Trajectories and Regimes in Research and Knowledge Evaluations: Contributions to an Evolutionary Theory of Citation?

Abstract

Citation analysis can provide us with models of the evolutionary dynamics in interhuman communications. In the cited direction, observable citations can be aligned along historical trajectories and used for institutionally oriented research evaluation. In the citing direction, the knowledge contents are evaluated. The forward (cited) and the reflexive (citing) directions are relevant for research and knowledge evaluations, respectively, and for an evolutionary theory of citation. By recursively selecting on historical trajectories, an evolutionary regime of expectations can be a consequence of the cycling of information. Under selection pressure, orders of expectations co-evolve on top of the historical trajectories. We propose a model with indicators for measurement in both the cited and citing directions using (i) a set of papers in the environment of a single journal (Public Understanding of Science), (ii) a random sample of journals, and (iii) the entire journal set of the Web-of-Science (more than 10,000 journals). The models and measurements serve as a proof of concept.

Keywords: interdisciplinarity, synergy, bibliographic coupling, co-citation, research evaluation, knowledge evaluation