Abstract

Google Scholar Metrics' launch in April 2012, a new bibliometric tool for the evaluation of scientific journals by means of citation counting, has ended with the duopoly exerted by the Web of Science and Scopus databases. This paper aims at comparing the coverage of these three databases and the similarity their journal rankings may have. We selected a sample of journals from the field of Communication Studies indexed in the three databases. Data was recollected on 1720 November, 2012. 277 journals were identified to which we calculated their hindex and ranked them according to such indicator. Then, we analyzed the correlation between the rankings generated. Google Scholar Metrics dobles the coverage of the other databases, reducing the bias toward English language both; web of Science and Scopus have. Google Scholar Metrics shows higher hindex values (an average 47% higher than Scopus and 40% higher than Web of Science), allowing to better rank journals. We conclude that Google Scholar Metrics is a tool capable of identifying the main journals in Communication Studies offering results as reliable and valid as the ones Web of Science and Scopus show.

Abstract

This is a kind of conceptual document, and at the same time a reflection, but also something more, an act of provocation in the form of a piece of theater that shows a reality, something dramatic and comical at the same time, as is the panorama ofour research. It also includes a good portion of humor, but the kind of humor the great writer and thinker Luigi Pirandello defined as „the one that does not provoke the immediate laughter, but only pulls a smile behind which hides the bitter taste of the absurd or the unbearable lightness of our existence.“ This piece of theater, short and concise so as not to bore anyone, narrates the efforts that are required daily, as well as the situations created, to carry out the task –which is perhaps a utopia- of trying to measure something that is incommensurable, as is science on the part of those who are dedicated to its evaluation or to the study of its development. In this comedy, all actors involved, both protagonists and the indicators themselves, have the opportunity to present their hopes and fears, their merits and their complaints, their recommendations and warnings. They narrate the search for a path in a jungle in which the world of information has been converted, that is practicable, augurs a promising future for science, and allows us a more just interpretation.