

Jason Priem and Heather Piwowar

Free for 30 days, then $60 a year.

Sample Impactstory Profile

Profile Metrics

Article Details

Altmetric.com

London-based start-up

Funding from Digital Science (LabGuru, FigShare)

Altmetrics widget (donut)

Used by publishers/journals

Nature Publishing, Cell Press

Springer

BioMed Central

BMJ Specialty journals

Nature Neuroscience

Nature Neuroscience

Nature Neuroscience

Altmetric Explorer

Subscription product monitor, search and measure conversations about your publications and those of your competitors

Pricing options

Altmetric Bookmarklet

Free

Reading a paper and want to find out its Altmetric details? Install the bookmarklet in your browser

When viewing the paper, Altmetric it

Altmetric Bookmarklet

Altmetric Bookmarklet

Plum Analytics

Gathers metrics (altmetrics) about research from more than thirty sources including PLOS, PubMed and YouTube, and categorizes them

PlumX is an institutional impact dashboard that provides information on how research output is being utilized, interacted with, and talked about around the world.

Plum Analytics

PlumX Metric Categories

Usage (downloads, views, ILL)

Captures (favorites, bookmarks)

Mentions (blog posts, news, Wikipedia)

Social Media (tweets, likes)

Citations (PubMed, Scopus, patents)

PlumX in Action

Pitt PlumX dashboard https://plu.mx/pitt/g/

Michael Pinsky, MD https://plu.mx/u/mpinsky

PlumX

PlumX Author Profile

Article View

However

Standards arent fully defined

Definitions, calculations, etc.

NISO effort

Are altmetrics important for discovery? For evaluation? Both?

Issues

Issues

Impact vs. attention

David C.s Improbable Science Why you should ignore altmetrics and other bibliometric nightmares

http://www.dcscience.net/?p=6369

Popularity

Popular topics get higher counts, quickly, but then fade. How does this reflect quality?

Issues

Does social media help promote good science? Or not? (e.g. anti-vaccine)

Altmetrics: worth pursuing? If you think yes

What you can do now

Check what measurements/metrics are available for your articles

Consider deposit of your other products of research

What you can do now

Investigate use of free measurement tools (Altmetric bookmarklet, ImpactStory profile)

Set up social media profiles and lurk

Experiment with low-commitment activities

Example

Choose a journal/database

Find one of your articles

Check the altmetrics

Go to Twitter

Search for your discipline/area of research

See what information has been shared/who is sharing it

Kimberley R. Barker, MLIS [email protected]

Andrea H. Denton, MLIS

[email protected]

Questions?