CROSS-NATIONAL ASSESSMENT OF SPECIALIZATION PATTERNS IN CHEMISTRY

In this study, the specialization profiles of eleven countries are compared along two interconnected but distinct dimensions of research, viz. publication output and citation impact in nine subfields of chemistry. The data for comparative analysis were taken from Scientometric Datafiles.1 Since raw counts of publications and citations are confounded by the size of the countries and the size of subject fields, cross-national comparison is made, using relative indicators - activity index and attractivity index. The subfields of relative strength and weakness for these countries are identified from the values of these indicators. The similarity structure of specialization profiles of the eleven countries is mapped, using hierarchical cluster analysis and multidimensional scaling. This mapping leads to the representation of chemistry as it is structured by the dynamics of national science policies of these countries.