Association Between Journal Citation Distribution and Impact Factor

There was an inverse relationship between the Gini coefficient and the log of the IF (coefficient: -0.13, p < 0.001; adjusted R2 = 0.26), with journals with higher IFs having lower Gini coefficients (Figure 1), signifying that higher-impact journals have a more equal distribution of citations compared with lower-impact journals. [...]these journals' Gini coefficients became more equal, to different degrees, after removing high-citation documents, suggesting that these papers have a marked impact on a given journal's citation distribution.