Abstract
Biographical articles in scientific journals offer a platform for the commemoration of distinguished individuals from the world of science. Despite so important a role for the scientific community, research on biographical articles is scarce. To fill this gap, we have analyzed 190,350 biographical articles indexed in Web of Science, written by 251,908 authors in 1945–2014. We have analyzed the development of this article type over the studied period and research areas, how women and men are represented in the subject of articles, and who the authors are. Over the time the number of biographical articles has been increasing, with the highest number in Life Sciences and Biomedicine. Around 20% of the articles were written about women, with the highest share of 24% in Arts and Humanities. Both male and female authors write more often about men than about women, a stable situation for the last 70 years.
Highlights
Article types vary in their roles in the dissemination of knowledge and in their frequency in journals (Sigogneau 2000)
We have analyzed the development of this article type over the studied period and research areas, how women and men are represented in the subject of articles, and who the authors are
In order to do so, we analyze a collection of documents classified by WoS as either biographical item or item about an individual, published from 1945 to 2014 in scholarly journals indexed in Web of Science
Summary
Article types vary in their roles in the dissemination of knowledge and in their frequency in journals (Sigogneau 2000). Normally considered a source of original research, are the most basic—and the most important—document type; for instance, they accounted for 57.4% of all documents indexed by WoS for 2014. All others document types accounted for 2.2% of all the documents in 2014. In 1998, the two article types were joined into category biographical item, so we will not differentiate them throughout the whole studied period; we will refer to them by one term, biographical articles
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
