“睡美人”文献及唤醒睡美人的“王子”文献的识别方法与典型特征研究

A “Sleeping Beauty in Science” is a publication that goes unnoticed (or “sleeps”) for a long time and then, almost suddenly, attracts a lot of attention (or “is awakened by a Prince”). This concept is actually a quantitative description of “delayed recognition of scientific achievements”, a phenomenon widely discussed in sociology of science. “Premature discoveries” and “transformative innovations” are crucial for the development of science, but they are often initially neglected or resisted by the scientific community and thus are often subject to delayed recognition. Based on our early study, this project plans to carry out the following several tasks. First, we will apply big data analysis techniques to develop a systematic methodology for identifying sleeping beauty publications, and investigate the typical patterns of them based on a comparative study towards articles which have the similar age, citations and research level with the sleeping beauty. Second, using co-citation analysis, citation content analysis, as well as the interviews to authors of the sleeping beauty and the corresponding prince articles, we seek to identify princes who awake the sleeping articles and arouse attention of the science community to previously overlooked sleeping beauty‘s research. Meanwhile, we will figure out the awaking mechanisms through a retrospective analysis of typical cases, combined with a detailed citation analysis of a set of sleeping beauties together with that of the corresponding princes (if any). Third, we try to explore the critical markers for assessing the hidden value of less cited papers by linking article recommendations in Faculty of 1000 with citations in Scopus. Finally, we will recommend some measures to avoid delayed recognition based on the above research. This study will extend the application scope of citation content analysis, and provide implications for identifying potential “ahead of time” discoveries or transformative research, and shortening time lag for such original research to get recognized.

“睡美人”文献是从科学计量学角度对科学社会学延迟承认现象的定量描述，其本质是超前性或变革性科学研究。针对睡美人文献“发表后长期未被引，而后突然高被引”的时序特征和动态过程，开展以下研究：①探索从海量文献中系统识别睡美人文献的模型与方法，并通过对照研究分析其典型特征。②鉴于“王子”文献对睡美人文献的被引突增起关键诱发作用，综合同被引分析、引文内容分析以及对双方作者的定性访谈，形成王子文献识别方案。基于典型案例与客观证据，回顾性分析睡美人-王子文献之间的引用网络与创新关系，揭示王子文献特质。③基于文献发表之初同行评议与此后被引次数二维数据，设计对照研究，前瞻性探索零被引或低被引文献因其内在知识价值而受到高推荐的影响因素。综上，凝练评价低被引文献具有睡美人潜质的关键线索，制定规避延迟承认的策略建议。为从理论上拓展引文分析方法，在实践中发现超前性或变革性创新以及缩短重大科学发现的认可时滞提供依据。

“睡美人”文献是从科学计量学角度对科学社会学延迟承认现象的定量描述，其本质是超前性或变革性科学研究。针对睡美人文献“发表后长期未被引，而后突然高被引”的时序特征和动态过程，开展了以下研究：①提出一个从海量文献中系统识别睡美人文献的非参数指标，可挖掘平常易被忽视的非高被引文献中的睡美人文献，也解决了不同学科领域论文被引规模差异导致的睡美人文献难以统一定义的问题。②通过回顾性研究揭示出睡美人文献具有“多出自跨学科研究和综合性期刊”、“多具有潜在技术与应用属性”、“多为高质量研究”三大特征。③设计“延迟承认”与“立即承认”论文集对照研究发现，与引文曲线表现为“立即承认”的文献相比，延迟承认型文献会被更多的专利（族）引用，其首次施引专利的影响力更大，且被专利引用的持续时间更长。④通过引文分析揭示出不同类型科学研究遭遇延迟承认的唤醒机制，即“王子文献”的特征：以生物学为代表的基础研究领域表现为“专利唤醒”，即“技术驱动唤醒机制”；以临床医学为代表的应用基础研究或应用研究领域表现为“综述、指南等二次文献唤醒”，即“共识驱动唤醒机制”。多数延迟承认文献可能遵循“同学科科学共同体内零星式扩散——从科学向技术交叉扩散——从技术再次反馈到科学，并在不同学科间扩散”的引文路径。⑤根据已积累生物医学案例，睡美人文献多与超前性技术或变革性技术有关。例如超分辨率荧光显微镜、高压氢气治疗癌症、经皮腔内血管成型术等均是重大技术发明。具有颠覆效应的科学突破可能先在技术领域被验证和认可，即“间接影响或直接形成了技术”，进而再反馈到科学领域被认可。这解释了睡美人文献在“睡眠期”（极少被科学论文引用）会被专利引用。提示需重视那些尽管在科学界被引很少，但却已被专利引用的论文，这类研究可能具有潜在变革性。⑥提出早期预测睡美人文献的两个思路：一是从引用角度，综合采用科学引用延迟分析（Bcp指数）和论文-专利引用分析，识别中低被引论文（under-cited）中未来可能突然高被引的论文。二是从文本角度，本项目发现具有变革性/颠覆性效应的延迟承认文献发表早期表现为批评式或争议式引用，或科学知识陈述具有不确定性语言修饰特征，可采用施引文献中的评论性引用语句和原始文献中的不确定性表述语句等计算语言学方法，预测科学研究的潜在变革性。以上研究为从理论上深化引文分析方法，在实践中预测超前性或变革性研究提供了重要依据。