Can otolaryngology compete with larger fields regarding impact factor?: is percentile-based impact factor a solution?

Area of Science:

• Bibliometrics
• Medical Informatics
• Scientific Publishing

Background:

• The journal Impact Factor (IF) is a widely used metric for evaluating journal influence.
• Despite criticisms, IF significantly impacts academic advancement and research assessment.
• A potential bias exists where the size of a medical specialty may influence its journals' IFs.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the relationship between the population size of medical specialty fields and their respective journal Impact Factors.
• To explore methods for mitigating population bias in journal impact metrics.

Main Methods:

• Selection of the top 10 journals from 13 medical specialty fields based on Impact Factor (IF) from Web of Science.
• Acquisition of specialty field population data from the American Board of Medical Specialties.
• Statistical analysis to determine the correlation between field size and IF.

Main Results:

• A strong positive correlation (r = 0.9) was observed between smaller specialty fields and lower Impact Factors.
• This suggests that field size is a significant factor influencing journal IFs.
• A novel metric, percentile-based impact factor (PIF), was proposed to normalize IFs across fields.

Conclusions:

• Journal Impact Factor is demonstrably influenced by the population size of its specialty field.
• The proposed percentile-based impact factor (PIF) can provide a more equitable basis for comparing journal influence across different medical specialties.
• PIF aims to "level the playing field" for journals in smaller or less populated fields.