Citation Rates of Medical German-Language Journals in English-Language papers - Do They Correlate With the Impact Factor, and Who Cites?

Background and objective: Several publications are warning that the German language is no longer needed for transmission of scientific data. One of the causes may be the Impact Factor (IF), which appears to be derived predominantly from Anglo-American journals. The aim of this study was to check actual international attention paid to German- language journals, i. e. their citation frequencies in English-language papers. Are these citing rates in English-language articles correlated to the IF, and from where do citing articles originate?

Methods: Of 25 arbitrarily selected > 85 % German-language medical journals, IF as well as language distributions of citing articles were determined by searching publication years 1995-2000 in Science Citation Index (SCI). MEDLINE and EMBASE were used as supplementary retrieval systems.

Results: (i) The sample journals displayed an average IF = 0.357. A 99 % correlation (Pearson factor r = 0.987; n = 25) was observed between our ” constructed ” IF 2000 and IF published in Journal Citation Report 2000. This proves Stegmann’s IF determination method (31) to be valid. On the average, 53 % German-language and 45 % English-language articles between 1995-2000 cited the 1995-1999’ contributions of the studied journals. No correlation was observed between IF vs. rates of citing articles in English (r < 0.1). 64 % of citing English-language articles showed corporate sources in Germany/ Austria/ Switzerland, and 13.5 % authors’ institutions in USA.

Conclusions: (i) An IF 1 is, obviously, very hard to attain by German-language journals. ISI’s differentiation between Citing vs. Cited-only Journals (the latter often serving as MEDLINE/ EMBASE sources) during derivation of IF appears unjustified. (ii) English now serves as the predominant communication language in sciences in German-speaking countries, but has not supplanted the German language. Our study reveals remarkable international attention rates remaining.

