Journal-level publication metrics: Traditional and contemporary approaches to improving journal selection for ophthalmic researchers

Journal-level publication metrics (JPM) are used to assess the research impact and influence of an academic journal.¹ The most widely adopted and established JPMs are the Impact factor (IF), Eigenfactor score (EF) and SCImago journal rank (SJR). Researchers often use IF to guide choices of ophthalmic journals for reading and publication. However, as the characteristics of JPMs vary, (Table 1), they should not be used in isolation to evaluate a journal's research activity and influence.²

JPMs do not entirely reflect real-world impact and thus may not fully depict the attention and interest in a journal and its contents. Furthermore, JPMs are not directly comparable and measure different qualities, which leads to differences in rankings. For example, Ali et al. reported that otolaryngology journals ranked below the top quartile for IF were found to be within the top five journals when ranked by EF.³ Similarly, we performed a cross-sectional analysis comparing the ranking of IF, SJR and EF, using the most recent citation data published by the sources Clarivate Journal Citation Reports, Scimago Journal Rank, and Eigenfactor Journal Ranking, respectively. We found that the top five ophthalmic journals ranked by IF were also the top five by SJR. Interestingly, however, we found that the top three ophthalmic journals ranked by IF were ranked 15th, 2nd, 16th in terms of EF. Similarly, the top three ophthalmic journals ranked by EF were ranked 10th, 2nd, and 8th, respectively in terms of IF, and 12th, 2nd, and 6th, respectively in terms of SJR.

The holistic use of JPMs may provide a more transparent view of real-world impact when selecting a journal for reading or manuscript submission. Future research may consider development of metrics that reflect a new angle of user interest and attention. Such metrics could identify user engagement on the journal's website, capturing number of page and article views, time spent on articles, and number of clicks. Additionally, a contemporary metric could capture real-time journal influence through the dissemination of a journal's content through the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), using metadata including the number of tweets, likes and retweets.⁵ These contemporary metrics would reflect how much users are actually reading and sharing the journal's content. While these contemporary metrics may overcome some challenges of traditional JPMs, they may introduce limitations of their own and be subject to manipulation.

For example, Clinical & Experimental Ophthalmology (CEO) may utilise metadata from their X account (@ClinExpOphthal) to reflect user engagement as a real-time metric on the journal's webpage. While CEO lists metrics including full-text views, other usage metrics that may be incorporated include the duration of full-text views per day and per year. Additionally, metrics capturing relevant metadata for each ophthalmic category published in CEO may be utilised to reflect where the interest of CEO's readership lies. Furthermore, a graph displaying CEO's continuing uptrend in JPM rankings will signify the journal's increasing ophthalmic research impact and influence. Reflecting these metrics to CEO's readership may be of use to guide reader article selection, and manuscript submission.

Understanding the utility and future applications of JPMs within ophthalmology is necessary for the continued improvement of ophthalmic evidence-based medicine practice. Holistic analysis of JPMs may allow for improved journal targeting for ophthalmic manuscript submission that more accurately lies with the intended outcomes and audiences of the article. This may lead to a greater impact of the work, as well as subsequently improving author-level metrics. This article is limited by its observational nature. Future research developing contemporary JPMs that more accurately reflect real-world attention and influence of a journal is indicated.

The primary author of this study received funding from The University of Adelaide for 2023 Summer Research Scholarship. Stephen Bacchi is supported by a Fulbright Scholarship (funded by The Kinghorn Foundation).

The authors declare no conflict of interest.