Usage Factor

Last updated: January 2012

Usage-based measures of journal impact and quality

The overall aim of the Usage Factor project is to explore how online journal usage statistics might form the basis of a new measure of journal impact and quality, the Journal Usage Factor (JUF). The specific objectives of the project are: to examine the ways in which journal quality is currently assessed; to assess whether the JUF would be a statistically meaningful measure; whether it would be accepted by researchers, publishers, librarians and research institutions; whether it would be statistically credible and robust; whether there is an organizational and economic model for its implementation that would be acceptable to the major stakeholder groups.

The project is being executed in three stages, from 2007 onwards. Stage 1 focussed on market research into the overall feasibility and acceptability of the Usage Factor in principle. Stage 2 focussed on modelling and analysis, in which real usage data from COUNTER-compliant publishers was used to test the formula for calculation of UF, as well as the processes for doing so on a sustainable, ongoing basis. The full report on Stages 1 and 2 of the project is provided below. Stage 3 of the project, which commenced in October 2011, is now under way.

Stages 1 and 2

Full Report

Journal Usage Factor: results, recommendations and next steps (Download/View report - PDF)

Appendix A: The Journal Usage Factor: exploratory data analysis (Download/View appendix - PDF)

Stage 3

Objectives

The following objectives have been set for Stage 3:

Publication of a draft Code of Practice for the Usage Factor
Further testing of the recommended methodology for calculating Usage Factor for journals
Investigation of an appropriate, resilient subject taxonomy for the classification of journals
Exploration of the options for an infrastructure to support the sustainable implementation of Usage Factor
Investigate the feasibility of applying the Usage Factor concept to other categories of publication in addition to journals

Organization

Co-Chairs:

Jayne Marks, Wolters Kluwer, USA
Hazel Woodward, Cranfield University, UK

Members

Mayur Amin, Elsevier, UK
Kim Armstrong, CIC Center for Library Initiatives, USA
Peter Ashman, BMJ Group, UK
Terry Bucknell, University of Liverpool, UK
Ian Craig, Wiley, UK
Joanna Cross, Taylor & Francis, UK
David Hoole, Nature Publishing Group, UK
Tim Jewell, University of Washington, USA
Jack Ochs, ACS Publications, USA
Tony O’Rourke, IOP Publishing, UK
Clive Parry, Sage Publications, UK
Jason Price, Claremont College, USA
Ian Rowlands, CIBER, UK
Bill Russell, Emerald, UK
Ian Russell, Oxford University Press, UK
John Sack, HighWire Press, USA
David Sommer, COUNTER, UK
Harald Wirsching, Springer, Germany

Project Director

Peter Shepherd, COUNTER, UK