====== ResearchGate ======

A study evaluated the utilization of ResearchGate for neurosurgical research collaboration and compared the ResearchGate score with more classical bibliometrics. ResearchGate as a unifying social platform that can strengthen global research collaboration (e.g. data sharing) in the neurosurgery community.

Publicly available metrics on a total of 3718 neurosurgery clinical faculty and residents in Canada and United States was obtained from the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) website. The following metrics were collected: program name, clinician name, sex, attending (yes or no), resident (yes or no), post-graduate year (if resident), ResearchGate profile (yes or no). ResearchGate score and its components and h-index excluding self-citations were collected. Fellows were not included.

Of the 3718 total individuals included, 1338 (36.0%) were present on ResearchGate, comprised of 181 (13.5%) females and 1157 (86.5%) males. Females and males were present in similar proportions (33.8% of females and 36.3% of males) χ2 (1, N=3718)=1.26, p = 0.26. A greater amount of faculty were present on ResearchGate than residents (62.4%) χ2 (1, N=3718) = 11.42, p=0.001. A very strong, positive monotonic correlation between H-index and ResearchGate score was shown rs (1292)= 0.93, p<0.0005. Over 400 international departments were determined.

ResearchGate may be a useful platform to increase neurosurgical networking and research collaboration. Its novel bibliometrics are strongly correlated to more classical ones
((Joshi ND, Lieber B, Wong K, Al-Alam E, Agarwal N, Diaz V. Social Media in
Neurosurgery: Utilizing ResearchGate. World Neurosurg. 2019 Apr 6. pii:
S1878-8750(19)30998-2. doi: 10.1016/j.wneu.2019.04.007. [Epub ahead of print]
PubMed PMID: 30965167.
)).
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ResearchGate provides an array of novel metrics such as the RG score, Research Interest score, and RG reads. However, the major [[criticism]] leveled at the alternative metrics and the sites that provide them has been the lack of [[transparency]] regarding the [[algorithm]]s used to calculate the metrics, thus precluding [[reproducibility]]
((Graz University of Technology: a critical look at the ResearchGate score as a measure of scientific reputation. [ Jul; 2022 ];Kraker Kraker, P. P., & Lex, E E. http://ascw.know-center.tugraz.at/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/ASCW15_kraker-lex-a-critical-look-at-the-researchgate-score_v1-1.pdf Proceedings of. 2015 2015:7–9.))
((Research Interest: another undisclosed (and redundant) algorithm by ResearchGate. Copiello S. Scientometrics. 2019;120:351–360.))
((Scholarly reputation in the digital age and the role of emerging platforms and mechanisms. Jamali HR, Nicholas D, Herman E. Res Eval. 2015;25:37–49.))