The Author-Assigned Citation Importance Measure
C-SQD aims to capture a meaningful measure of how much one manuscript contributes to another’s development. Traditional citation counts do not distinguish between critical references and those included mainly for completeness. To address this, we will implement a system where authors assign an importance score to each cited reference at the time of submission.
Our Method
Authors will classify each cited reference into one of three importance tiers:
- 3: Critically important—central to the manuscript’s methods, theory, or results.
- 2: Moderately important—used for context, framing, or secondary analysis.
- 1: Mildly important—cited for completeness, related work, or background details.
These assignments create a more informative citation profile. Instead of a single citation count, we have a rough signal of the reference’s role in shaping the citing work.
Initial Problems Considered
We began with the recognition that simple citation counts lack qualitative depth. Counting how many times one manuscript is mentioned across or within papers does not necessarily reflect its influence. Additional complexity arises when trying to infer importance automatically. It is difficult to determine from text analysis alone whether a citation is critical or peripheral.
Alternative Options Explored
- Asking Authors to Rank All Citations:
Having authors produce a full ranking would provide detailed data but would create substantial effort and possibly lead to unreliable or biased rankings, especially when dealing with large numbers of references. - Having Authors Select a Small Number of Top Citations:
Restricting authors to select their top-n most important references reduces their workload. However, it provides no gradient for other citations that might still be somewhat meaningful. - Automatic Text Analysis Methods:
Using NLP-based systems to infer citation importance could reduce author workload and bias. Yet such systems may be inaccurate or need extensive tuning and training, and they might not capture the author’s own perspective.
Reasons for Choosing Author-Assigned Scores
We will proceed with a system where authors assign an importance score to each reference, as outlined above. This approach is simpler than a full ranking, yet more informative than listing only a small number of top citations. Unlike fully automated methods, it captures the authors’ intentions directly. Unlike complex rankings or classification schemes, it requires only a small amount of additional effort during manuscript preparation.
By keeping the scale small (three tiers), we reduce the subjectivity and confusion that larger scales might introduce. Over time, as the platform gathers data, we can analyze how these author-assigned importance scores correlate with other indicators of citation quality. If necessary, we may later refine the scoring guidelines or add optional automated checks to ensure consistency.
In short, the author-assigned importance score approach balances effort, clarity, and utility. It provides a reasonable starting point to enrich citation data without overwhelming authors or relying solely on uncertain inference methods.