Search

Cited information is an important pathway of scientific influence. It can reflect the knowledge flows among research units. This study develops two new bibliometric indices—the Citation Flow Index (CFI) and the Normalized Citation Flow Index (NCFI)—to measure knowledge flows based on scientific literature citations. The CFI measures the interactions of knowledge flows among different research units. The NCFI measures the number of papers that a research unit cited and the number of papers by a research unit that are cited. The newly developed indices were tested on a country-wide scale using the literature on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP) as an example. The results indicate that the worldwide flow of knowledge on the QTP can be quantitatively measured and spatially displayed. Additionally, the annual NCFI change trend is analyzed for each research unit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]