Examining the Impact of Chemistry Education Research Articles from 2007 through 2013 by Citation Counts

Evaluating the impact of Chemistry Education Research articles has historically centered on the impact factor of the publishing journal. With the advent of electronic journal indices, it is possible to determine the impact of individual research articles by the number of citations it has received. However, in a relatively new discipline, such as Chemistry Education Research, it is necessary to provide context for the citation counts, particularly because Chemistry Education Research faculty are likely evaluated by chemistry faculty in more established subdisciplines. This study seeks to provide context by reviewing the citation counts for a sample of 749 Chemistry Education Research articles published in chemistry education or science education journals from 2007 through 2013. The number of citations was found to follow a non-normal distribution and, thus, results are presented using quartiles to describe the range of citations. The results are delineated by metric of citations (Web of Science and Google Scholar), year published, and in terms of established authors.