The Thomson Reuters Web of Knowledge has published the 2013 Journal Citation Reports. Following similar studies I performed in the past sever years (2007, '08, '09, '10, '11, '12, '13) here is my analysis of the current status and trends for the impact factor of computer science journals.
Let me start with an overview of the method I followed. I performed my analysis on the 476 journals appearing under the Web of Knowledge's computer science subject categories: artificial intelligence; cybernetics; hardware & architecture; information systems; interdisciplinary applications; software engineering; theory & methods. Note that journals may appear in many categories. In particular, there are many overlaps between the above categories and "electrical and electronic engineering" and "operations research and management science".
Don't take this report too seriously. The impact factor is notoriously prone to misuse; let's not make the situation worse. You can learn more about the corresponding issues by reading the key points or the complete statement of the IEEE on the appropriate use of bibliometric indicators for the assessment of journals, research proposals, and individuals. Also note that in computer science there are tens of prestigious conferences. For a ranking of these conferences you may wish to consult the Conference Ranking Exercise performed by the Australian Government's, Excellence in Research for Australia body.
Journals with the Highest Impact Factor
| Rank | Name | ISSN | IF |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ACM T INTEL SYST TEC | 2157-6904 | 9.390 |
| 2 | IEEE T IND INFORM | 1551-3203 | 8.785 |
| 3 | IEEE WIREL COMMUN | 1536-1284 | 6.524 |
| 4 | IEEE COMMUN SURV TUT | 1553-877X | 6.490 |
| 5 | IEEE T FUZZY SYST | 1063-6706 | 6.306 |
| 6 | INT J NEURAL SYST | 0129-0657 | 6.056 |
| 7 | IEEE T PATTERN ANAL | 0162-8828 | 5.694 |
| 8 | COMPUT-AIDED CIV INF | 1093-9687 | 5.625 |
| 9 | IEEE T EVOLUT COMPUT | 1089-778X | 5.545 |
| 10 | MIS QUART | 0276-7783 | 5.405 |
Interestingly, just one of the journals with the highest impact factor comes from a commercial publisher: Computer-aided civil and infrastructure engineering, which is published by Wiley-Blackwell. All the rest are published by professional or academic institutions: IEEE (6 titles), ACM, Oxford University Press, and the Society for Management Information Systems.
Seven journals in this list were also in the top-ten list last year. The newcomers are IEEE Wireless Communications, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, and ACM Transactions on Intelligent Systems and Technology. The Enterprise Information Systems journal, on whose strange appearance at the top of the top-ten list I commented last year, has no longer its impact factor published by Thomson Reuters. I leave the reasons behind its disappearance from the Journal Citation Reports as an exercise to the reader.
The ACM Computing Surveys, which used to appear in the top-ten list until 2012, is missing for a second year in a row.
Journals Added to the JCR in 2013
| Name | ISSN | IF |
|---|---|---|
| ACM SIGCOMM COMP COM | 0146-4833 | 1.102 |
| ACM T INTEL SYST TEC | 2157-6904 | 9.390 |
| CRYPTOGR COMMUN | 1936-2447 | 0.647 |
| IEEE DES TEST | 2168-2356 | 1.140 |
| IEEE J BIOMED HEALTH | 2168-2194 | |
| IEEE T AFFECT COMPUT | 1949-3045 | 3.466 |
| IEEE T CYBERNETICS | 2168-2267 | |
| IEEE T HUM-MACH SYST | 2168-2291 | |
| IEEE T SYST MAN CY-S | 2168-2216 | 2.169 |
| INT J COMPUT INT SYS | 1875-6891 | 0.451 |
| INT J INF TECH DECIS | 0219-6220 | 1.890 |
| INT J WAVELETS MULTI | 0219-6913 | 0.694 |
| INTELL AUTOM SOFT CO | 1079-8587 | 0.189 |
| J COMPUT SCI-NETH | 1877-7503 | 1.567 |
| J DATABASE MANAGE | 1063-8016 | 0.903 |
| J PARALLEL DISTR COM | 0743-7315 | 1.011 |
| J SIMUL | 1747-7778 | 0.383 |
| KNOWL INF SYST | 0219-1377 | 2.639 |
| MOB INF SYST | 1574-017X | 1.789 |
Three of the journals added to the JRC in 2013 don't have an impact factor included in the list, although they do have both citations (26, 116, 23) and articles (116, 179, 56) in 2013. This can be explained by the following renaming exercise performed by the IEEE Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Society.
| Old Name | New Name |
|---|---|
| IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS PART A: SYSTEMS AND HUMANS | IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS: SYSTEMS |
| IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS PART B: CYBERNETICS | IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CYBERNETICS |
| IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SYSTEMS, MAN, AND CYBERNETICS PART C: APPLICATIONS AND REVIEWS | IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON HUMAN–MACHINE SYSTEMS |
The publication IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics also comes from renaming IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine. The renamed journals obtained a new ISSN, which, apparently, reset their impact factor. Keep that in mind, when coming up with a very specific and trendy new journal title, or when deciding to change a journal's name. The Part B and Part C journals also appear in the 2013 JCR, while Part A seems to have been dropped with that name (see below).
