Literature Growth, Journal Characteristics, and Author Productivity in Subject Indexing, 1977 to 2000

This study employed the Perl program, Excel software, and some bibliometric techniques to investigate growth pattern, journal characteristics, and author productivity of the subject indexing literature from 1977 to 2000, based on the subject search of a descriptor field in the Library and Information Science Abstracts (LISA) database. The literature growth from 1977 to 2000 in subject indexing could be fitted well by the logistic curve. The Bradford plot of journal literature fits the typical Bradford- Zipf S-shaped curve. Twenty core journals making a significant contribution could be identified from the Bradford-Zipf distribution. Four major research topics in the area of subject indexing were identified as: (1) information organization, (2) information processing, (3) information storage and retrieval, and (4) information systems and services. It was also found that a vast majority of authors (76.7%) contributed only one article, which is a much larger percentage than the 60% of original Lotka’s data. The 15 most productive authors and the key concepts of their research were identified