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Commentary

Nature 444, 1003-1004 (21 December 2006) | doi:10.1038/4441003a; Published online 21 December 2006

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Measures for measures

Sune Lehmann1, Andrew D. Jackson2 & Benny E. Lautrup2

  1. Sune Lehmann is at the Department of Informatics and Mathematical Modeling, Technical University of Denmark, DK-2800, Lyngby, Denmark.
  2. Andrew D. Jackson and Benny E. Lautrup are at The Niels Bohr Institute, Blegdamsvej 17, DK-2100, Copenhagen, Denmark.

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Are some ways of measuring scientific quality better than others? Sune Lehmann, Andrew D. Jackson and Benny E. Lautrup analyse the reliability of commonly used methods for comparing citation records.

Although quantifying the quality of individual scientists is difficult, the general view is that it is better to publish more than less and that the citation count of a paper (relative to citation habits in its field) is a useful measure of its quality. How citation counts are weighed and analysed in practice becomes important as publication records are increasingly used in funding, appointment and promotion decisions.

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