May 16, 2013 – By Sylvia Hunter, SSP Communications Committee
In 2013, an analysis of impact measures was added to the Library Journal Periodicals Price Survey for the first time. Authors Stephen Bosch (University of Arizona Library, Tucson) and Kittie Henderson (EBSCO Information Services) wanted to determine if there were relationships between journals prices and metrics, as well as to see if more expensive journals had higher ranking than lower cost titles.
Bosch and Henderson used the data on periodicals and publishers they collected for the Price Survey to “explore the relationship between prices and metrics used to assess journals” – in this case, Impact Factor (IF), Eigenfactor, and Article Influence Score (AIS).
Analysis was based on 2013 impact and pricing data for ISI-indexed periodicals. Pricing data were used to split the journals into 5 “price bands” (from < $410 through to > $2,475 per year), each containing approximately 1,100 titles. Values of each type of impact data (IF, Eigenfactor, AIS) for all titles in each price band were averaged, and the average values were compared across price bands.
The authors found that IF and Eigenfactor “tended to show a fairly strong increase with the increase in price,” whereas AIS did not. Both average IF and average Eigenfactor were highest for the highest price band (> $2,475/yr). Average IF for this group was 3.17, a value approximately two times that of the lowest price band (< $410/yr, at 1.57), and average Eigenfactor was almost 6 times as great (0.0313 vs. 0.0040). Average AIS for all price bands, however, was clustered between 0.87 (price band 2, $410–$760/yr) and 1.24 (price band 5, > $2475/yr), and did not show a strong correlation between score and price.
A full summary of the 2013 survey is available on the Library Journal website.
Sylvia Hunter is Editorial Manager, Journals, at the University of Toronto Press.
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