One way to estimate the percentage of Pay-Per-View is to study the cited
literature.
This study was done by my colleague Patricia Volland-Nail for the
articles published in our laboratory by 65 researchers studying
domestic animal reproductive physiology and behaviour. Our lab is
organized into 8 teams. Our library subscribes to 94 periodicals. The
study was for the period 1996-1999 (4 years).
Patricia used Science Citation Index and found 298 indexed articles
published by the researchers from our lab. These 298 articles generated
12167 citations in 1751 differents sources (periodicals,
proceedings...)
The 20 most cited periodicals were cited 4983 times (41% of total
citations). The 3 most cited periodicals were cited 766, 757, 703 times
and the 20th, 107 times.
Of these 20 top periodicals, two are not in our library: Brain Research
and Journal of Comparative Neurology. Each costs about $13 000. (This
is perhaps not the precise price, but I was obliged to convert from
french francs).
We counted the number of cited periodicals by
each team (minimum 4 times for 4 years).
T1 cited 20 periodicals: 6 were not it our library : 30%
T3 cited 47 periodicals: 20 were not in our libraty : 42%
T4 cited 47 periodicals: 23 were not in our library : 49%
T5 cited 45 periodicals: 13 were not in our library : 29%
T6 cited 26 periodicals: 7 were not in our library : 37%
T7 cited 57 periodicals: 17 were not in our library :30%
T8 cited 48 periodicals: 17 were not in our library : 35%
(Note that accessing only the "top periodicals" may be restrictive
for the mind. Often these periodicals merely happen to follow a
"fashion". I have two examples in my lab of "success" or progress in
research through using a very inusual literature. First, a researcher
found the solution to his problem concerning spermatogenesis by looking
at a vegetal model in the vegetal literature. Second, accessing a very
original russian litterature concerning behavior and genetics made
possible a new form of research in the study of domestic animal
behaviour.)
Helene Bosc
Bibliotheque
Unite Physiologie de la Reproduction
et des Comportements
UMR 6073 INRA-CNRS-Universite F. Rabelais
37380 Nouzilly
France
http://www.tours.inra.fr/
TEL : 02 47 42 78 00
FAX : 02 47 42 77 43
e-mail: hbosc_at_tours.inra.fr
Received on Wed Jan 03 2001 - 19:17:43 GMT