Kardashian Index

The Kardashian Index (K-Index), named after Kim Kardashian, is a metric measuring the discrepancy between a scientist's social media profile and publication record.^[1] Proposed in 2014, the measure compares the number of followers a research scientist has on Twitter to the number of citations they have for their peer-reviewed work.

Definition

The relationship between the number of Twitter followers ( $F$ ) and the number of citations ( $C$ ) is described as:

$F=43.3C^{0.32}$

The Kardashian Index is thus calculated as:

$K-index={\frac {F(a)}{F(c)}}$

where $F(a)$ is the actual number of Twitter followers of researcher $X$ and $F(c)$ is the number researcher should have given their citations.

Interpretation

A high K-index indicates an over-blown scientific fame while a low K-index suggests that a scientist is being undervalued. According to the author, researchers whose K-index > 5 can be considered 'Science Kardashians'.

Criticism

The K-index suggests that the number of citations of a given scientist is comparable to his or her scientific value. This assumption has been criticized.^[2]^[3]

References

↑ "The Kardashian index: a measure of discrepant social media profile for scientists" (PDF). Genome Biology. 15 (7): 424. July 30, 2014. doi:10.1186/s13059-014-0424-0. Retrieved August 15, 2014.
↑ "Introducing the "K Index"".
↑ "Citations are not a measure of quality".

Bibliography

Francisco, Mikael Angelo (2014-07-31). "The Kardashian Index: A scientific measure of unwarranted fame". GMA Network. Archived from the original on 2014-10-10. Retrieved 2014-10-10.
Staff writer (2014-08-05). "Scientist proposes Kardashian Index". Yahoo! News. Press Association. Archived from the original on 2014-10-10. Retrieved 2014-10-10.
Larki, Shadan (2014-08-05). "The 'Kardashian index' measures researchers' social clout". The Daily Dot. Archived from the original on 2014-10-10. Retrieved 2014-10-10.
Woolston, Chris (2014-08-14). "Clash over the Kardashians of science". Nature. Macmillan Publishers. 512 (17): 517. doi:10.1038/512117e. Archived from the original on 2014-10-10. Retrieved 2014-10-10.
Parr, Chris (2014-08-14). "Kardashian Index: the academics famous just for being famous". Times Higher Education. Archived from the original on 2014-10-11. Retrieved 2014-10-10.
Steinbauer, Von Anna (2014-09-22). ""Kardashian"-Index in der Wissenschaft". Süddeutsche Zeitung. Archived from the original on 2014-10-10. Retrieved 2014-10-10.

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