Journal Citation Reports (
JCR) is an
annual publicationAn annual publication, more often called simply an annual, is a book or a magazine, comic book or comic strip published yearly. For example, a weekly or monthly publication may produce an Annual featuring similar materials to the regular publication....
by the Institute of Scientific Information, a division of
Thomson ReutersThomson Reuters is an information company created by the Thomson Corporation's purchase of Reuters on 17 April 2008. Thomson Reuters shares are listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange . Thomson Reuters is a Canadian-controlled corporation operating from Midtown...
. It provides information about
academic journalAn academic journal is a peer-reviewed periodical in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as forums for the introduction and presentation for scrutiny of new research, and the critique of existing research. Content typically takes the...
s in the sciences and
social sciencesThe social sciences are the fields of scientific knowledge and academic scholarship that study social groups and, more generally, human society. The social sciences initially were constituted of five fields: Jurisprudence and Amendment of the Law; Education; Health; Economy and Trade; Art...
. It was originally published as a part of
Science Citation IndexThe Science Citation Index is a citation index originally produced by the Institute for Scientific Information in 1960, which is now owned by Thomson Reuters. The larger version covers 6,400 of the world's leading journals of science and technology...
, and is compiled from the
citationLoosely, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source . More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated alphanumeric expression Loosely, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source (not always the original source). More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated...
data found there.
The information given for each journal includes:
- the basic bibliographic information of publisher, title abbreviation, language, ISSN
- the subject categories (there are 171 such categories in the sciences and 54 in the social sciences)
- Basic citation data:
- the number of articles published during that year and
- the number of times the articles in the journal were cited during the year by later articles in itself and other journals,
- detailed tables showing
- the number of times the articles in the journal were cited during the year by later articles in itself and other journals,
- the number of citations made from articles published in the journal that year to it and other specific individual journals during each of the most recent ten years (the 20 journals most cited are included)
- the number of times articles published in the journal during each of the most recent 10 years were cited by individual specific journals during the year (the twenty journals with the greatest number of citation are given)
- and several measures derived from these data:
- the journal impact factor
The impact factor, often abbreviated IF, is a measure reflecting the average number of citations to articles published in science and social science journals. It is frequently used as a proxy for the relative importance of a journal within its field, with journals with higher impact factors deemed...
, the ratio of the number of citations to the previous 2 years of the journal divided by the number of articles in those years — this is essentially the average number of recent citations per article
- the journal immediacy index, the number of citations that year to articles published the same year,
- the journal citing half life, the median age of the articles that were cited by the articles published in the journal that year,
- the journal cited half life, the median age of the articles in the journal that were cited by other journals during the year.
There are separate editions for the sciences and the social sciences; the science portion includes 6166 journals, and the social science edition contains 1,768 titles.
Journal Citation Reports (
JCR) is an
annual publicationAn annual publication, more often called simply an annual, is a book or a magazine, comic book or comic strip published yearly. For example, a weekly or monthly publication may produce an Annual featuring similar materials to the regular publication....
by the Institute of Scientific Information, a division of
Thomson ReutersThomson Reuters is an information company created by the Thomson Corporation's purchase of Reuters on 17 April 2008. Thomson Reuters shares are listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange . Thomson Reuters is a Canadian-controlled corporation operating from Midtown...
. It provides information about
academic journalAn academic journal is a peer-reviewed periodical in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as forums for the introduction and presentation for scrutiny of new research, and the critique of existing research. Content typically takes the...
s in the sciences and
social sciencesThe social sciences are the fields of scientific knowledge and academic scholarship that study social groups and, more generally, human society. The social sciences initially were constituted of five fields: Jurisprudence and Amendment of the Law; Education; Health; Economy and Trade; Art...
. It was originally published as a part of
Science Citation IndexThe Science Citation Index is a citation index originally produced by the Institute for Scientific Information in 1960, which is now owned by Thomson Reuters. The larger version covers 6,400 of the world's leading journals of science and technology...
, and is compiled from the
citationLoosely, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source . More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated alphanumeric expression Loosely, a citation is a reference to a published or unpublished source (not always the original source). More precisely, a citation is an abbreviated...
data found there.
Basic journal information
The information given for each journal includes:
- the basic bibliographic information of publisher, title abbreviation, language, ISSN
- the subject categories (there are 171 such categories in the sciences and 54 in the social sciences)
Citation information
- Basic citation data:
- the number of articles published during that year and
- the number of times the articles in the journal were cited during the year by later articles in itself and other journals,
- detailed tables showing
- the number of times the articles in the journal were cited during the year by later articles in itself and other journals,
- the number of citations made from articles published in the journal that year to it and other specific individual journals during each of the most recent ten years (the 20 journals most cited are included)
- the number of times articles published in the journal during each of the most recent 10 years were cited by individual specific journals during the year (the twenty journals with the greatest number of citation are given)
- and several measures derived from these data:
- the journal impact factor
The impact factor, often abbreviated IF, is a measure reflecting the average number of citations to articles published in science and social science journals. It is frequently used as a proxy for the relative importance of a journal within its field, with journals with higher impact factors deemed...
, the ratio of the number of citations to the previous 2 years of the journal divided by the number of articles in those years — this is essentially the average number of recent citations per article
- the journal immediacy index, the number of citations that year to articles published the same year,
- the journal citing half life, the median age of the articles that were cited by the articles published in the journal that year,
- the journal cited half life, the median age of the articles in the journal that were cited by other journals during the year.
There are separate editions for the sciences and the social sciences; the science portion includes 6166 journals, and the social science edition contains 1,768 titles. The issue for each year is published the following year, after the citations for the year have been published and the information processed.
The publication is available online (
JCR on the Web), or in CD format (
JCR on CD-ROM); it was originally published in print, with the detailed tables on microfiche.
Criticism
The use of these data has been subject to various criticisms, which are discussed in detail in the article on
impact factorThe impact factor, often abbreviated IF, is a measure reflecting the average number of citations to articles published in science and social science journals. It is frequently used as a proxy for the relative importance of a journal within its field, with journals with higher impact factors deemed...
s.
The primary acknowledged limitation is that almost all the journals covered are
English languageEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
journals from North America, western Europe and Australia, and that the information in the derived tables combines original research journals and
review journalA review journal in academic publishing is a periodical or series that is devoted to the publication of review articles that summarize the progress in some particular area or topic during a preceding period.-Types:Review journals can be divided by...
s — which have very different citation behavior.
External links