The Relative Influence of Social Work Journals

Abstract

This article compares the results of two methods of ranking the influence of journals based on citation counts. For 22 core social work journals, ranking by Social Sciences Citation Index’s “impact factors” is compared with ranking by “core influence” scores, which count citations only within the same core journals. The substantial differences between the rankings suggest that impact factors do not accurately indicate the most influential journals within the discipline of social work. The implications of these findings for faculty and libraries are discussed.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

L. Allen Furr

The author thanks Abby Shapiro, Stephen Kraus, William Thompson, and the Journal’s anonymous reviewers for their assistance in preparing this article.