Characteristics and Longevity of Electronic Citations in Four Leading Biomedical Journals in Spain

• Published in: Revista española de cardiología (English ed.) 2014-10, Vol.67 (10), p.837-843
• Main Authors: Valcárcel de Laiglesia, María Ángel, Alfonso, Fernando, Miró, Òscar, Casademont, Jordi, Burbano Santos, Pablo, Burillo-Putze, Guillermo, Fernández Pérez, Cristina, Martín-Sánchez, Francisco Javier
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Access to Information; Bibliometrics; Bibliometría; Citas electrónicas; Cross-Sectional Studies; Electronic citations; Internet - statistics & numerical data; Periodicals as Topic - statistics & numerical data; Publishing - statistics & numerical data; Spain; Time Factors; Web
• ISSN: 1885-5857; 1885-5857
• DOI: 10.1016/j.rec.2014.01.029

We aimed to determine the frequency of use and accessibility over time of electronic citations in Revista Española de Cardiología and 3 other Spanish biomedical journals, and to identify the factors that influence the accessibility and retrievability of these links. A cross-sectional, descriptive study was performed of all the references in articles published in the first issue of each even year from 2002 to 2012 in selected journals. Data were collected on the journal, publication, references, and links. The variables analyzed were the percentage of articles with at least 1 electronic citation, the percentage of electronic citations with respect to the total number of citations in the full sample, and the percentages of link accessibility and retrievability. We included 377 articles, of which 73 (19.4%; 95% confidence interval, 15.2%-23.5%) had at least 1 electronic citation, and a total of 7077 references, of which 164 (2.3%; 95% confidence interval, 2.0%-2.7%) were electronic citations. Revista Española de Cardiología had 17 (15.2%) and 38 (1.3%), respectively. Use of electronic citations significantly increased over time (linear tendency, P