Mapping the Literature of GIS
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Mapping the Literature of GIS Edith A. Scarletto This study analyzed citations in four journals, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Cartography and Geographic Information Science, International Journal of Geographical Information Science, and Cartographic Journal, using Bradford’s Law of Scattering to identify three influence zones indicating core and peripheral titles in the study areas of GIS. Journals were ranked resulting in twenty-three core journals and 187 secondary journals. Scores for relevant indexing/abstracting services are also given to describe access points and coverage. The results can assist librarians and collection managers to support research in their institutions where GIS is both used and studied. cademic librarians have tra- to support research and to contribute ditionally fit emerging dis- additional knowledge to their discipline. ciplines into their existing Academic libraries support research by structure, and Geography collecting and providing access to journal and Map Librarians (among others) have literature in their institutions. The chal- integrated Geographic Information Sci- lenge of selecting journals is exacerbated ence (GIS) into their duties as quickly as as budgets shrink and is especially dif- faculty and students have adopted them. ficult for a multidisciplinary research The ARL (Association of Research Librar- area like GIS. ies) GIS Literacy Project began during the This article examines and creates a early 1990s to recognize the increasing list of the GIS journals in three ranked interest in GIS, and several SPEC KITS zones of influence using Bradford’s Law have been issued about its support includ- of Scattering.4 Analyzing citations in four ing Davie1 and Salem.2 Using a working source journals, Annals of the Association definition from the Encyclopedia of GIS, of American Geographers, Cartography and GIS is “knowledge acquired through Geographic Information Science, Interna- processing geographically referenced tional Journal of Geographical Information data. Geographic Information Services Science, and Cartographic Journal, the are… provisions of information gener- resulting three influence zones can as- ated from geospatial data.”3 As GIS has sist librarians in identifying core and evolved into a discipline of its own, the peripheral titles in the study areas of GIS. challenge of supporting this research area Comparing these results with other bib- has become more acute. Practitioners and liometric studies of GIS and geography researchers at many ends of the technical journals cited in this paper, in addition and theoretical spectrum need literature to using Impact Factors and metrics, can Edith A. Scarletto is Assistant Professor, Head Map Library, and Subject Librarian for Geography and Geology in the University Library at Kent State University; e-mail: [email protected]. © 2014 Edith A. Scarletto, Attribution-NonCommercial (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) CC BY-NC 179 crl12-389 180 College & Research Libraries March 2014 help librarians determine where funding the subdisciplines noted by Allen and should be spent to cover the most ground Buchanan and Herubel above, many of for GIS literature support. the subdisciplines are likely to be present in the results of this study. Literature Review Geography and GIS have also been The discipline of Geographic Informa- studied using citation analysis to examine tion Science (GIS or GIScience) has its the characteristics of literature use in the history in both technical and theoretical disciplines. William Robinson and Paul disciplines. The development includes Poston8 used citation analysis to inves- geographic information systems, com- tigate this idea, looking at how authors puter science, remote sensing, geography, used literature and the nature of what they and statistics, making it nearly impossible cited. They found that authors in different to isolate where GIS begins and ends. To- journals used different percentages of lit- gether with the technical and theoretical erature formats depending on the journal aspects of acquiring geographically refer- in which they published. The proportion enced data (remote sensing and others), of books cited compared to periodicals tools and knowledge contribute to the and report literature differed between growing research area. This is sometimes publications. They also found a similar referred to as GIScience, difference in the age of the literature used and the country where it was published. a scholarly discipline that addresses Each journal in turn exhibited different au- fundamental issues surrounding the thor characteristics. The proportional use use of a variety of digital technolo- of different source formats is one aspect gies to handle geographic informa- of the literature that will be examined in tion, namely information about the Results section of this study. places, activities and phenomena Additional studies have used the core on and near the surface of the Earth journal approach with bibliometrics and that is stored in maps or images. citation analysis in geography to rep- GIScience includes the existing tech- resent the discipline, identifying most nologies and research areas.5 cited authors, classic authors over time, and the network of geography journals. The interdisciplinarity of GIS has These studies attempt to find the most been documented by Robert Allen,6 who influential or “classic” authors of the field. identified the topics in the following They include: Andrew Bodman;9 J.W. areas: Biology/Ecology, Urban/Regional Whitehand;10 Neil Wrigley and Stephen Planning, Technology, Natural Resources, Matthews;11 Robinson and Poston;12 and Hydrology, Geography, Library Science, David Lee and Arthur Evans.13 Because Atmospheric Science, Education, Trans- the choice of source journals was a critical portation, Archeology, Criminology, and issue in the development of this study, a Medicine. He found that these disciplines review of their methodologies follows. both use and write about GIS. Other Bodman used the journals in the interdisciplinary studies of geography geography category listed in the Social have included Anne Buchanan and Jean- Science Citation Index to generate his core Pierre Herubel.7 Buchanan and Herubel journal list. He suggests that using a core used citation analysis to identify the journal list in affiliated disciplines could interdisciplinary nature of Historical Ge- contribute to the breadth of the geography ography, finding that the subdisciplines core for future studies.14 Wrigley and Mat- draw deeply from the related subject thews15 examined the geography journals area, historical geography from history, Area, Transactions of the Institute of British economic geography from economics. Geographers, Annals of the American As- As GIS is also expected to draw from sociation of Geographers (AAAG), and Pro- Mapping the Literature of GIS 181 fessional Geographer for the articles cited Studies have also been done looking most often in a ten-year period. Their list at perceptions of quality and the impact of most cited articles features four of the status of journals in geography and GIS. articles they deem as potential classics in Caron et al. (2008) comes closest to the geography. These classics were found in purpose of this study by using a com- the journals Transactions of the Institute of bination of subjective journal ranking the British Geographers, Progress in Human (Delphi method) and objective Impact Geography, Geographical Analysis, and Factor analysis19 to determine an overall Environment and Planning A. Wrigley and journal ranking in the field of GIS, using Matthews are looking specifically at the an international focus. The final ranking field of geography. of GIScience journals20 by Caron et al. Robinson and Poston also looked at included forty-six titles. Their list contains literature use, implementing what they a majority of international titles, including considered to be “leading periodicals,” quite a few from remote sensing. studying the titles AAAG, Applied Ge- ography, CJ, Economic Geography, and Methodology Geographical Analysis.16 Sampling these The “Protocol for Mapping the Lit- titles and examining citation patterns, erature for Nursing and Allied Health they found that the authors in each of Professions”21 was followed as a model these journals differed in how they used for this study. This protocol has been geographic literature. Gatrell and Smith17 used primarily in the nursing and allied looked at journal citation networks using health professions22 and has been a well- a set of twenty-two journals in geography respected methodology of the Medical to determine how journals were repre- Library Association for eighteen years. sented in the citations of others on the The protocol consists of choosing several list. They specifically excluded cartogra- source journals in a field and examining phy journals making their resulting core the citations to articles in those journals list of literature less applicable to GIS, a over a period of time to determine the cartographic tool. The journals AAAG, most cited journals, or core literature. Antipode, Environment and Planning A, These journals are ranked into three zones Geoforum, Geographical Analysis, Profes- of influence by the number of times they sional Geographer, and Transactions of the are cited by the articles included in the Institute of British Geographer18 were high study: Zone 1, highest influence journals; on their list in the citation networks.