编者按 加费尔德(Eugene Garfield)博士是美国著名的情报学家，前美国情报学会主席。上世纪60年代以来，他先后创办了《科学引文索引》(SCI)、《艺术和人文科学引文索引》(A&HCI)、《社会科学引文索引》(SSCI)、《现刊目次》(Currentcontents)、《科技会议录索引》(ISTP)等大型索引刊物。45年来，三大引文索引刊物从最初的印刷版，经过光盘版，如今已发展为网络版ISI Web ofKnowledge…，总之，加费尔德博士及其创办的美国科技信息研究所(ISI)为文献信息检索开辟了一条新的蹊径，并为文献计量学、科学计量学的发展奠定了基础。
最近南京农业大学信息管理系侯汉清教授寄来了加费尔德博士2002年12月为其专著《引文索引的理论和应用》中译本新写的序言。本刊用英汉对照的形式全文发表这一序言，先飨读者。此书的中译本在加费尔德博士的大力支持下今年将由北京图书馆出版社正式出版。
关键词 引文索引法
1980年我首次访问中国时，《引文索引法的理论和应用》刚刚问世不到一年。1983年此书第一版销售告罄，由美国科技信息研究所重印。在我的众多出版物中，这本著作的被引率无疑是最高的，虽然我尚未做全面的分析以确定被引率高的原因。许多著者是把此书当作引文索引法或引文分析的符号而予以引用的。有些著者则是引用此书的某些章节，例如将引文数据应用在期刊评价或者文献计量学的其它方面。 1980年在中国当时有很少的迹象表明，引文索引法已为人知晓。但是几年后，引文索引法引起了中国学者、编辑以及科研管理者越来越大的兴趣。《科学引文索引》(简称SCI)印刷版和1980年以后的光盘版，在中国高校图书馆学和情报学系中越来越多地得到使用和讲授。随着互联网和美国科技信息研究所的“科学网”(Webof Science)的出现，SCI在文献检索中所独有的连接功能更加明显，它在科学研究和期刊评价方面的功用也日益突出。 尽管《科学引文索引》在美国及其它地方得到了广泛的普及，但是，相关的用户教育工作仍是一项永无止境的任务。美国科技信息研究所和大多数其他文摘索引机构一直在向图书馆员和科研人员开展大规模的用户教育项目，以推进其产品的普及和正确的使用。然而，短短几个小时的讲座或短暂的研讨会所能做的事情，往往是有限的。由一些已经掌握《科学引文索引》的科学家担任辅导教师、培训他们的学生，去解决每天实验室中遇到的研究问题，是最好不过的了。《引文索引法的理论和应用》一书可以帮助研究人员全面了解SCI的义理、内容及其广泛的应用。
在中国不少知晓用户教育需求的高等院校教师中，经过纽约长岛大学储荷婷教授的介绍，我结识了南京农业大学侯汉清教授。他提议，由他及他的一些同事把《引文索引法的理论和应用》(1979年版)翻译成中文，尽管此书距今已有20多年，并可以在网上免费获取，而且大多数研究者都可以用英语阅读科技文献。我同意了他的建议，因为引文索引法和引文分析的基本原理还没有改变。事实上在《科学引文索引》问世近40年之后，基于引文的检索已经成为一种惯用的检索方法。不管用户是从《科学引文索引》的一个题名关键词开始查找，还是利用它的其他索引查找，追踪一条被引的参考文献展开搜索，现在已经几乎成为一种常规的做法。当然，那些熟悉《科学引文索引》的用户会从一篇已知的论文或一本图书出发，并扩展其检索。
2002年我访问中国，先后到过北京、合肥、上海、成都和香港等地。我在上海停留期间，会见了侯汉清教授。我们在一起讨论了这篇中文序言的主题。为了赶上这本书出版的截止期，我们一致认为，要对过去25年中已经发表的众多相关文献予以评述，是不大可能的。前些年已经发表了多篇重要的述评文章。而且述评的主题仍在不断地更新。中国的期刊编辑和科研人员似乎更加关注于期刊影响因子这一论题的讨论。最近我发表的关于这些讨论的论文，已经全都放在我的个人免费网站上(www.eugenegarfield)。
最后我还要指出，有关此书第七章阐述的引文分析用于科学史图绘制这一论题的讨论，近年来十分活跃。我们已经开发出将《科学引文索引》的相关数据转换为科学史图的软件，详见美国情报学会2002年年会的报道(http://garfield.library.upenn.edu/paper/asis2002presentation.htm)。这些方法与“文献管理者”Reference Manager)之类工具的结合使用，将会使得科研人员管理个人文献的工作变得更加有效。引文索引法和引文分析的最终目的就在于促进研究人员创造性地获取情报，从而推动研究的创新与发现。
侯汉清 南京农业大学信息管理系教授，博士生导师
Preface toChinese Edition of Citation Indexing
presented by
Eugene Garfield
Chairman Emeritus, ISI
President and Founding Editor, The Scientist
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Tel. 215-243-2205
Fax 215-387-1266
e-mail: garfield@CODEX.cis.upenn.edu
Home Page: http://garfield.library.upenn.edu
When 1first visited China in 1980, Citation Indexing was less than one year old. By1983 the first edition was out of print so ISI issued a second reprint edition.Of my many publications, this work is undoubtedly my most-cited though I havenever done a context analysis to determine why it is cited. Many authors citethe book as a general reference using it as a symbol for the concepts ofcitation indexing or citation analysis. Others refer to specific chapters suchas the use of citation data in journal evaluation or other aspects ofbilbiometrics.
