Objective: To investigate the utilization and the requirement of literatures by the researchers through analyzing and valuing citation of the ophthalmological journals in Chinese.
Methods: There were 13 journals, of which five were core journals, to publish the results of primary study in ophthalmology in 2001. The citation amount and type, language category, self-citing rate of 13 journals were calculated. Meanwhile, the time distribution of citation, the Price index, the half-citing life and the cited situation of 5 core ophthalmological journals were investigated.
Results: In 2001, total amount of citations of 13 journals were 16,429. The mean citations per article were 5.13, and the mean citation rate 77.42%, self-citing rate 23.49%, other-citing rate 76.51%. The major language of citation was English (59.17%), and the major citation was from journals (89.25%). In 5 core ophthalmological journals, the time distribution of foreign language and Chinese references ranked at highest was the fourth and third year, respectively, after they were published. The total Price index of citations was 35.22%, the half-citing life of the Chinese and English references was 5.12 and 7.52 years, respectively.
Conclusions: The main citations of 13 ophthalmological journals came from the English journals. There was a short half-citing life for Chinese literatures. Cited-papers in Chinese were mainly from five core ophthalmological journals.