Skip to contentScholarGate
LibraryBookshelfDeskReview StudioAssistant
Sign in
Journal Impact Factor/Evidence
Method evidence record

Journal Impact Factor

Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is a metric developed by Eugene Garfield in 1955 and published annually by Clarivate Analytics through Journal Citation Reports (JCR). It measures the average citation frequency of articles published in a journal over a two-year window, serving as a proxy for journal prestige and influence. A journal's Impact Factor equals the number of citations received in year Y to articles published in Y-1 and Y-2, divided by the number of citable items published in that same window. Despite widespread adoption in research evaluation, Impact Factor has significant limitations and critics argue it conflates journal prestige with article quality.

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Source record

Citations copied verbatim from the method’s source record. No claim-level verification is inferred from them.

Journal Impact Factor (JIF) Metric
Taxonomic method record · process-pipeline / bibliometrics
  • Garfield, E. (1972). Citation analysis as a tool in journal evaluation. Science, 178(4060), 471-479. · DOI 10.1126/science.178.4060.471
  • Clarivate Analytics. (2023). Journal Citation Reports: Impact Factor Methodology. https://clarivate.com/webofsciencegroup/essays/journal-citation-reports-methodology/ · URL
  • San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment. (2012). Retrieved from https://sfdora.org/ · URL
Open full method

Curated claims

Claims persisted in the evidence ledger, each with its own assessment.

No curated claims yet

This view does not invent a claim assessment when the ledger has none.

Related methods

Generated from the method graph and shown as machine-suggested relations — no evidence claim is inferred.

Same method familyH-Indexmachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familyJournal Citation Reportsmachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familySCImago Journal Rankmachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familyScopus Databasemachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.Same method familyWeb of Science Databasemachine-suggested · Relational suggestion, not evidence.

Evidence status

Sources recorded, not reviewed

Bibliographic sources are present. Claim-level evidence review has not been performed.

Sources

3 recorded citations, copied from the method source record.

Actions

Open method page
ScholarGate

A content-first reference library for research methods — what each one is, how it works, and where it comes from.

Open data (CC-BY)

Explore

  • Library
  • Search the library…
  • Browse by field
  • Fields
  • Journey
  • Compare
  • Which method?

Reference

  • Subjects
  • Atlas
  • Glossary
  • Methodology
  • Philosophy

Your tools

  • Bookshelf
  • Desk
  • Chat

Company

  • About
  • Pricing
  • Contact
  • Suggest a method

Entries are compiled from published sources for reference. Verifying the accuracy and suitability of any information for your own use remains your responsibility.

© 2026 ScholarGate · A research-method reference library
  • Privacy
  • Cookies
  • Terms
  • Delete account