What are altmetrics?

Definition

"Altmetrics are new metrics proposed as an alternative to the widely used journal impact factor and personal citation indices like the h-index. The term altmetrics was proposed in 2010,[1][2] as a generalization of article level metrics,[3] and has its roots in the twitter #altmetrics hashtag. Although altmetrics are often thought of as metrics about articles, they can be applied to people, journals, books, data sets, presentations, videos, source code repositories, web pages, etc.[4] Altmetrics cover not just citation counts, but also other aspects of the impact of a work, such as how many data and knowledge bases refer to it, article views, downloads, or mentions in social media and news media."

From & See more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altmetrics

The concept has been around for 5+ years now, and is slowly gaining ground, especially with those who want to trace the impact of their writings on the social web. (Twitter, Mendeley, blogs etc. - shares basically). The argument is that online sharing does not invoke the same behaviours as traditional methods and consequently needs its own set of metrics. There are different characteristics to the behaviours and these generate different data that that traditionally collated by impact factor generators, therefore creating the need for a new approach to measuring impact > Altmetrics.

For example Elsevier clusters like kinds of activity for this type of reporting, rather than compressing all activities into one.



Image from: http://altmetrics.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/four-ways-to-measure-impact-copy.png

Leaders in the field include

• Altmetrics
• Plum
• PLOS (code)
• http://impactstory.org - free (plugs into Google Scholar My Citations)

Some of these interact with other services such as Vivo, Profiles, SciVal, Experts, and Figshare.

• Altmetrics are starting to appear in subscription resources as sub products or reports.
• Altmetrics are a way for crowd sourced / funded projects. to measure their success in reaching their targets. They enable researchers to be able to assess whether they are reaching the right market / population with outreach and gives context to the research / paper.
• Recent trends include tweetable abstract submissions

Spaces to watch

• growkudos.com
• ORCID
• Counter (use in Institutional Repositories).
• Altmetric explorer - a web application that helps you see the attention your publications are getting.

Read more at: http://altmetrics.org/manifesto/


Related blog posts - Keep track of citations to your articles - enhance your online reputation

Journal of Forensic Sciences in full text now available @Library IT Tallaght

Students and staff at ITT Dublin may now access the Journal of Forensic Sciences from Wiley.

Full text is available for the current year and previous 4 years.  Please log in using your library PIN.

This peer-reviewed journal from the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFS) provides the latest information on the many disciplines represented in forensic sciences.   The journal's comprehensive coverage includes: 

• pathology and biology
• toxicology
• psychiatry and behavioral sciences
• odontology
• physical anthropology
• jurisprudence
• criminalistics
• questioned documents
• engineering sciences
• digital and multimedia sciences

Source: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1556-4029/homepage/ProductInformation.html

Access to full text of 800+ journals via Sage Premier Collection

The library can now provide access to the Sage Premier Collection giving access to the full text of over 800 journals published by Sage. This is an interdisciplinary collection covering business management, education, communications, psychology, sociology, criminology, health sciences, science and technology.


Some of the Science journals available include:

American Journal of Sports Medicine
European Journal of Criminology
Food Science and Technology International
International Journal of Evidence and Proof
International Journal of Toxicology
Journal of Biomaterials Applications
Nutrition and Health
Sports Health


Click here to begin searching Sage Premier now (you will need your library ID and PIN)

For a list of all library databases go to Databases A-Z

Keep track of citations to your articles - enhance your online reputation

Suggestions for researchers to enhance online reputation

There are a number a useful places for researchers to maintain an online profile and showcase their work.
These tools enable you to track your citations and h-index and make your publications easily retrievable. Some are detailed below:

Google Scholar Citations

• Create a public profile e.g. Eamon Maher, Michael O'Connell

Researcher ID (Web of Science)

• Make your publications easily retrievable with your Research ID badge

Other similar communities and useful links :

Academic Search (Microsoft)
MyScienceWork
Academic.edu

ResearchGate

Mendeley

ARROW@DIT - Institutional repository administered by DIT

Kudos - a free web service that helps promote your research - Kudos user guide .  It can link to your ORCID ID (see below).

ORCID - provides a platform to link these communities together

ORCID provides a unique persistent identifer number linked to your research e.g. Wouter Gerritsma

Already have a Researcher ID? 
A number of organisations have integrated the ORCID registry.  ResearcherID has created an integration with ORCID that allows users to transfer publications as well as profile data between the two systems. From the user's ResearcherID profile or ORCID record they can initiate a link which will add the ORCID ID to their RID account and their RID number to their ORCID record. The user then has the option to transfer works and basic biographical information between the two systems.

Ten things you need to know about ORCID

With an ORCID ID you can join Impactstory for free. With Impactstory you can track buzz on Twitter, blogs, news outlets and more: we're like Google Scholar for your research's online reach. Making a profile takes just seconds:

Social Media

Health check your digital identity - a resource from piirus.ac.uk (accessed 10/11/2016)
Using Twitter in university research, teaching and impact activities from the LSE impact blog (accessed 10/11/2016)

Which one should I use?

