Investigation of the Accessibility of Online Citations in Iranian Researchers’ Articles Indexed in ISI in Translation Studies

Abstract

This study was intended to investigate the URLs of web resources in Iranian researchers’ articles indexed in ISI in translation studies. This applied research was of quantitative measurement type. The research method was citation analysis. The statistical population of this research was all articles by Iranian researchers in translation studies in ISI database which were indexed in SSCI (Social Science Citation Index). The results of this research revealed that in articles written by Iranian researchers indexed in ISI in translation studies there were 2411 citations of which 18 percent were online citations. The most frequently used domain in all three fields was .org. The most stable and persistent domains were .org and .com. The most frequent file format was pdf which had the highest rate of stability together with html. The status of inaccessible internet addresses in all investigated articles regarding error messages also indicated that in translation studies, 404 error message (Not found) was the most frequent error with 24 percent. The average half-life of online citations calculated in all investigated articles was 1 year and 11 months.