[Citation analysis of three ophthalmology journals].

OBJECTIVE

To find the reference aspects of three ophthalmology journals published in China, the United States and the United Kingdom to discover the characteristics of literature requested by different ophthalmic researchers.

METHOD

Citation analysis was used to analyze the references cited in articles published by three different journals, the American Journal of Ophthalmology (AJO), British Journal of Ophthalmology (BJO) and Chinese Journal of Ophthalmology (CJO). Variable parameters include number, types and chronology distribution of the references, Price Index, Self-citing rate and top cited journals of these three journals.

RESULTS

The average number of references per article in AJO, BJO and CJO was 12.67, 21.31 and 11.50, respectively. The Price Index was 37.12%, 33.47% and 44.42% in AJO, BJO and CJO, respectively. The self-citing rate was 13.39%, 7.54%, and 9.89% in AJO, BJO and CJO, respectively. There were 1140, 1487 and 724 different journals cited by AJO, BJO and CJO, respectively. The top 13 of them accounted for 58.82%, 49.51%, and 46.39% of all references cited in AJO, BJO and CJO, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

These three journals exhibited unique trends in references cited. BJO has more references per paper than the other two journals and has a lower self-cited rate and longer citing half-life. Percentage of the top 13 journals in references cited in AJO is greater than that in the other two journals and AJO has a higher self-cited rate. While CJO cited more recently published references with a higher Price Index and has a moderate self-cited rate.