In health research publications, the number of authors is strongly associated with collective self-citations but less so with citations by others.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

. This study investigated the associations between the number of authors and collective self-citations versus citations by others.

Study design and setting

. We analyzed 88,594 health science articles published in 2015 and citations they received until 2020. The main variables were the number of authors, the number of citations by co-authors (collective self-citations), and the number of citations by others.

Results

. The number of authors correlated more strongly with the number of citations by co-authors than with citations by others (Spearman r 0.31 vs. 0.23; mutually adjusted r 0.26 vs. 0.12). The percentage of self-citations among all citations was 10.6% for single-authored articles, and increased gradually with the number of authors to 34.8% for ≥ 50 a

SUBMITTER: Jaksic C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10568899 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature