Bibliometric Analysis Asia-Pacific Research Area ... - JuSER

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A high production of articles only describes the basis of visibility not the perception. Previous
studies 3 have already shown that China lies well below expectations, which predicted a higher
perception due to the high growth in the production of articles. The situation was found to be the
same in this study (see Chapter 3). However, the production of articles in China also shows that
China is becoming a more important partner in research alliances. Its dynamics should not be
underestimated, even if it did experience a slight decrease in 2007.
Figure 2 shows that the majority of countries analysed produce a level of publications that
currently ranges between a few hundred to around 10,000 per annum. Some of these countries
have high citation rates when taken as percentages, but in terms of absolute numbers, they
remain on a relatively low level. Five countries in this group distinguish themselves from the
others in that they partially exhibit significantly higher outputs. These include: Taiwan, currently
with approximately 20,000 publications per annum, South Korea (approx. 33,000), Australia
(approx. 40,000), Japan (approx. 90,000) and China (approx. 100,000). Out of all of the
countries studied, China is the only country that has sustained a high relative increase together
with a comparably high output over the entire period of this analysis.
Publications 1992 - 2007
Number of publications
140000
120000
100000
80000
60000
500000
400000
300000
200000
Number of publications (USA and EU-27)
40000
100000
20000
0
1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007
0
Germany Japan China Australia South Korea Taiwan New Zealand Singapore
Iran Thailand Malaysia Indonesia Vietnam USA EU-27
Figure 2: Absolute number of publications over time
In Figure 3, data from 1992 are taken as 100 %. This allows us to measure the relative
development of publications in the years that followed in relation to the first year of the analysis.
Due to the fact that other countries began with a lower initial value, the growth of almost all of
the countries was found to be higher than the growth of Germany. The exceptions to this are the
USA and Japan, who generally exhibit a low publication development in terms of percent. The
leading country with regard to relative publication growth is Iran: between 1992 (253
publications) and 2007 (10,346 publications), Iran experienced a forty-fold growth.
3 For example, see Mittermaier et al. 2006/2007: WissdeX – Das bdw-Wissenschaftsranking (Bild der
Wissenschaft 03/2006 – 05/2007), http://epaper.konradin-relations.de/wissdex/
2