RFQ Publication Quality Measures: Methodological Issues

The Research Quality Framework uses Thomson-ISI citation benchmarks as its main set of objective measures of research quality. The Thomson-ISI measures rely on identifying a core set of journals in which the major publications for a discipline are to be found. The core for a discipline is determined by applying a non-transparent process that is partly based on Bradford’s Law (1934). Yet Bradford was not seeking measures about quality of publications or journals. How valid then is it to base measures of publication quality on Bradford’s Law? We explore this by returning to Bradford’s Law and subsequent related research asking ‘what is Bradford’s Law really about? ’ We go further, and ask ‘does Bradford’s Law apply in Information Systems?’ We use data from John Lamp’s internationally respected Index of Information Systems Journals to explore th