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David Crotty, The Impact Factor, European Heart Journal, Volume 38, Issue 32, 21 August 2017, Pages 2456–2457, https://doi.org/10.1093/eurheartj/ehx432
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David Crotty PhD continues the discussion of Journal Metrics with the Impact Factor, a journal-level metric
The Impact Factor (IF, also frequently referred to as the Journal Impact Factor, or JIF) was created in the early 1960s by Eugene Garfield (Garfield, E. 2006. The History and Meaning of the Journal Impact Factor, JAMA, vol. 295, Issue 1, pp 90–93) as a tool for evaluating journals, namely to help librarians make informed subscription decisions. Used in that context, it is an effective, if flawed metric.
Unfortunately, over the years the IF has become widely misused as the one metric through which many research assessments are judged. It is worth looking at the IF, understanding how it is generated and what flaws it presents.
The Impact Factor is a ratio based on citation.
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To determine it, you take the number of citations seen in a given year to articles published in the 2 previous years and divide that by the total number of articles that were published in those 2 previous years. So, for example, the most recent IF is the 2016 IF which is, citations in 2016 to articles published in 2015 and 2014 divided by the total number of articles published in the journal in 2015 and 2014. The denominator only includes research articles and review articles—publications such as editorials and book reviews are excluded (although any citations to those types of articles are still included in the numerator).