Journals Dropped from the JCR in 2013
| Name | ISSN | Last Year's IF |
|---|---|---|
| APPL INTELL | 0924-669X | 1.853 |
| BIOMED ENG-APP BAS C | 1016-2372 | 0.233 |
| COMPUT COMMUN REV | 0146-4833 | 0.909 |
| COMPUT MATH APPL | 0898-1221 | 2.069 |
| ENTERP INF SYST-UK | 1751-7575 | 9.256 |
| ICGA J | 1389-6911 | 0.519 |
| IEEE DES TEST COMPUT | 0740-7475 | 1.623 |
| IEEE T SYST MAN CY A | 1083-4427 | 2.183 |
| INFORM TECHNOL LIBR | 0730-9295 | 0.595 |
| J RES PRACT INF TECH | 1443-458X | 0.222 |
I have already commented about the disappearance of the Enterprise Information Systems journal, with a stellar 2012 impact factor of 9.256 in the first section of this entry.
Journals with the Highest Increase in their Impact Factor
| Name | ISSN | IF | Δ IF |
|---|---|---|---|
| IEEE T IND INFORM | 1551-3203 | 8.785 | 5.404 |
| IEEE WIREL COMMUN | 1536-1284 | 6.524 | 2.784 |
| IEEE COMMUN SURV TUT | 1553-877X | 6.490 | 1.672 |
| EVOL COMPUT | 1063-6560 | 3.733 | 1.624 |
| ACM T MATH SOFTWARE | 0098-3500 | 3.289 | 1.355 |
| INTEGR COMPUT-AID E | 1069-2509 | 4.667 | 1.297 |
| INFORM FUSION | 1566-2535 | 3.472 | 1.21 |
| ARCH COMPUT METHOD E | 1134-3060 | 4.136 | 1.205 |
| SWARM INTELL-US | 1935-3812 | 1.833 | 1.193 |
| COMPUT-AIDED CIV INF | 1093-9687 | 5.625 | 1.165 |
Worryingly, the magazine with the highest increase in its impact factor, IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, owes most of the increase to citations published in the same magazine: 514 (35% of 1432) self cites to years used in the impact factor calculation. Without these self cites its impact factor would be 5.632, rather than 8.785. The hundreds of yearly self-citations used to be below 50 up until 2008. Another 195 (102 and 93) citations come from the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, up, again, from below 10 citations per year until 2009. Significant citations and a rise in them in 2012 come from Enterprise Information Systems (27) and Mathematical Problems in Engineering (30); I commented on both of these journals last year.
From the magazines with the highest increase in their impact factor IEEE Wireless Communications and Computer-Aided Civil and Infrastructure Engineering appear in the list for the second year in a row. Other than that, IEEE Computational Intelligence Magazine and Swarm Intelligence revert to the mean, after appearing on the journals with the highest decrease in their impact factor last year.
Journals with the Highest Decrease in their Impact Factor
| Name | ISSN | IF | Δ IF |
|---|---|---|---|
| IEEE COMPUT INTELL M | 1556-603X | 2.706 | -1.923 |
| DATA MIN KNOWL DISC | 1384-5810 | 1.743 | -1.134 |
| J STAT SOFTW | 1548-7660 | 3.801 | -1.109 |
| KNOWL-BASED SYST | 0950-7051 | 3.058 | -1.046 |
| IEEE T SYST MAN CY C | 1094-6977 | 1.526 | -1.022 |
| IEEE T AUTON MENT DE | 1943-0604 | 1.348 | -0.822 |
| COMPUT PHYS COMMUN | 0010-4655 | 2.407 | -0.671 |
| ARTIF INTELL REV | 0269-2821 | 0.895 | -0.67 |
| IEEE T RELIAB | 0018-9529 | 1.657 | -0.636 |
| ACM T COMPUT-HUM INT | 1073-0516 | 0.574 | -0.605 |
In this table we seem to have a case of means reversal for Knowledge-based systems, which appeared in the journals with the highest increases last year.
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