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Hello Nature Index readers, This week, we’re all about alternative metrics. We look at how altmetrics might be useful to early career researchers, and we bring you the stand-out studies of the year so far by Altmetric score, from an account of a 'space hurricane' in Earth’s upper atmosphere to an exploration of how COVID-19 research could be relevant to other diseases, such as multiple sclerosis. Also this week, visualizing the world's population by age group. |
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Since 1950, the global median age has increased by 7 years, from 24 to 31, according to the United Nations. That said, young people accounted for 33% of the global population in 2020, making them the largest demographic across the globe, as this infographic from Visual Capitalist shows. | ||||||||||||||||||
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You might think "millennial" researchers (born between the early 1980s and late 1990s, according to popular definition) would embrace alternative metrics, especially those based on social media activity. Not so, or at least not yet, according to a 2020 study by David Nicholas et al. (paywalled), based on a survey of 1600 early-career researchers from seven countries: ECRs, understandably, are still welded to the citation-based indicators used by institutions and funders to assess their performance. Yet altmetrics may help make academic evaluation fairer: the authors of this Nature Index article studied the Altmetric Attention Score of 200,000 papers aggregated by altmetrics.com, and found the score displays no gender bias, in contrast to citation scores, grant allocations and reference letters. This PLOS Blog post sensibly advises ECRs trying to establish an "impact narrative" to focus on the article-level metrics that are most relevant to the intentions of their research. For example, if it was important to get the public’s attention, highlight your media mentions and social media coverage; if having your data open and re-usable was the impact you sought, showcase that. |
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You have been sent this email because you have signed up to receive the Nature Index newsletter. You can unsubscribe from the newsletter at any time. Nature | The Springer Nature Campus, 4 Crinan Street, London, N1 9XW, United Kingdom Nature | Shiroyama Trust Tower 5F, 4-3-1 Toranomon, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan Nature Research, part of Springer Nature. © 2020 Springer Nature Limited. All rights reserved. |