CiteScore Update for 2021

A few days ago, Scopus released the CiteScore for 2020. It seems that this time the methodology was not tweaked but remained the same as last year. As usual, the CiteScore update is a nice opportunity to have a fresh look at how the open access journals have performed in the past year and to highlight some noticeable changes (or lack thereof).

See the updated list here: LINK

What has changed:

The most noticeable change is that Educational Technology & Society (ET&S) is no longer the journal with the most citations per published documents but that International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education (ETHE) has taken its place. With a 2020 CiteScore of 9.2 (2019: 5.6), ETHE has seen a massive increase in citations: 1,686 cites over 183 documents. In comparison, ET&S has seen a more moderate increase with a 2020 CiteScore of 7.2 (2019: 6.3), consisting of a similar amount of cites (1,694), but spread out over more documents (235).

After the stagnation of last year (4.2 for 2018 and 2019), the International Review of Research on Open and Distributed Learning (IRRODL), has again seen an increase this year. Its 2020 CiteScore of 5.8 consists of 1,761 cites over 306 documents.

Another change worth noting is the steep increase in citations for Journal of New Approaches in Educational Research (NAER). Noted for its cool and modern take on scientific publishing, the journal has a 2020 CiteScore of 5.2 (2019: 2.4), with 412 cites over 80 documents.

Journal of Learning Analytics (JLA) is another journal that has seen a noticeable increase in citations, as reflected by its 2020 CiteScore of 3.4 (2019: 1.0). This score is made up of 161 cites from 47 documents. Given the popularity of Learning Analytics as a research field, this development makes a lot of sense and I suspect it will continue over the next years.

Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education (TOJDE) has received a CiteScore this year.* This 2020 CiteScore of 2.2 consists of 434 cites over 198 documents.

* Although the Scopus database currently reports consistent TOJDE scores for the preceding years, I’m quite sure that, as of last year, it had not received a 2019 CiteScore. It has happened in the past that scores have been attributed or been taken away retroactively for reasons I don’t understand.

What hasn’t changed:

Two journal that have seen little or no increase in their score are Research in Learning Technology (RLT) and Digital Education Review (DER), respectively. While RLT shows a slight increase with a 2020 CiteScore of 2.6 (2019: 2.4) with 350 cites over 130 documents, DER received the same score as last year, a 2020 CiteScore of 2.2, with 164 cites over 96 documents.

As last year, many journal still have not received a CiteScore in 2020. These are European Journal of Open, Distance, and E-Learning (EURODL), Pacific Journal of Technology-Enhanced Learning (PJTEL), Asian Journal of Distance Education (AJDE), Open Praxis, Studies in Technology-enhanced Learning (STEL), and Italian Journal of Educational Technology (IJET).

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