The discipline dependence of citation statistics

This study compares the citations characteristics of researchers in engineering disciplines with other major scientific disciplines, and investigates variations in citing patterns within subdisciplines in the field of engineering. Utilizing citations statistics including Hirsch’s (Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 102(46):16569–16572, 2005) h-index value, we find that significant differences in citing characteristics exist between engineering disciplines and other scientific fields. Our findings also reveal statistical differences in citing characteristics between subdisciplines found within the same engineering discipline.