ASSESSMENT OF THE INTERNATIONAL STANDING OF UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENTS RESEARCH - A COMPARISON OF BIBLIOMETRIC METHODS

Several bibliometric methods of assessing the research performance of departments are examined: intranational comparison of departments, comparison with foreign departments of good standing, and comparison with a bibliometric world average. In the study, two Dutch experimental psychology departments were compared with one good US and one outstanding UK department. The better of the Dutch departments performed below both foreign departments. However, using the method involving Journal Citation Scores, it was shown that this Dutch department scored above world average recently, while the other department consistently scored below world average. The best picture is obtained when both methods are combined, which shows that the better Dutch department is ranking in the sub-top of the world, while the other department performs below average.