Text to reference ratios in scientific journals

Abstract

I n 1987, Peter Junars, the editor of Limnology and Oceanography, reported that the ratio of printed pages of text t o nunber of references had decreased during the period 1980 to 1987. I n other words, authors were using an increasing nunber o f references - an observation which was o f sane concern because Limnozoology and Oceanography publishes only a fixed nunber of pages per year. I n the present study, an attempt was made t o detenine whether journals from other scientific disciplines (botany, physical chemistry, and geology) were undergoing a similar change i n the ratio of text t o references. SCISEARCH, the online version o f Science Citation Index, was used t o obtain a random sample of 900 articles from 30 journals. Contrary t o Jumars' findings, no significant changes were observed between 1980 and 1987 i n the ratio of text t o references. However, overall article length did increase over the period studied.