A new bibliometric approach to measure knowledge transfer of internationally mobile scientists

Valeria Aman ()
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Valeria Aman: German Centre for Higher Education Research and Science Studies (DZHW)

Scientometrics, 2018, vol. 117, issue 1, No 14, 227-247

Abstract: Abstract This study introduces a new bibliometric approach to study the effects of international scientific mobility on knowledge transfer. It is based on an analysis of internationally mobile and non-internationally mobile German scientists publishing in journals that are indexed in Scopus. Using bibliometric data such co-authored articles, references and lexical abstract terms from the Scopus database, a method is presented that is based on cosine similarity to measure the similarity of the knowledge base of authors and their co-authors. This quantifiable method is capable of revealing potential knowledge transfer between internationally mobile scientists and different types of co-authors. In addition, the Shannon index is used as a diversity measure to analyse the knowledge base of scientists. Analyses are presented for an overall 9-year publication period (2007–2015), split into a pre-mobility phase, a mobility phase and a post-mobility phase, each of which lasts for 3 years. Internationally mobile scientists are compared with non-internationally mobile scientists and the potentials and limitations of the method presented are discussed. It is concluded that the bibliometric approach proposed is useful when applied on a large scale. International mobility proves to benefit the exchange of knowledge between scientists and various types of co-authors.

Keywords: International scientific mobility; Knowledge transfer; Cosine similarity; Knowledge base; Shannon index; Scopus author ID; Bibliometric approach (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

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DOI: 10.1007/s11192-018-2864-x

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