Citations have long been the default measure of academic impact, providing a seemingly simple way to track a scholar’s impact. The logic is simple. The more cited a study is, the higher its perceived value.
However, the limitations of this tool are becoming increasingly apparent. Citations focus on direct academic impact and often miss the bigger picture, especially the broader societal impact that research can have.
“What we see in the citations is the downstream impact on academia, but we don’t know whether those ideas are actually adopted,” said Ludo, professor of quantitative scientific research at Leiden University in the Netherlands. Waltman says.
So why do citations remain so appealing? Diana Hicks, a professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Public Policy, says, “The reason citations have been so influential is that they make it easier for outsiders to understand the contributions researchers have made.” This is because it provides a means for researchers to know, in other words, evidence that researchers have advanced knowledge.” However, she warns that it would be “naive” to rely too much on this single metric.
First, the numbers can be skewed by self-citations, where scholars refer to their own work. “If you’re building on a body of research, it’s perfectly reasonable to self-cite,” says Elizabeth, editor of the Academy of Management Annals and professor at Cambridge Judge Business School. George says. But she also points out the “gaming” of the system, where self-citations are used to artificially inflate the tally.
Additionally, citation practices vary across disciplines, making comparisons difficult. Fields such as medicine tend to attract more citations due to their vast research community, clinical relevance, and interdisciplinary nature.
Another concern is that because English-language journals dominate academic publishing, research in regions where English is not the primary language may be overlooked. “If citation counts were the only thing that mattered in evaluating research, this kind of research would disappear,” Hicks warns.
In response to these concerns, new tools are emerging that provide a more nuanced view of academic impact. OpenAlex, a platform launched in 2021, aims to provide a more balanced picture of research impact across disciplines, using metrics that reconcile differences between disciplines. Another tool, Scite, goes further by evaluating the quality of citations, whether they support or challenge research.
Scite focuses on quality as well as quantity
Scite, a Brooklyn-based startup, is changing the way academia looks at citations. Rather than simply counting how often a paper is cited, Scite tracks the nature of those citations, such as whether they support, challenge, or simply mention the paper.
“Being able to consider content rather than number of citations is a big change from traditional approaches,” says Sean Rife, director of academic relations at Scite. “We need to consider not only the quantity of academic research, but also its quality.”
The ongoing “replication crisis,” in which much research cannot be replicated, led to the creation of Scite in 2018. Rife warns that relying too much on a single metric, such as citation counts, can encourage misconduct in academia.
Scite complements traditional tools such as h-index (a number that shows whether a researcher’s work has been mentioned at least as many times as others), but adds depth and qualitative analysis to citation tracking. bring.
According to Rife, this approach, combined with platforms like OpenAlex, signals a shift toward more transparent and nuanced ways to measure academic impact. “We are seeing a shift away from relying on a small number of data providers to using openly available data in creative ways,” he observes.
Despite the rise of alternatives, traditional citation metrics still influence hiring and tenure decisions. Emmanuel Metes, dean of France’s Edec Business School, said: “Performance evaluations based on academic citations are important, but other indicators that provide adequate evidence that the research has been useful to practitioners and students are important.” It needs to be completed by.”
To ensure that research has broader societal impact, Edhec also takes into account external funding, media exposure, and student outcomes. “We value our faculty and encourage them to leverage the knowledge they produce . . . to drive progress beyond the walls of our campus,” Mettes says.
For now, therefore, citations remain an important, albeit flawed, part of the evaluation process in academia. However, as the industry accepts the limitations of these metrics, efforts toward more meaningful and balanced measures are likely to continue.
Some have already established themselves. Metrics such as “contextualized” citations (which describe different disciplines) and “positive” citations (which track how research is being applied and built on) provide more nuanced information about scholarly impact. provide perspective. Below, we highlight some of the top academic papers that have excelled in these new metrics, providing a new perspective on the influence and impact of the field as a whole.
Total confusion: discrepancies in ESG ratings
In this paper, we address an increasingly serious problem in sustainable investing: why different environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ratings can lead to fundamentally different images of the same company.
