One measure of an author's productivity as well as citation-based impact can be analyzed with a tool known as the h Index, so named after its developer, Jorge E. Hirsch. The h Index is based on a scholar's most cited works and the number of times these have been referenced in other scholars' publications.
As an example, "an h Index for a group of selected documents or selected author(s) with an h Index of 12 means that out of the total number of documents selected to produce the graph, 12 of the documents have been cited at least 12 times. Published documents with fewer citations than h, in this case less than 12, are considered, but would not count in the h Index." [Taken from the Scopus database]
-Comparisons should not be made among researchers with different career lengths and different disciplines.
-No adjustment is made for researchers with short careers and/or those who have published only a few, yet significant articles.
-Multiple author IDs in a database for the same author will skew results.
You may want to check both Web of Science and Scopus to compare values (or ask a librarian for assistance). The values can differ in the 2 databases based on the different dates covered as well as different journals included.
Note: The h Index in the Web of Science is based on the depth of Mayo Clinic's subscription (1975+) and the calculation only includes items covered by the Web of Science database.
1. Open the Web of Science database [find under Databases on the library web site].
2. Select Author from the drop-down menu to the right of the Basic Search box ["Author" is listed under the "Topic" drop-down menu].
3. Enter the Author’s last name/first initial as directed and click search.
4. Refine your search by organizations [e.g., Mayo], research area or other filters.
5. Review your results.
6. On the Author results page, click Create Citation Report to the right of the first citation.
7. From the Citation Report screen, see the h-index in the right column.
Note: Scopus is in progress of updating pre-1996 cited references going back to 1970. The h-index might increase over time. Also, the calculation only includes items covered in the Scopus database.
1. Open the Scopus database [find under Databases on the library web site].
2. Click the Author Search tab and type the author’s last name and first name or initials in the search box. You can also refine your search by typing an organization [such as Mayo] in the Affiliation box. Click the Search button.
3. A list of authors appears with different variations of the name. Check all the appropriate author names and click on View Citation Overview.
4. The h-index is displayed at the top of the page under the number of cited documents.