What factors affect the visibility of Argentinean publications in humanities and social sciences in Scopus? Some evidence beyond the geographic realm of research

Argentina´s patterns of publication in the humanities and social sciences were studied for the period 2003-2012, using the Scopus database and distinguishing the geographic realm of the research. The results indicate that “topics of national scope” have grown and gained international visibility. They can be broadly characterized as having Spanish as the language of publication, and a marked preference for single authorship; in contrast, the publication of “global topics”, not geographically limited, characteristically have English as the language of divulgation, and institutional collaboration is stronger and more consolidated. Citation is apparently not determined only by the geographic realm of research, but also by language of publication, co-authorship, and the profiles of the journals where published. These results could contribute to constructive reflection upon publishing policy. The existence of a community of journals that tolerates biased patterns may make researchers echo and perpetuate poor practices, constructing or adapting the channels of communication. Such results also prove useful as a point of reference when evaluation criteria are elaborated by scientific committees, as unsupervised promotion and evaluation patterns could become based on local or overly subjective precepts, disregarding the disciplinary practices of the international scientific community