Bibliometric Analysis of the Plant Taxonomy Journal Nelumbo, 2004-2011

International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

BIBLIOMETRIC ANALYSIS OF THE PLANT TAXONOMY JOURNAL NELUMBO, 2004-2011

Hemanta Kumar Das

Botanical Survey of India, ERC, Shillong-793003, India Mobile:+91-9436312552 [email protected]

ABSTRACT

This study carried out a bibliometric analysis of 210 papers and 2999 citations published in the journal Nelumbo published by the of Botanical Survey of India for the period 2004 to 2011.Yearwise distribution of contributions in their different volumes, authorship pattern, degree of collaboration, length of papers, citation pattern, average citation per contribution per volume, type of documents and their citations, subject- wise distribution of papers, rank list of cited journals, ranking of contributors have been studied. Joint authorship pattern comes 74.76% which is higher than single authorship pattern. Out of 2999 citations maximum 52.59% are from journals. Number of papers on New Record comes in first place with 20%.The Journal of Hattori Botany Lab. Comes in top in journal rank study which is a foreign journal followed by two Indian journals i.e. Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany and the studied journal Nelumbo respectively.

Keywords: Bibliometric analysis, study; Nelumbo; Bulletin of Botanical Survey of India.

INTRODUCTION

A bibliometric study for a journal is very essential to evaluate the journal and find out yearwise distribution of papers, authorship pattern, citation pattern, length of papers, institution- distribution of papers etc. In 1969 Prichard first coined the term bibliometrics. There are various bibliometric studies has been made in a single journal time to time. Single journals bibliometric studies helps to know the research trends of a particular field of research i.e. year wise distribution of contributions, authorship patter and the trends of research collaboration, subject wise distribution of contribution, rank of journals etc. Nelumbo is a peer reviewed journal in the field of plant taxonomy research. In the present study the attempt has been made to carry out a details study including ranking of cited journals for the 8 volumes of the journal and i.e. for the period of 2004-2011.

LITERATURE REVIEW

In a single journal different bibliometric studies has been made. Gupta 1(1977) analyzed the citations in Geliotekhnika :a Russian journal of solar energy engineering, Kundu 2 (1981) analyzed citations of Annals of Library Science and Documentation, Raina 3 (1984) studied the rank of cited journals of Annual Review of Biochemistry, Rao 4 (1984) studied citations of Research Quarterly to rank periodicals on physical education, Mote and Deshmukh 5 (1996) in their study on Annals of Library Science and Documentation found that journals are most cited form of communication amongst the library and information scientists and the source Page 51 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

journal is the most cited publication. Dhiman 6 (2000) studied the ten year publications of the journal of Ethnobotany, Shokeen and Kaushik 7 (2004) in their study on Indian Journal of Plant Physiology found that journal articles are predominant with 81% of total citations. Biswas 8(2006) studied the bibliometric study of the Bulletin of Botanical survey of India for the period of 1994-2003 .Biswas 9 (2007) did the bibliometric study of the journal Economic Botany, Dixit and Katare 10(2007) studied the pattern of articles published in the Journal of Indian Society of Cotton Improvement for the period 1995-2000.,Narang 11 (2010) under took a bibliometric study of 4798 citations appended to 400 articles in five volumes (2003-2007) of the Indian Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics and found that the most cited documents are articles from research journals and the foreign authors have contributed more than Indian authors. Swain 12 (2011) studied the journal Library Philosophy and Practice for its five year citations. Jena, Swain and Sahu 13 (2012)in their bibliometric study of The Electronic Library from 2003 to 2009 revealed some interesting bibliometric traits of the journal.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

The Bulletin of Botanical survey of India has been changed its name to Nelumbo from 2009.The Bulletin of Botanical survey of India was first published in 1959 under the editorship of Fr.H. Santapau the then, Director of Botanical Survey of India. The journal already published its 53rd volume in 2011.The Journal use to published article concerning plant taxonomy and allied fields contribution from the scientists of the survey and other institutes. The present study has been made to have an in depth in the journal Nelumbo during the period 2004-2011. The objectives of the study are:

1. To study the year wise distribution of papers. 2. To study the authorship pattern and degree of collaboration. 3. To study the length of the papers 4. To study the citation pattern of the papers. 5. To study the bibliographical forms of documents 6. To study the subject wise distribution of the papers 7. To Study and prepare a rank list of journals used in plant taxonomy research in India. 8. To study the rank of contributors

METHODOLOGY

The papers of the journal Nelumbo from the volumes (2004-2011) were checked physically and the data relating to author, number of contributions, number of references and the number of pages, core journals, were scanned and tabulated using MS-Excel. Subject wise contributions were also counted and tabulated. From the collected data they were analyzed to find out result.

