Publication and Citation Analysis

This chapter introduces publication and citation analysis in general. Publication analysis refers to the quantitative study of publication patterns and counts, while citation analysis is the quantitative study of patterns of giving and receiving citations. Citations are stored in a citation index like Web of Science, Scopus or Google Scholar. We discuss various sociological aspects, such as reasons to cite, citation classification schemes and concept symbols. Citation analysis in practice raises various difficulties, such as the question of how to handle self-citations or how to count coauthorship. Citations between documents can be represented as a citation network or graph. The related concepts of bibliographic coupling and cocitation are introduced. We also explain citation generations, delayed recognition and Sleeping Beauties.