Changes proposed for calculating journal impact factor
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.028129
Nature : Because of widespread misuse of the journal impact factor, which is calculated by the information firm Thomson Reuters , scientists and research organizations have called for improvements in the way research is evaluated. The impact factor was designed to compare scientific journals on the basis of the number of citations they receive. However, it has instead come to be used to judge the quality of individual research papers and the scientists who wrote them. Also, the metric for calculating impact factors has been questioned for its lack of transparency. In response, Thomson Reuters says it will make the data used for its calculations available to the public and provide citation metrics for articles as well as for journals. Nevertheless, other journal impact factors have been proposed, including the Jfactor by SISSA Medialab.
