This 12 months’s Nobel Prize for physics was awarded to Alain Side, John Clauser and Anton Zeilinger. They individually performed groundbreaking experiments utilizing entangled quantum states. Their outcomes have now paved the way in which for the event of a brand new expertise that will be primarily based on quantum info.
Curiously, a couple of individuals on-line have identified that Clauser has a comparatively low h-index. Clauser just isn’t the one one. Harry Kroto, the 1996 winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, didn’t have a excessive h-index; actually, a single publication earned him the distinguished award.
Usually thought-about a metric to measure the analysis high quality of a scientist, Clauser and Kroto’s case exhibits that the h-index might not be an correct indicator of scientific excellence.
How h-index got here to being
In 2005, JE Hirsch, professor of Physics on the College of California, devised the h-index and launched it via a paper titled, ‘An index to quantify a person’s scientific analysis output’. In his paper, he mentioned that it’s a problem to quantify the cumulative influence and relevance of a researcher’s output. A standardised metric or a quantification helps in evaluating and evaluating the output, which might, in flip, assist in college school recruitment and award of grants, and extra. Measuring high quality is vital, notably when scientists are competing for a restricted variety of alternatives.
JE Hirsch
He then proposed the h-index, which in his personal phrases, gives “a helpful yardstick with which to match, in an unbiased method, completely different people competing for a similar useful resource when an vital analysis criterion is a scientific achievement”.
This index measures the variety of highly-cited papers a scientist has written. The worth of h is the variety of papers which have every been cited by not less than h different papers. For instance, a scientist who has authored 5 papers should have not less than 5 citations for every paper to have an h-index of 5. It has been near 20 years now, and the h-index has been accepted because the trade customary to gauge when making use of for grants, jobs, and awards. The h-index is typically additionally used to measure the scientific output of a analysis group, scientific amenities, and even nations.
Criticism towards h-index
Hirsch’s proposal to have a metric that would mathematically point out the analysis achievements of a scientist has fascinated many. Whereas this metric has change into a kind of ‘trade customary’, it has confronted a lot criticism from varied quarters. It’s typically deemed too generalised, simplistic, and even deceptive.
In a 2008 paper, authors Lehmann and group wrote, “The issue is that Hirsch assumes equality between incommensurable portions. An creator’s papers are listed so as of reducing citations with paper i having C(i) citations. Hirsch’s index is decided by the equality, h = C(h), which posits equality between two portions with no evident logical connection”.
The h-index might range relying on the analysis discipline in consideration. Even in his seminal work, Hirsh reported that researchers from the life sciences discipline could have larger h-indices in comparison with a discipline like Physics. Additional, he additionally mentioned that researchers working in domains apart from science won’t have the identical h-index values as the highest in these working within the excessive topical areas. That is indicative of how the h-index imposes a ‘one-size-fits-all strategy’ to scientific influence.
One other disadvantage of the h-index is that an creator can artificially inflate their index. At this level, you will need to discuss in regards to the eminent French microbiologist, Didier Raoult. He mentioned that the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine as a remedy for coronavirus; This discovery helped him earn international fame, and even then, US President Donald Trump championed the tactic. Nonetheless, it was shortly confirmed that the drug doesn’t work towards the virus. Raoult was quickly slapped with prison costs.
Didier Raoult
A separate report showcases one other side of Raoult’s analysis work. He revealed 2,053 articles between 1979 and 2018 and obtained a complete quotation of 72,847 and his h-index was discovered to be 120. Nonetheless, the Internet of Science Database exhibits that of the full citations attributed to articles co-authored by him, 18,145 come from the articles he has co-authored. The self-citations alone fashioned 25% of the full quantity. Deducting these, his precise h-index involves a price of 104. The h-index thereby fails to distinguish relative contributions to the work in multiple-author papers.
One other main criticism towards the h-index is that it places younger scientists at an obstacle. It’s nearly unattainable to match researchers at completely different phases of their careers, even these working in the identical discipline. It is because some articles accumulate citations, and the quantity solely will increase over time. In such conditions, it purely turns into a case of what analysis work has been round for an extended time period.
Not an correct metric
Analytics India Journal spoke to Prof. Rajat Agarwal, Affiliate Dean of Innovation and Incubation and School on the Division of Administration Research, IIT Roorkee, relating to the influence of the h-index. He mentioned, “Exceptions are at all times attainable the place the h-index might not measure the influence of your analysis output. It’s simply one of many many parameters which can be utilized for measuring educational influence. It’s extra helpful to trace the consistency in your analysis output and guarantee you’re constantly lively within the discipline. For an lively researcher monitoring the expansion of the h-index means that you’re constantly producing impactful analysis”.
He additional added that analysis efficiency must be evaluated in a way more holistic method somewhat than utilizing merely one parameter. Crucial issue for measuring the analysis efficiency is its software in fixing real-life issues. “Due to this fact, patents and bringing merchandise/options primarily based on these patents to the market is one vital dimension of analysis efficiency. Subsequent is the publication, the place publication within the top-ranking journal is essential, and quotation of analysis in a similar-level journal is a vital indicator,” he concluded.
