The museum of errors/horrors in Scopus

Journal of Informetrics, 2016

In the last decade, a growing number of studies focused on the qualitative/quantitative analysis of bibliometric-database errors. Most of these studies relied on the identification and (manual) examination of relatively limited samples of errors. Using an automated procedure, we collected a large corpus of more than 10,000 errors in the two multidisciplinary databases Scopus and Web of Science (WoS), mainly including articles in the Engineering-Manufacturing field. Based on the manual examination of a portion (of about 10%) of these errors, this paper provides a preliminary analysis and classification, identifying similarities and differences between Scopus and WoS. The analysis reveals interesting results, such as: (i) although Scopus seems more accurate than WoS, it tends to forget to index more papers, causing the loss of the relevant citations given/obtained, (ii) both databases have relatively serious problems in managing the so-called Online-First articles, and (iii) lack of correlation between databases, regarding the distribution of the errors in several error categories. The description is supported by practical examples concerning a variety of errors in the Scopus and WoS databases.

Publications, 2021

Nowadays, the importance of bibliographic databases (DBs) has increased enormously, as they are the main providers of publication metadata and bibliometric indicators universally used both for research assessment practices and for performing daily tasks. Because the reliability of these tasks firstly depends on the data source, all users of the DBs should be able to choose the most suitable one. Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus are the two main bibliographic DBs. The comprehensive evaluation of the DBs’ coverage is practically impossible without extensive bibliometric analyses or literature reviews, but most DBs users do not have bibliometric competence and/or are not willing to invest additional time for such evaluations. Apart from that, the convenience of the DB’s interface, performance, provided impact indicators and additional tools may also influence the users’ choice. The main goal of this work is to provide all of the potential users with an all-inclusive description of the two main bibliographic DBs by gathering the findings that are presented in the most recent literature and information provided by the owners of the DBs at one place. This overview should aid all stakeholders employing publication and citation data in selecting the most suitable DB.

2006

Scientific and Technical Information Processing, 2019

This paper presents the results of the analysis of the causes for duplicate profiles in the Scopus database on the basis of a random sampling of profiles of 400 Russian authors and 400 organizations. We estimate the number of duplicate profiles and calculate the level of uncertainty that errors in bibliographic descriptions can contribute to the results of scientometric studies using the Scopus database. The analysis showed that in Scopus 76% of the organizations and 24% of the authors have duplicate profiles. In this regard, organizations lose an average of 17% of publications and authors lose 11%. The results of this study can be used in elaboration of the Scopus database and estimating the error level in the research assessment of institutions and individuals.

Scientometrics, 2009

For many years, the ISI Web of Knowledge from Thomson Reuters was the sole publication and citation database covering all areas of science thus becoming an invaluable tool in bibliometric analysis. In 2004, Elsevier introduced Scopus and this is rapidly becoming a good alternative. Several attempts have been made at comparing these two instruments from the point of view of journal coverage for research or for bibliometric assessment of research output. This paper attempts to answer the question that all researchers ask, i.e., what is to be gained by searching both databases? Or, if you are forced to opt for one of them, which should you prefer? To answer this question, a detailed paper by paper study is presented of the coverage achieved by ISI Web of Science and by Scopus of the output of a typical university. After considering the set of Portuguese universities, the detailed analysis is made for two of them for 2006, the two being chosen for their comprehensiveness typical of most European universities. The general conclusion is that about 2/3 of the documents referenced in any of the two databases may be found in both databases while a fringe of 1/3 are only referenced in one or the other. The citation impact of the documents in the core present in both databases is higher, but the impact of the fringe that are present only in one of the databases should not be disregarded as some high impact documents may be found among them.

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021

In a broad sense, science can be understood as the knowledge contained in scientific manuscripts published in scientific journals. Scientific databases index only those journals that reach certain quality standards. Therefore, research and dissemination of scientific knowledge are essential activities for the growth of science itself. The aim of this manuscript is to assess the situation of medicine and environmental sciences among the bibliometric literature and to put it in perspective with the overall bibliometric publications in all scientific fields. The main countries publishing bibliometric manuscripts are China, USA and Spain. The latter country is ranked three out of the top five institutions according to the Scopus and WoS databases. In both databases, the average scientific collaboration of the top 20 institutions offers the same result, 41%. According to Scopus, the main subject categories in which this research falls are social sciences (38%), computer science (26%) and...

Asian Social Science , 2013

Nowadays, the world’s scientific community has been publishing an enormous number of papers in different scientific fields. In such environment, it is essential to know which databases are equally efficient and objective for literature searches. It seems that two most extensive databases are Web of Science and Scopus. Besides searching the literature, these two databases used to rank journals in terms of their productivity and the total citations received to indicate the journals impact, prestige or influence. This article attempts to provide a comprehensive comparison of these databases to answer frequent questions which researchers ask, such as: How Web of Science and Scopus are different? In which aspects these two databases are similar? Or, if the researchers are forced to choose one of them, which one should they prefer? For answering these questions, these two databases will be compared based on their qualitative and quantitative characteristics.

Research Analytics, 2017

A Brief History of Scopus ◾ 33 citation database (covered elsewhere in this book), which was already well established and known for its infamous Impact Factor (IF) rating of scientific journals. However, in its young history, Scopus has done incredibly well so far, growing from a mere 27 million indexed items in 2004 to over 67 million items at the time of writing in 2017, drawn from more than 22,700 serial titles; 98,000 conferences; and 144,000 books from over 5,000 different publishers worldwide, and last year, in 2016, it introduced its own CiteScore metric of journal performance. Today, Scopus is being used as the primary research citation data source by researchers and health professionals from top universities and research institutes around the globe, by leading university ranking organizations such as Times Higher Education (THE) and Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), by funding organizations such as the European Research Council (ERC) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), and by evaluation bodies conducting national research assessments such as the Research Excellence Framework (REF) in the United Kingdom in 2014 and the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) exercises in 2010, 2012, and 2015. This chapter aims to give an overview of Scopus' remarkable success story since its inception, including its user interface, functionality, advanced analysis tools, and bibliometric indicators; its coverage of different subject areas, publication years, sources, and document types; its stringent content selection policies and processes; the many author and affiliation profiles that can be found in Scopus; how Scopus data feed into other Elsevier research products such as SciVal, ScienceDirect, Pure, and Mendeley; and how customers use Scopus Custom Data (SCD) and Scopus application programming interfaces (APIs) to incorporate into their own tools.

Scientometrics, 2007

Our aim is to compare the coverage of the Scopus database with that of Ulrich, to determine just how homogenous it is in the academic world. The variables taken into account were subject distribution, geographical distribution, distribution by publishers and the language of publication. The analysis of the coverage of a product of this nature should be done in relation to an accepted model, the optimal choice being Ulrich’s Directory, considered the international point of reference for the most comprehensive information on journals published throughout the world. The results described here allow us to draw a profile of Scopus in terms of its coverage by areas – geographic and thematic – and the significance of peer-review in its publications. Both these aspects are highly pragmatic considerations for information retrieval, the evaluation of research, and the design of policies for the use of scientific databases in scientific promotion.

Библиотекар, 2019

e article presents the evaluation of scienti c publications of Bulgarian scientists. e current problems in journal indexing in the eld of social sciences and humanities in the most popular databases are discussed. ere is emphasized the necessity to be established a national citation index for increasing the visibility of scienti c results and for improving the quality of scienti c publications through criteria relevant to the practice. e national citation index is highlight as a reliable tool for assessing the scienti c results of Bulgarian scientists.