Hi Marisa,

I would caution you not to attribute too much importance to the Larivière paper. Larivière et al studied the period pre- 2000 and from 2001 to 2004. ETDs are a recent phenomena and there has been an exponential growth in them since 2004. The study was also limited to only Thomson Scientific databases.

This study came to the attention of the NDLTD Board of Directors in the fall of 2007.  We provided M. Larivière with some suggestions for further study such as incorporating works not included in the Thomson Scientific databases.  We also pointed out that one cause of low citations could be the continued inaccessibility of the large percentage of paper based theses and dissertations.

While I'm not sure if further studies have been done at the time we recognized the requirement to analyze long term trends to changes in theses citation rates on an ongoing basis.

Cheers,

Sharon

Sharon Reeves
Manager, Theses Canada / Gestionnaire, Thèses Canada Published Heritage Branch / Direction du patrimoine de l'édition Library and Archives Canada / Bibliothèque et Archives Canada 550, boul. de la Cité, Gatineau QC Canada K1A 0N4 [log in to unmask] Telephone / Téléphone 819-994-6882 Facsimile / Télécopieur 819-997-2395 Government of Canada / Gouvernement du Canada www.collectionscanada.gc.ca



-----Original Message-----
From: etd-l Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Marisa Ramirez
Sent: September 28, 2009 1:31 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: The Decline of ETD impact?

Hello all -

From anecdotal information, I was under the impression that the impact of theses has increased overtime particularly with increased access & availability of ETDs.

However,  I stumbled upon a bibliometric study that reported the following paradox: while theses are becoming increasingly accessible to scholars in the form of ETDs, the overall impact of theses has declined over time. (See Lariviere, V et al. (2008). "The declining scientific impact of theses: Implications for electronic theses and dissertation repositories and graduate studies"  Scientometrics,
74(1): 109-121.)

Are there any studies that support the contrary?

Thanks,
Marisa

Marisa Ramirez
Digital Repository Librarian
California Polytechnic State University
Phone: 805.756.7040
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