References

• 1 Ammon U. Deutsch als Wissenschaftssprache.  Spektrum der Wissenschaft. 1992;  124 117-118; 124
• 2 Barnaby D P, Gallagher E J. Alternative to the Science Citation Index impact factor as an assessment of emergency medicine’s scientific contributions.  Ann Emerg Med. 1998;  31 78-82
• 3 Beller F K. Die Zukunft der deutschen Sprache in der Wissenschaft.  Gynakol-geburtshilfliche Rundsch. 2000;  40 (1) 50-54
• 4 Benitez-Bribiesca L. The impact factor of medical journals: its use and misuse.  Arch Med Research. 1999;  30 161-162
• 5 Boettiger L E. Reference lists in medical journals - language and length.  Acta med scand. 1983;  214 (1) 73-77
• 6 Bookstein A, Yitzhaki M. Own-language preference: a new measure of ”relative language self-citation”.  Scientometrics. 1999;  46 (2) 337-348
• 7 Dietrich G V, Hempelmann G. Welchen Stellenwert hat eine Publikation in deutscher Sprache?.  Anasthesiol Intensivmed. 2000;  35(9) 543-544
• 8 DIMDI. Deutsches Institut für Medizinische Dokumentation und Information (DIMDI), Gate Database Searching.  Internet URL http://www.dimdi.de/.
• 9 Finzen A, Hoffmann-Richter U, Dittmann V, Haug H -J. Deutsch lesen - Englisch schreiben. Fachzeitschriften zwischen Science Citation Index und Nulltarif.  Psychiat Prax. 1996;  23 (1) 1-3
• 10 Froemter E, Braehler E, Langenbeck U, Meenen N M, Usadel K H. Das AWMF-Modell zur Evaluierung publizierter Forschungsbeiträge in der Medizin.  Dtsch Med Wochenschr. 1999;  124 910-915
• 11 Gallagher E J, Barnaby D B. Evidence of methodological bias in the derivation of the Science Citation Index impact factor.  Ann Emerg Med. 1998;  31 83-86
• 12 Garfield E. The Impact Factor.  Internet URL www.isinet.com/isi/hot/essays/journalcitationreports/7.html (as of Febr. 2002).
• 13 Garfield E. How can impact factors be improved?.  Br Med J. 1997;  313 411-413
• 14 Gießler A. Zur Evaluierung der Forschungsleistung eines Universitätsklinikums.  Dtsch Med Wochenschr. 2000;  125 979-983
• 15 Haller U, Hepp H, Reinold E. Tötet der ”Impact Factor” die deutsche Sprache?.  Gynakol-geburtshilfliche Rundsch. 1997;  37 117-118
• 16 Haller U, Hepp H, Reinold E. Tötet der ”Impact Factor” die deutsche Sprache?.  Chirurg. 1999;  70 (2) Suppl 39-41
• 17 Keul A G, Gigerenzer G, Stroebe W. Wie international ist die Psychologie in Deutschland, sterreich und der Schweiz? Eine SSCI-Analyse.  Psychol Rundsch. 1993;  44 (4) 159-169
• 18 Lehrl S. Der Impact-Faktor als Bewertungskriterium wissenschaftlicher Leistungen - das Recht auf Chancengleichheit.  Strahlenther Onkol. 1999;  175 141-153
• 19 Meenen N M. Der Impact-Faktor - ein zuverlässiger scientometrischer Parameter?.  Rontgenpraxis. 1998;  51 266-271
• 20 National Library of Medicine . Creator of MEDLINE.  Internet URL http://www.nlm.nih.gov.
• 21 Navarro F A. Englisch oder Deutsch? Die Sprache der Medizin aufgrund der in der Deutschen Medizinischen Wochenschrift erschienenen Literaturangaben (1920 bis 1995).  Dtsch Med Wochenschr. 1996;  121 (50) 1561-1566
• 22 Navarro F A. Die Sprache der Medizin in der Schweiz von 1920 bis 1995.  Schweiz Med Wochenschr. 1997;  127 (38) 1565-1573
• 23 Navarro F A. Die Sprache der Medizin in sterreich (1920 - 1995).  Wiener Klin Wochenschr. 1996;  108 (12) 363-369
• 24 Navarro F A. L’importance de l’anglais et du francais sur la base de references bibliographiques de travaux originaux publies dans la Presse Medicale (1920 - 1995).  Presse Med. 1995;  33 1547-1551
• 25 Navarro F A. El idioma de la medicina a traves de las referencias bibliograficas de los articulos originales publicados en Medicina Clinica durante 50 anos (1945 - 1995).  Med Clinica. 1996;  107 (16) 608-613
• 26 Navarro F A. De taal in de geneeskunde afgeleid uit in literatuurreferenties van oorspronkelijke stukken in het Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Geneeskunde (1930 - 1995).  Nederl Tijdschr Geneeskd. 1996;  140 1263-1267
• 27 Ojasoo T, Dor J C. Citation bias in medical journals.  Scientometrics. 1999;  45 81-94
• 28 Schoonbaert D, Roelants G. Citation analysis for measuring the value of scientific publications: quality assessment tool or comedy of errors?.  Trop Med Int Health. 1996;  1 739-752
• 29 Seglen P O. Why the impact factor of journals should not be used for evaluation of research.  Br Med J. 1997;  314 498-502
• 30 Seglen P O. Citations and journal impact factors: questionable indicators of research quality.  Allergy. 1997;  52 1050-1056
• 31 Stegmann J. How to evaluate impact factors.  Nature. 1997;  390 550
• 32 Stegmann J. Building a list of journals with constructed impact factors.  J Documentation. 1999;  55 310-324
• 33 Stegmann J. Constructed Impact Factors (CIF) for journals not listed in the Journal Citation Report (JCR).  Internet URL http://www.medizin.fu-berlin.de/medbib/CIF/cif.html. 1999; 
• 34 Winkmann G, Schweim H G. Medizinisch-biowissenschaftliche Datenbanken und der Impact Faktor.  Dtsch Med Wochenschr. 2000;  38 1133-1141

correspondence