SCOPE OF THE STUDY

In the present study 210 papers and 2999 citation appeared in the journal Nelumbo during the period 2004 to 2011 have been analyzed. The Volume numbers 46 to 53 of the journal have Page 52 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

been covered in this study.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

The Total number of 210 papers, which comprises of research and review papers and short communications, were studied. The bulletin also used to publish Book reviews which were excluded in the present study.

Year wise distribution of publications

Table 1 shows that The Journal published maximum numbers of papers in the year 2008 i.e. 39 (18.58%) and minimum numbers of papers in the year 2006 and 2010 i.e. 15 (7.14%).All together 210 papers were published in between 2004 to 2011.

Table 1: Year wise distribution of papers Year Vol. Total Number of papers Percentage 2004 46 38 18.10 2005 47 31 14.77 2006 48 15 7.14 2007 49 24 11.42 2008 50 39 18.58 2009 51 27 12.85 2010 52 15 7.14 2011 53 21 10.00 Total 8 Volumes 210 100.00

Figure 1

Year wise distribution of papers

45 40 35 30 25 20 15 No. of papers 10 5 0 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Year Number of Papers Percentage

Authorship pattern of papers

Table 2(A) shows that Out of 210 papers maximum number of article are contributed by two authors i.e.105 (50%) which is followed by single authors i.e.53(25.24%),three authors i.e. 37(17.62%) and more than three authors i.e. 15(7.14).It is observed that single and two authors contributed more papers.

Page 53 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

Table 2(A): Year wise authorship pattern Year Vol. Number of authors Total One Two Three >Three 2004 46 9 19 5 5 38 2005 47 5 18 4 4 31 2006 48 8 6 1 0 15 2007 49 7 11 5 1 24 2008 50 11 15 11 2 39 2009 51 5 16 4 2 27 2010 52 4 8 2 1 15 2011 53 4 12 5 0 21 Total Total 53 105 37 15 210 Percentage Percentage 25.24 50 17.62 7.14 100

It is also seen in the Table 2(B) that 53(25.24%) papers are contributed by single author and the rest 157(74.76%) are contributed by joint authors. It is found that joint authorship pattern is higher than single authorship pattern.

Table 2(B): Single and Joint authorship pattern Authorship Year Total percentage 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Single 9 5 8 7 11 5 4 4 53 25.24 author Multiple 29 26 7 17 28 22 11 17 157 74.76 authors Total 38 31 15 24 39 27 15 21 210 100

Figure 2

Single author and multiple authors

157

Single Author Multiple Authors

Degree of Collaboration

To find out the degree of collaboration, the formula suggested by K. Subramanyam 14 (1983) has been used and the result shown in Table 2(C).

The used formula is: C=Nm/Nm+Ns Where C=Degree of Colaboration of a discipline Nm=Number of multiple authored papers Ns=Number of Single authored papers Page 54 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

Table 2(C): Degree of collaboration by Year Year Single author Multiple author Degree of (Ns) (Nm) collaboration C=Nm/Nm+Ns) 2004 9 29 0.76 2005 5 26 0.83 2006 8 7 0.47 2007 7 17 0.70 2008 11 28 0.71 2009 5 22 0.81 2010 4 11 0.74 2011 4 17 0.80 Total 53 157 0.75

Table 2(C) shows that Plant taxonomists generally prefer to conduct collaborative research work. It is found that the average degree of collaboration in plant taxonomy is 0.75 which is the high degree of collaborative research in plant taxonomy. The Table shows that in 2006 it decreased to 0.47 but in 2004, 2005, 2007,2008,2009,2010 and 2011 found in high degree i.e. between 0.70 to 0.83.

