English

Stochastic modeling of citation slips

Disordered Systems and Neural Networks 2007-05-23 v2 Physics and Society

Abstract

We present empirical data on frequency and pattern of misprints in citations to twelve high-profile papers. We find that the distribution of misprints, ranked by frequency of their repetition, follows Zipf's law. We propose a stochastic model of citation process, which explains these findings, and leads to the conclusion that 70-90% of scientific citations are copied from the lists of references used in other papers.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0401529,
  title  = {Stochastic modeling of citation slips},
  author = {M. V. Simkin and V. P. Roychowdhury},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0401529},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

Some corrections and additions. To appear in Scientometrics

R2 v1 2026-07-22T10:59:10.376Z