Citation Metrics and Boyer’s Model of Scholarship: How Do Bibliometrics and Altmetrics Respond to Research Impact?

This article explores how well bibliometrics and altmetrics reflect research impact in relation to Boyer’s Model of the Scholarship. Indices used for both types of metrics are explored and discussed while including an analysis on primary methodological works performed on each in the literature to date. As confirmatory in nature, we chose as our focus of analysis the most highly cited, solo-authored, peer-reviewed article from each of two scholars at an R1 institution in the field of higher education: a rising junior scholar and a well-established senior scholar. In addition to analysis of bibliometric and altmetrics, extensive textual analysis was conducted on the works ( n = 165) of both scholars to determine how substantitive in-text citations were from authors citing these scholars’ research. Different authors coded each of the citing works, and both inter-rater reliability ( k