Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: van Eck, N.J.P.
Author-Name-Last: van Eck
Author-Name-First: Nees Jan
Author-Name: Waltman, L.
Author-Name-Last: Waltman
Author-Name-First: Ludo
Title: Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Abstract: We provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.
Creation-Date: 2007-12-13
File-URL: https://repub.eur.nl/pub/10889/ERS-2007-091-LIS.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
Series: RePEc:ems:eureri
Number: ERS-2007-091-LIS
Classification-JEL: C19, M, M11, R4
Keywords: Pearson correlation, author cocitation analysis, cosine, information science, similarity measure
Handle: RePEc:ems:eureri:10889