A DIGEST OF
Harzing, A-W
& Alakangas, S.
Microsoft
Academic: is the Phoenix getting wings?
Scientometrics.
OBJECTIVES
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2. To investigate the extent to which the findings change if using the more liberal “estimated citation count” in Microsoft Academic rather than the more conservative “linked citation count” |
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METHOD
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Sample
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145 Associate Professors and Full Professors at the University of Melbourne, Australia in 37 disciplines grouped into 5 broad disciplinary areas: Life Sciences, Sciences, Engineering, Social Sciences, and Humanities
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Design
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For each researcher, 4 indicators were calculated from 4 different sources.
- Indicators: Number of papers; Citations received; h-index; hla-index - Sources: Google Scholar; Microsoft Academic; Scopus; Web of Science
Publish or Perish (PoP) was used to conduct searches for Google Scholar and Microsoft Academic.
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Period
analyzed
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All time. Data collected
in the first week of October 2016.
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RESULTS
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Microsoft Academic coverage has improved
substantially (an average growth of nearly 10%). The biggest increase is found
for several books or book chapters, as well as some publications in minor journals.
In terms of data quality, namely several erroneous
year allocations, and citations that were split between a version of the
publication with the main title only and a version with both the main title and
a sub-title – have not yet been resolved.
On average Microsoft Academic citations, are very
similar to Scopus and Web of Science citations and substantively lower only
than Google Scholar citations.
As to disciplines, Microsoft Academic has fewer
citations than Scopus and, marginally, than Web of Science for the Life Sciences
and Sciences. In the Social Sciences, however, Microsoft Academic has a clear
advantage over both Scopus and Web of Science, providing 1.5 to 2 times as many
citations for the sample. The difference is even starker for the Humanities,
where Microsoft Academic has a coverage that is 1.7 to nearly 3 times as high.
Google Scholar citations were higher than
Microsoft Academic citations for all but one individual in the sample
 
FIG 2. Average
citations for 145 academics across Google Scholar, Microsoft Academic, Scopus
and Web of Science, grouped by five major disciplinary areas
Taking Microsoft Academic estimated citation
counts rather than linked citation counts as our basis for the comparison
with Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar does change the comparative
picture quite dramatically.
Looking at our overall sample of 145 academics,
Microsoft Academic’s average estimated citation counts (3873) are much higher
than both Scopus (2413) and Web of Science (2168) citation counts, and very
similar to Google Scholar’s average counts (3982).
For the Life Sciences Microsoft Academic estimated
citation counts are in fact 12% higher than Google Scholar counts, whereas
for the Sciences they are almost identical.
FIG 3. Comparison of average Microsoft Academic estimated citation counts
with Google Scholar citation counts, grouped by five major disciplinary areas
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CONCLUSIONS
The study
suggests that the new incarnation of Microsoft Academic presents with an
excellent alternative for citation analysis. Moreover, the comparison of
citation growth over the last 6 months also suggests that Microsoft Academic is
still increasing its coverage.
FINAL REMARKS
To the
best of our knowledge, this work represents one of the first empirical analyses
concerned to tackle with the estimated citation counts, a procedure followed by
the new generation of academic search engines.
This
constitutes a paramount shift in citation analyses as it manages estimated
citations instead of real citations. In this sense, we would like to emphasize
the following results provided:
a) When using the more liberal
estimated citation counts for Microsoft Academic its average citations counts
were higher than both Scopus and the Web of Science for all disciplines.
b) For the Life Sciences, Microsoft
Academic estimated citation counts are even higher than Google Scholar counts,
whereas for the Sciences they are almost identical.
c) For Engineering, Microsoft Academic
estimated citation counts are 14% lower than Google Scholar citations, whereas
for the Social Sciences this is 23%. Only for the Humanities are they
substantially (69%) lower than Google Scholar citations.
When comparing Academic Search with
Google Scholar, we need to take into account that Google Scholar does not work
– at least currently – with estimated citations. Therefore, the more fair
comparison should be with the so-called Microsoft Academic’s conservative
citation counts. However, the similar results found in some disciplines may be
a signal of accuracy in the estimation processes, which in turn may change the
way in which academic search engines will work in the future.
Faced with this scenario, we may
ask a question in the wind… do we need to estimate when we can gather
everything?
