Co-authorship patterns and networks of Korean radiation oncologists

• Published in: Radiation oncology journal 2011, 29(3), , pp.164-173
• Main Authors: Choi, Jinhyun, Kang, Jin Oh, Park, Seo Hyun, Kim, Sang Ki
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Original; 방사선과학
• ISSN: 2234-1900; 2234-3164; 2234-3156
• DOI: 10.3857/roj.2011.29.3.164

Purpose: This research aimed to analyze the patterns of co-authorship network among the Korean radiation oncologists and to identify attributing factors for the formation of networks. Materials and Methods: A total of 1,447 articles including contents of ‘Radiation Oncology’ and ‘Therapeutic Radiology’ were searched from the KoreaMed database. The co-authorship was assorted by the author’s full name, affi liation and specialties. UCINET 6.0 was used to fi gure out the author’s network centrality and the cluster analysis, and KeyPlayer 1.44 program was used to get a result of key player index. Sociogram was analyzed with the Netdraw 2.090. The statistical comparison was performed by a t-test and ANOVA using SPSS 16.0 with p-value < 0.05 as the signifi cant value. Results: The number of articles written by a radiation oncologist as the fi rst author was 1,025 out of 1,447. The pattern of coauthorship was classifi ed into fi ve groups. For articles of which the fi rst author was a radiation oncologist, the number of singleauthor articles (type-A) was 81; single-institution articles (type-B) was 687; and multiple-author articles (type-C) was 257. For the articles which radiation oncologists participated in as a co-author, the number of single-institution articles (type-D) was 280 while multiple-institution articles (type-E) were 142. There were 8,895 authors from 1,366 co-authored articles, thus the average number of authors per article was 6.51. It was 5.73 for type-B, 6.44 for type-C, 7.90 for type-D, and 7.67 for type-E (p = 0.000) in the average number of authors per article. The number of authors for articles from the hospitals published more than 100 articles was 7.23 while form others was 5.94 (p = 0.005). Its number was 5.94 and 7.16 for the articles published before and after 2001 (p = 0.000). The articles written by a radiation oncologist as the fi rst author had 5.92 authors while others for 7.82 (p = 0.025). Its number was 5.57 and 7.71 for the Journal of the Korean Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology and others (p = 0.000), respectively. Among the analysis, a signifi cant difference in the average number of author per article was indicated. The out-degree centrality of network among authors was 4.26% (2.03–7.09%) while in-degree centrality was 1.31% (0.53–2.84%). The three signifi cant nodes were classifi ed and listed as following: Choi, Eun Kyung for 1991-1995, Kim, Dae Young for 1998-2001, Park, Won and Lee, Sang Wook for 2003-2010.