Length of papers

Table 3 reveals that majority of the papers 108(51.42%) have the length of 1-5 pages followed by 52(24.77%) papers with 6-10 pages,23(10.96%) papers with more than 20 pages,15(7.14%) papers with 11-15 pages and remaining 12 (5.71%) papers with 16-20 pages. Table 3: Length of papers Pages Year Total percentage 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 1-5 9 19 6 12 29 18 6 9 108 51.42 6-10 10 9 4 7 6 3 6 7 52 24.77 11-15 7 1 1 2 1 2 - 1 15 7.14 16-20 8 - 1 - 2 - 1 - 12 5.71 >20 4 2 3 3 1 4 2 4 23 10.96 Total 38 31 15 24 39 27 15 21 210 100

Citation Pattern

It is shown in the Table 4 that in the 210 papers total of 2999 citations are found. In the year 2004 maximum citations 592(19.73%) followed by 388(12.94%) in 2009, 385(12.84%) in 2006, 380(12.68%) in 2007, 357(11.91%) in 2011, 331(11.03%) in 2010, 311(10.37%) in 2008 and a lowest 255(8.50%) in 2005 are found.

Page 55 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

Table 4: Citation Pattern Year Vol. No. Year Number of Citations Percentage 2004 46 2004 592 19.73 2005 47 2005 255 8.50 2006 48 2006 385 12.84 2007 49 2007 380 12.68 2008 50 2008 311 10.37 2009 51 2009 388 12.94 2010 52 2010 331 11.03 2011 53 2011 357 11.91 Total 8 Vols. Total 2999 100.00

The Table: 5 of revealed that Vol. 46 had the highest average citation per contribution which is found as 25.67 with 15 contributions and 385 citations.

Table 5: Average Citation per Contribution per Volume Year Vol. No. No. of No. of Average Contributions Citations 2004 46 38 592 15.57 2005 47 31 255 8.22 2006 48 15 385 25.67 2007 49 24 380 15.84 2008 50 39 311 7.97 2009 51 27 388 14.37 2010 52 15 331 22.07 2011 53 21 357 17.00 Total 210 2999 14.28

Types of documents and their citations

In the table 6 it is showed that majority of citations are from the journals i.e.1577 (52.59%) followed by books 1292 (43.08%), thesis/dissertations54 (1.80%), seminar/workshop/ conference proceedings 42(1.40%), reports (Government/Project/Committee) 19(0.64%), Online sources 6 (0.20%), newsletters/Magazine 4(0.13%) and minimum citations from others (includes pamphlet, information leaflet etc.) i.e. 4 (0.13%).

Table 6: Bibliographic distribution of citations Types of Year Tota % Documents 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 l cited 250 96 216 232 156 218 244 165 1577 52.59 Journals

Books 283 154 160 128 148 152 85 182 1292 43.08 Thesis/dissertati 33 0 0 9 1 9 0 2 54 1.80 ons Seminar/worksh 16 4 8 5 3 4 0 2 42 1.40 op/conference proceedings Reports(Govern 9 0 0 2 1 5 0 2 19 0.64 ment/Project/Co mmittee)

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Online sources 0 0 1 1 1 0 1 2 6 0.20 Newletters/Mag 0 0 0 2 1 0 1 1 5 0.16 azine Others 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 4 0.13 Total 592 255 385 380 311 388 331 357 2999 100

Subject-wise Distribution of papers

From the table 7 it is found that contribution on the area of subject new species is highest i.e.20% followed by to Floristic study i.e. 15.8% and Economic botany (ethno botany/ pharmacognosy/ medicinal plants) i.e.12.8%.

Table 7: Subject-wise Distribution of papers Subjects Year 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Total % S1 6 2 2 7 1 1 7 26 12.4 S2 9 4 4 11 5 3 6 42 20.0 S3 3 3 3 1 3 4 1 18 8.6 S4 2 2 2 1 1 8 3.8 S5 1 1 1 3 2 6 1 15 7.1 S6 14 2 1 3 6 1 3 3 33 15.8 S7 1 1 2 1.0 S8 1 2 3 1.4 S9 16 2 1 4 1 3 27 12.8 S10 2 2 4 1.9 S11 1 1 1 1 1 1 6 2.8 S12 3 1 2 1 2 9 4.3 S13 5 2 3 2 1 13 6.2 S14 1 1 0.5 S14 1 2 3 1.4 Total 38 31 15 24 39 27 15 21 210 100

S1 New Taxa(Genera, species and Infraspecific taxa), S2 New Records, S3 Revision, S4 Nomenclature, S5 Identity, Typification, Distributional Data & Taxonomic Status, S6 Floristics,S7 Biosystematics, S8 Pant Ecology(Vegetation/wild life/soil science, S9 Economic Botany(Ethno-botany/Pharmacognosy/medicinal plants), S10 Plant Morphology,S11 Enumeration, S12 Biodiversity conservation(RET/Endemic),S13 Rediscovery,S14 Biotech S15 Miscellaneous.

