Wolfgang Glänzel - Böcker

This handbook offers a state-of-the-art overview of quantitative science and technology research. It focuses on the development and application of indicators derived from data on scientific or scholarly publications and patents. It comprises 34 chapters written by leading specialists in the various sub-domains. These chapters deal with theoretical and methodological issues, illustrate applications, and highlight their policy context and relevance. Authors present a survey of the research topics they address, and show their most recent achievements. The 34 chapters are arranged into 5 parts: Disciplinary Approaches; General Methodology; The Science System; The Technology System; and The Science–Technology Interface. The Editor’s Introduction provides a further specification of the handbook’s scope and of the main topics addressed in its chapters. This handbook aims at four distinct groups of readers: – practitioners in the field of science and technology studies; – research students inthis field; – scientists, scholars and technicians who are interested in a systematic, thorough analysis of their activities; – policy makers and administrators who wish to be informed about the potentialities and limitations of the various approaches and about their results.

This handbook presents the state of the art of quantitative methods and models to understand and assess the science and technology system. Focusing on various aspects of the development and application of indicators derived from data on scholarly publications, patents and electronic communications, the individual chapters, written by leading experts, discuss theoretical and methodological issues, illustrate applications, highlight their policy context and relevance, and point to future research directions.A substantial portion of the book is dedicated to detailed descriptions and analyses of data sources, presenting both traditional and advanced approaches. It addresses the main bibliographic metrics and indexes, such as the journal impact factor and the h-index, as well as altmetric and webometric indicators and science mapping techniques on different levels of aggregation and in the context of their value for the assessment of research performance as well as their impact onresearch policy and society. It also presents and critically discusses various national research evaluation systems.Complementing the sections reflecting on the science system, the technology section includes multiple chapters that explain different aspects of patent statistics, patent classification and database search methods to retrieve patent-related information. In addition, it examines the relevance of trademarks and standards as additional technological indicators.The Springer Handbook of Science and Technology Indicators is an invaluable resource for practitioners, scientists and policy makers wanting a systematic and thorough analysis of the potential and limitations of the various approaches to assess research and research performance.

We intend to edit a Festschrift for Henk Moed combining a “best of” collection of his papers and new contributions (original research papers) by authors having worked and collaborated with him.