Characterizing structure of cross-disciplinary impact of global disciplines: A perspective of the Hierarchy of Science

Purpose Interdisciplinary fields have become the driving force of modern science and a significant source of scientific innovation. However, there is still a paucity of analysis about the essential characteristics of disciplines’ cross-disciplinary impact. Design/methodology/approach In this study, we define cross-disciplinary impact on one discipline as its impact to other disciplines, and refer to a three-dimensional framework of variety-balance-disparity to characterize the structure of cross-disciplinary impact. The variety of cross-disciplinary impact of the discipline was defined as the proportion of the high cross-disciplinary impact publications, and the balance and disparity of cross-disciplinary impact were measured as well. To demonstrate the cross-disciplinary impact of the disciplines in science, we chose Microsoft Academic Graph (MAG) as the data source, and investigated the relationship between disciplines’ cross-disciplinary impact and their positions in the Hierarchy of Science (HOS). Findings Analytical results show that there is a significant correlation between the ranking of cross-disciplinary impact and the HOS structure, and that the discipline exerts a greater cross-disciplinary impact on its neighboring disciplines. Several bibliometric features that measure the hardness of a discipline, including the number of references, the number of cited disciplines, the citation distribution, and the Price index have a significant positive effect on the variety of cross-disciplinary impact. The number of references, the number of cited disciplines, and the citation distribution have significant positive and negative effects on balance and disparity, respectively. It is concluded that the less hard the discipline, the greater the cross-disciplinary impact, the higher balance and the lower disparity of cross-disciplinary impact. Research limitations In the empirical analysis of HOS, we only included five broad disciplines. This study also has some biases caused by the data source and applied regression models. Practical implications This study contributes to the formulation of discipline-specific policies and promotes the growth of interdisciplinary research, as well as offering fresh insights for predicting the cross-disciplinary impact of disciplines. Originality/value This study provides a new perspective to properly understand the mechanisms of cross-disciplinary impact and disciplinary integration.