An alternative axiomatization of the Hirsch index

We axiomatize the well-known Hirsch index (h-index), which evaluates researcher productivity and impact on a field, and formalize a new axiom called head-independence. Under head-independence, a decrease, to some extent, in the number of citations of “frequently cited papers” has no effect on the index. Together with symmetry and axiom D, head-independence uniquely characterizes the h-index on a certain domain of indices. Some relationships between our axiomatization and those in the literature are also investigated.