Citation Analysis and Research Assessment in the United Kingdom

E valuation of publicly funded university research in the United Kingdom has been conducted through a series of Research Assessment Exercises (RAEs) in 1992, 1996 and 2001. The results of the RAEs have been used as a factor in the calculation of public funds for distribution to universities for research. The primary mechanism used for the research evaluation has been direct peer review of submissions and publications from university departments. The conduct of the RAEs, the public debate generated and a recent central government report of future research evaluation has generated issues relevant to other jurisdictions and to the interest in research evaluation within information science. In particular, a crucial transformation in the value of citation analysis in research evaluation can be detected. Two antithetical viewpoints on the appropriate relation of citation analysis to the RAEs have coexisted within information science, developing since the mid-1990s. The dominant approach established strong correlations between rankings of entities for research assessment derived from citation analyses and from RAE grades. Replacement of the process of peer review embodied in RAE procedures by an ordering (and conversion of the ordering into grades) determined by the results of citation analyses was then advocated on the grounds of broad equivalence of results and lower relative costs. An alternative perspective (articuCitation Analysis and Research Assessment in the United Kingdom