Publication
Title
Cognitive distances between evaluators and evaluees in research evaluation : a comparison between three informetric methods at the journal and subject category aggregation level
Author
Abstract
This article compares six informetric approaches to determine cognitive distances between the publications of panel members (PMs) and those of research groups in discipline-specific research evaluation. We used data collected in the framework of six completed research evaluations from the period 20092014 at the University of Antwerp as a test case. We distinguish between two levels of aggregationWeb of Science Subject Categories and journalsand three methods: while the barycenter method (2-dimensional) is based on global maps of science, the similarity-adapted publication vector (SAPV) method and weighted cosine similarity (WCS) method (both in higher dimensions) use a full similarity matrix. In total, this leads to six different approaches, all of which are based on the publication profile of research groups and PMs. We use Euclidean distances between barycenters and SAPVs, as well as values of WCS between PMs and research groups as indicators of cognitive distance. We systematically compare how these six approaches are related. The results show that the level of aggregation has minor influence on determining cognitive distances, but dimensionality (two versus a high number of dimensions) has a greater influence. The SAPV and WCS methods agree in most cases at both levels of aggregation on which PM has the closest cognitive distance to the group to be evaluated, whereas the barycenter approaches often differ. Comparing the results of the methods to the main assessor that was assigned to each research group, we find that the barycenter method usually scores better. However, the barycenter method is less discriminatory and suggests more potential evaluators, whereas SAPV and WCS are more precise.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Frontiers in research metrics and analytics. - Lausanne, 2016, currens
Frontiers in Research Metrics and Analytics
Publication
Lausanne : Frontiers Media S.A , 2017
ISSN
2504-0537
DOI
10.3389/FRMA.2017.00006
Volume/pages
2 (2017) , p. 1-13
Number
2504-0537
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Project info
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
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Record
Identifier
Creation 01.09.2017
Last edited 04.03.2024
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