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April 14, 2006
Why doesn't economics cite other fields?
WHO TALKS TO WHOM: INTRA- AND INTERDISCIPLINARY COMMUNICATION OF ECONOMICS JOURNALS
A talk by Jeffrey Pfeffer currently touring the world cites some stats from Who Talks to Whom? Intra- and Interdisciplinary Communication of Economics Journals, a 2002 paper by Rik Pieters and Hans Baumgartner:
" * 90% of citations in economics is intradisciplinary
* The 5 economics journals studied made no citations to management, marketing, anthropology, or psychology journals
* Economics is cited 4333 times by its sister disciplines between 1995 & 1997, while economics cites other disciplines (mostly finance at 79%) 601 times"
ABSTRACT of Pieters and Baumgartner:
Citation patterns between 42 journals in economics from 1995 to 1997 are examined, plus between economics and anthropology, political science, psychology, sociology and five business disciplines. Building on social network theory, we identify a hierarchical organization of journals in economics and seven journal clusters. Major citation flows are found from all areas of economics to the general interest and theory and method clusters, but not the other way around. Economics emerges as a significant source of interdisciplinary knowledge for the other social sciences and business. However, no area of economics appears to build substantially on insights from its sister disciplines.
Also note this recent piece in Foreign Policy by Moisés Naím suggest economics is overly inward gazing given its limited ability to preform its bread and butter task of forecasting the future(a point also made in a forthcoming book by Nassim Taleb).
AUTHORS:
Jeffrey Pfeffer
Rik Pieters
Hans Baumgartner
Posted by dggoldst at April 14, 2006 03:42 AM