Abstract
Purpose: To provide an overview of altmetrics, including their potential benefits and limitations, how they may be obtained, and their role in assessing pharmacoepidemiologic research impact. Methods: Our review was informed by compiling relevant literature identified through searching multiple health research databases (PubMed, Embase, and CIHNAHL) and grey literature sources (websites, blogs, and reports). We demonstrate how pharmacoepidemiologists, in particular, may use altmetrics to understand scholarly impact and knowledge translation by providing a case study of a drug-safety study conducted by the Canadian Network of Observational Drug Effect Studies. Results: A common approach to measuring research impact is the use of citation-based metrics, such as an article's citation count or a journal's impact factor. “Alternative” metrics, or altmetrics, are increasingly supported as a complementary measure of research uptake in the age of social media. Altmetrics are nontraditional indicators that capture a diverse set of traceable, online research-related artifacts including peer-reviewed publications and other research outputs (software, datasets, blogs, videos, posters, policy documents, presentations, social media posts, wiki entries, etc). Conclusion: Compared with traditional citation-based metrics, altmetrics take a more holistic view of research impact, attempting to capture the activity and engagement of both scholarly and nonscholarly communities. Despite the limited theoretical underpinnings, possible commercial influence, potential for gaming and manipulation, and numerous data quality-related issues, altmetrics are promising as a supplement to more traditional citation-based metrics because they can ingest and process a larger set of data points related to the flow and reach of scholarly communication from an expanded pool of stakeholders. Unlike citation-based metrics, altmetrics are not inherently rooted in the research publication process, which includes peer review; it is unclear to what extent they should be used for research evaluation.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 93-102 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety |
| Volume | 29 |
| Issue number | S1 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Jan 1 2020 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The Canadian Network for Observational Drug Effect Studies (CNODES), a collaborating center of the Drug Safety and Effectiveness Network (DSEN), is funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (grant number DSE-111845). I.S. and R.T. have received salary support, in part, from CIHR for the CNODES project. J.M.G. is supported by a CIHR New Investigator Award in Drug Safety and Effectiveness and a Clinician Scientist Award from Diabetes Canada. The authors would like to acknowledge Melissa Helwig, Information Services Librarian at the W.K. Kellogg Health Sciences Library (Dalhousie University), for her literature search support.
Funding Information:
The Canadian Network for Observational Drug Effect Studies (CNODES), a collaborating center of the Drug Safety and Effectiveness Network (DSEN), is funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (grant number DSE‐111845). I.S. and R.T. have received salary support, in part, from CIHR for the CNODES project. J.M.G. is supported by a CIHR New Investigator Award in Drug Safety and Effectiveness and a Clinician Scientist Award from Diabetes Canada. The authors would like to acknowledge Melissa Helwig, Information Services Librarian at the W.K. Kellogg Health Sciences Library (Dalhousie University), for her literature search support.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 The Authors. Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
ASJC Scopus Subject Areas
- Epidemiology
- Pharmacology (medical)
PubMed: MeSH publication types
- Journal Article
- Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
- Review