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The many publics of science: using altmetrics to identify common communication channels by scientific field

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Abstract

Altmetrics have led to new quantitative studies of science through social media interactions. However, there are no models of science communication that respond to the multiplicity of non-academic channels. Using the 3653 authors with the highest volume of altmetrics mentions from the main channels (Twitter, News, Facebook, Wikipedia, Blog, Policy documents, and Peer reviews) to their publications (2016-2020), it has been analyzed where the audiences of each discipline are located. The results evidence the generalities and specificities of these new communication models and the differences between areas. These findings are useful for the development of science communication policies and strategies.

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Notes

  1. Our first PCA showed a Communality of 0.119 for this indicator, hence it was removed.

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Funding

This work has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation grant numbers PID2019-109127RB-I00/SRA/https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033 and PID2020‐117007RA‐I00/10.13039/501100011033, and Regional Government of Andalusia Junta de Andalucía grant number A-SEJ-638-UGR20. Wenceslao Arroyo-Machado has an FPU Grant (FPU18/05835) from the Spanish Ministry of Universities. Nicolas Robinson-Garcia is funded by a Ramón y Cajal grant from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (REF: RYC2019-027886-I). Domingo Docampo has received financial support from the Xunta de Galicia (Centro singular de investigación de Galicia accreditation 2019–2022) and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund—ERDF).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Information and Communication Sciences, University of Granada, Granada, Spain

    Daniel Torres-Salinas, Wenceslao Arroyo-Machado & Nicolas Robinson-Garcia

  2. Atlantic Research Center for Information and Communication Technologies, University of Vigo, Vigo, Spain

    Domingo Docampo

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  1. Daniel Torres-Salinas

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  2. Domingo Docampo

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  3. Wenceslao Arroyo-Machado

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  4. Nicolas Robinson-Garcia

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Correspondence toWenceslao Arroyo-Machado.

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Nicolas Robinson-Garcia is Associate Editor of Scientometrics.

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Appendix

Appendix

See Fig. 4, Table4.

Fig. 4
figure 4

ESI categories and resume of the selection process form identification of top authors

Table 4 Principal component analysis for the 23 ESI fields

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Torres-Salinas, D., Docampo, D., Arroyo-Machado, W.et al. The many publics of science: using altmetrics to identify common communication channels by scientific field.Scientometrics129, 3705–3723 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-024-05077-1

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