Analysis of local journal metric relationships within an R1 university Collection

This paper examines the correlational relationships between local journal authorship, local and external citation counts, full-text downloads, link-resolver clicks, and four global journal impact factor indices within an all-disciplines journal collection of 12,200 titles and several subject subsets at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Library. Earlier investigations of the relationships between usage (downloads) and citation metrics have been inconclusive, but the preliminary results of this study show strong correlations in the all-disciplines set and most subject subsets. Normalized Eigenfactor was the only global impact factor index that correlated highly with local journal metrics. Some of the subject disciplines’ variations may be explained by the journal publication aspirations of UIUC researchers where faculty are unable to publish in the most highly cited or heavily downloaded journals.