It is suggested that you have an online presence on them all.  At any one time your citation metrics will be different on each profile so link to the best profile for funding proposals etc.


Academic spam
You should also be aware of academic spam.  A useful blog post from libfocus covers this topic.

Citation metrics
Bibliometrics are measures of an author's influence or impact - Bibliometrics for the individual - NDLR.
Altmetrics - What are altmetrics?

Other related blog topics -
Keeping up to date - current awareness




Image - Pixabay

Presentations & Posters - useful library material

If you have to present your research or prepare a poster the library has some great resources to help you.

The "Practical skills" series of books provide useful information for poster presentation - check availability

Nicol, A.A.M. & Pexman, P.M. 2010, Displaying your findings: a practical guide for creating figures, posters, and presentations - check availability

Bethell E. & Milsom, C. 2014, Posters & Presentations - check availability

Other books for presentations can be found in the library catalogue.

Present like a pro - University of Manchester - My Learning Essentials

NUI Galway, UCC and Trinity College have also developed an excellent resource providing tips for poster presentation - http://www.nuigalway.ie/remedi/poster/index.html

It is worth being aware that some conferences may not have the best academic credentials.  The following website may help to guide you to a trusted conference that you should attend and present your research - https://thinkcheckattend.org/ 

Other resources:

NYU Poly
Leicester University
London School of Economics - Poster Design Tips
F1000 - http://f1000.com/posters for ideas on style and design
Nature article - Last accessed 11/10/18
NSF Science Visualisation Challenge or Vizzies
Hopkins, W. (1997) How to Give Talks and Create an Effective Poster. Available: http://www.sportsci.org/
Last accessed 11/10/18. [Go to Research Resources from the homepage.  This resource is aimed at Sports Science research]
Science (2013). Posters & graphics. Science. 339 (6119), pp 514-15. http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6119/514.full.pdf

Eposters - Some conferences are now including electronic or eposters, the following short article gives a very good overview to this new format - http://www.sconul.ac.uk/sites/default/files/documents/7_15.pdf

Software for creating posters:
http://www.nuigalway.ie/remedi/poster/resources.html
Canva
Google Charts
Easel.ly
Microsoft Word, Powerpoint or Publisher

If you know of any other good resources please leave feedback.

Scientific reading and writing skills - recommended resources

An essential skill for science students is to communicate ideas and facts in a clear and precise way.

I have listed some useful resources below which will provide advice on

• reading 
• note-taking 
• lab reports 
• writing summaries and essays 
• grammar
• revision

Library ITT Dublin books - 

Pechenik, J.A., Lamb, B.C. & Pechenik, J.A. 1994, How to write about biology, HarperCollins.- check library availability

Boyle, Jennifer & Ramsay, Scott 2017, Writing for science students, Palgrave Study Skills - check library availability

Thody, A. 2006, Writing and presenting research, SAGE. - check library availability

Alley, M. 1996, The craft of scientific writing, Springer.- check library availability

Barrass, R. 2002, Scientists must write, Routledge. - check library availability

The "Practical skills" series of books - check availability

Godfrey, Jeanne 2014, "Reading & Making Notes", Palgrave - check library availablility

Online resources -
Hopkins, W. (1999) How to Write a Literature Review and How to Write a Research Paper. Available: http://www.sportsci.org/.  Last accessed 04/01/14. [From the homepage go to Research Resources > Writing]

Reading skills tutorial produced by University of Leeds - http://library.leeds.ac.uk/tutorials/reading/

Reinvent - a tutorial produced by ITT Dublin

Infographic: How to Read Scientific Papers from Elsevier



Other related blogposts - Literature Reviews

Food Science & Technology Abstracts - free trial until November 30th

We currently have a free trial of FSTA (Food Science & Technology Abstracts) until 30^th November.  

It is an extensive collection of abstracts from the world's food science, food technology and food related human nutrition literature. It contains over 1.2 million bibliographic records from 1969 to the present.  It would be relevant to the following subject areas:

Programs

• Food Science and Technology
• Food Business Management and Technology
• Sports Science and Health
• Pharmaceutical Science
• Applied Culinary Nutrition
• Culinary Arts
• Bioanalysis
• Chemical Analysis

Research

• Bio-Pharmaceutical and Neutraceutical Research Centre
• MiCRA-Biodiagnostics (Microsensors for Clinical Research & Analysis)

The trial is available through EBSCO databases.  The following link will bring you directly to searching FSTA only -  Search FSTA. 

You will require you library PIN to access the resource.  From your search results select the link “Where can I find this” to check if we access to the full text of articles.  Please contact me if you have any queries or feedback.