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Evaluate journal impact with enhanced JCR
Posted on June 9, 2009
JCR (Journal Citation Reports) presents quantitative data that aims to give an objective view of the world's leading scientifc journals and their impact on the global research community. The JCR Impact Factor is the average number of times an article from a journal published in the last two years has been cited in the JCR year.
How might you use the Impact Factor number? If you are considering submitting an article for publication to two journals (e.g., one with an Impact Factor of 1.2220 and the other with an Impact Factor of 3.503), you would probably submit the article first to the journal with the higher Impact Factor because articles in that journal are – on average – cited more frequently and theoretically are read more than articles in the other journal.
JCR has recently added enhancements:
- Five-year Impact Factor: Offers a longer-term view than the standard two-year Impact Factor.
- Eigenfactor Metrics: Uses citing journal data from the entire JCR files to reflect influence and prestige by considering scholarly literature as a network of journal-to-journal relationships. For more information, go to Eigenfactor.org.
JCR offers additional information about each journal:
- Immediacy Index
- Article Influence Score
- Cited Half-life
To help you understand and interpret the data presented in JCR, the publisher has provided:
- Information for New JCR Users
- A JCR tutorial
- Using Journal Citation Reports Wisely
- JCR Quick Reference Card
A caveat: Impact Factors attempt to measure the overall impact of a particular journal. They do not quantify the impact of a particular article. You can find further discussion of this and other aspects of Impact Factors in the Impact Factor article in Wikipedia.org.
To located JCR on the Library Web site, use the "Quick Links" drop down menu on the left sidebar.