Rank list of cited Journals

It is observed and found that out of 1577 citations of journals highest numbers of citations are from Journal of Hattori Botanical Lab (120 nos.) followed by Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany (83 citations) and the studied Journal Nelumbo (82 citations).Journals are the most cited source of information in the eight studied volumes.

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Table 8: Rank list of cited Journals Rank Name of the Journal No. of citations 1st Journal of Hattori Botanical Laboratory 120 2nd Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany 83 3rd Nelumbo 82 4th Journal of Indian Botanical Society 63 5th Journal of Bombay Natural History Society 60 6th Phykos 34 7th Geophytology 33 8th Bryophytorum Bibliotheca 32 8th Indian Forester 32 9th Current Science 30 10th Nova Hedwigi 27 Others 981 Total 1577

Ranking of contributors

Table 9 shows the ranking of contributors .Who has contributed minimum 3 papers or more are taken into account to prepare the rank list of contributors. A total of 505 contributors contributed in 210 papers.D.K.Singh have contributed 19 papers followed by Paramjit Singh and S.S.Dash with 9 papers, A.E.D Deniels contributed 7 papers.

Table 9: Ranking of contributors to Nelumbo during 2004-2011 Sl No. Rank Author Number of papers 1 1 D.K.Singh 19 2 2 Paramjit Singh 9 3 2 S.S.Dash 9 4 3 A.E.D. Daniels 8 5 4 P.Daniel 7 6 5 Sandhyajyoti Phukan 6 7 5 S.Panda 6 8 5 P.G.Diwakar 6 9 5 Monalisa Dey 6 10 5 Chhabi.Ghora 6 11 6 A.A.Mao 5 12 6 M.Bhaumik 5 13 6 Prashant K.Pulaskar 5 14 6 Pushpa Kumari 5 15 6 R.P.Pandey 5 16 6 S.K.Singh 5 17 6 S.K.Srivastava 5 18 7 Devendra Singh 4 19 7 K.A.A.Kabeen 4 20 7 S.C.Srivasatava 4 21 7 S.R.Yadav 4 22 8 A.P.Das 3 23 8 A.A.Ansari 3 Page 58 International Journal of Library and Information Studies ISSN: 2231-4911 Vol.2(4), Oct-Dec, 2012

24 8 Anjali Biswas 3 25 8 J.Jayanthi 3 26 8 K.C.Kariyappa 3 27 8 K.Karthigeyan 3 28 8 L.Rasingam 3 29 8 M.Gangopadhya 3 30 8 M.Sanjappa 3 31 8 P.J.Parmar 3 32 8 Pratibha Gupta 3 33 8 R.K.Gupta 3 34 8 S.K.Mahajan 3 35 8 S.P.Adhikary 3 36 8 Surender Singh 3 37 8 T.Bhuinya 3 38 8 V.J.Nair 3

FINDINGS

From the study the major findings are:

1. The Contribution of papers is varied from volume to volume. Highest contribution is shown in 2008. 2. Papers contributed by two authors is 50% which is followed by single author contributors i.e. 25.24% and, three authors i.e. 17.62% and more than three authors is 7.14%. 3. Joint author contributions dominant 74.76% and single author 25.24%.It shows that collaborative research is prominent in this field with an average degree of collaboration of 0.75. 4. Majority of the 51.42% papers have the length of 1-5 pages. 5. The highest average citation per contribution which is found as 25.67 with 15 contributions and 385 citations. 6. It is found that journals citations with 52.59% dominating the sources of citation in the journal. 7. Contributions on the new records of Plants appear mostly in the studied eight volumes. 8. In the subject analysis of contribution of papers the Journal of Hattori Botany Laboratory topped the rank list of journal which is a foreign journal followed by Journal of Economic and Taxonomic Botany in overall rank of journals which is an Indian journal. 9. Journal of Economic and taxonomic Botany toped among Indian journal followed by the studied journal Nelumbo.

CONCLUSION

In this bibliometric study of the selected volumes of Nelumbo, the numbers of contributions and citations are varying volume wise and the numbers of contribution almost follows an average standard and occupied mostly the subject area of new plant species, floristic study and economic botany (ethno-botany, pharmacognosy/medicinal plants).The study shows the high collaborative research trend in plant taxonomy research in India.

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