This is important because approximately $100 trillion of assets are tied to ESG criteria. Investors and companies rely heavily on these ratings to make decisions ranging from stock investments to corporate strategy.
The study, co-authored by Florian Berg and Roberto Rigobon of the MIT Sloan School of Management, and Julian Körbel of the University of St. Gallen, found that measurement differences between rating agencies were the main reason for the discrepancy, accounting for 56% of the discrepancy. It was found that occupies . of variations. The rest are scope and weight differences.
This causes problems. Companies receive mixed signals about which actions to prioritize, potentially under-investing in sustainability efforts. It also makes it difficult for investors to assess actual ESG performance and for markets to accurately factor ESG factors into stock values.
The paper argues that this disconnect hampers efforts to link CEO pay and ESG performance and undermines research in sustainable finance, where results can vary depending on which ratings are used. states that it is possible.
By highlighting these discrepancies, the study highlights the need for standardization and suggests that regulators could help by harmonizing ESG disclosure practices. This will make the evaluation more reliable and useful to decision makers.
Corporate immunity to the COVID-19 pandemic
This paper investigates how different company characteristics influenced stock price reactions during the early stages of the 2020 pandemic.
The study examined data from nearly 6,000 companies in more than 50 countries and found that companies with stronger financial health before the pandemic – those with more cash, less debt and higher profitability – saw their stock prices decline more slowly. It turned out to be.
Furthermore, a paper by Wenzhi Ding of Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Ross Levine of Berkeley Haas, Chen Lin and Wensi Xie of HKU Business School found that companies with greater exposure to global supply chains and customers in highly affected regions The drop in stock prices was so large. Graduated from CUHK Business School.
The document also highlights the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Companies that invested in CSR before the pandemic saw better stock performance during the crisis. This suggests that strong relationships with employees, suppliers, and communities can increase a company’s resilience during a crisis.
Additionally, companies with more flexible governance structures that allow for mergers and acquisitions and leadership changes performed better.
The findings highlight the broader importance of corporate health and social responsibility and provide insights for both policymakers and business leaders in building more resilient companies.
Artificial Intelligence and Management: The Paradox of Automation and Augmentation
This paper explores the increasing use of artificial intelligence in management, highlighting the tension between two key approaches: automation, where machines take over tasks, and augmentation, where humans and AI collaborate.
The study, by Sebastian Reisch of the Geneva School of Economics and Business and Sebastian Krakowski of the Stockholm School of Economics, highlights a contradiction. While some management thinkers advocate expansion as a better strategy, the authors argue that organizations cannot completely separate expansion from automation.
Rather, they argue that automation and expansion are interdependent, creating tensions as companies seek to balance efficiency and innovation.
This paper argues that placing too much emphasis on either approach can have negative consequences. Relying solely on automation risks job losses and de-skilling, while too much emphasis on expansion can create inefficiencies and reinforce human biases.
This research advocates for a balanced and integrated approach to management practices that not only improve organizational performance but also deliver broader societal benefits, such as fairer job markets and more responsible use of AI. is encouraged.
corporate green bonds
The study examines the rapid rise and impact of green bonds, financial instruments used by companies such as Unilever and Apple to finance environmentally friendly projects such as renewable energy and resource conservation. I am.
A paper by Caroline Flammer, written while attending Boston University’s Questrom School of Business, shows that green bonds are gaining momentum, with annual issuance more than doubling each year from 2013 to 2016. It shows.
Companies that issue green bonds tend to receive a strong response from the market, resulting in significant increases in shareholder value. For example, based on the initial 0.7 percent increase in shareholder value seen at the time of the bond announcement, a company’s market value increases by 2.2 percent one year later. Profitability, reflected in return on assets, also improves in the years following green bond issuance.
Research by Flammer, now at Columbia University, shows that companies that issue these bonds typically see an 8.8% increase in environmental ratings and a 27.7% decrease in CO₂ emissions. Indicating an increasing impact on society, the proportion of companies issuing “green” patents for environmentally friendly inventions has increased by 3.4 percentage points compared to all patents.
Mr. Flammer’s findings suggest that green bonds can support both environmental progress and long-term value creation.