In 1980, there was little evidence that citationindexing was known in the People's Republic of China. Over the years, however,citation indexing has been increasingly of greater interest to Chinese scholars,editors, as well as research administrators. The original printed editions ofthe Science Citation Index, and since 1980 the CD�ROM versions of SCI, wereincreasingly used and taught in Chinese schools of library and informationscience. With the advent of the Internet and the ISI Web of Science, the uniquelinking capabilities of the SCI in literature searching became more apparent.And its use as a tool in research and journal evaluation grew significantly.
In spite of the wide popularity of SCI in the USand elsewhere, the education of users is a never-ending task. It is critical tothe wider and more intelligent use of its products that the Institute forScientific Information (ISI), and most other indexing and abstracting services,maintain large educational programs for librarians and researchers alike.However, there are limits to what can be accomplished in a few hours oflectures and seminars. The best training is provided by scientist mentors whoalready understand the SCI and can teach their students to use SCI in thecontext of day to day laboratory research problems. Citation Indexing canprovide searchers an overview of its broad implications.
Among the number of Chinese faculty members whowere acutely aware of this need for the education of users is Professor HouHanqing of Nanjing Agriculture University who was introduced to me by ProfessorHeting Chu of Long lsland University in New York. Hou suggested that he andsome colleagues would translate the 1979 edition of Citation Indexing intoChinese even though the book is now over 20 years old and available free on theweb and most researchers read scientific English. I agreed to this propositionbecause the fundamental principles of citation indexing and analysis have notchanged. Indeed, almost 40 years after the SCI was first established, citation basedretrieval has become a traditional search method. Whether one begins with anSCI title word search or a search of other indexes, it is almost routine todayto follow up with a cited reference search. Of course, those already familiarwith the SCI will start with a known paper or book and expand the search fromthere.
During my 2002 trip to China, I visited not onlyBeijing, but also Hefei, Shanghai, Chengdu, and Hong Kong. During my stop inShanghai, I was able to meet Professor Hou where we discussed the subjectmatter of this preface. In order to meet the deadline for publishing the book,we agreed it would be impossible to review the vast literature on the topicwhich has been published in the past 25 years. Several important reviewarticles have been published over the years but the subject will always neednew updating. In particular, the topic of journal impact factors seem to be onthe minds of many Chinese editors and researchers. My recent contributions tothese discussions have all been posted free of charge on my personal website:www.eugenegarfield.org.
In closing,let me point out that the subject matter of Chapter Seven concerning thepreparation of science historiographs has been actively pursued in recenttimes. We have been able to develop algorithmic methods for converting SCIoutputs to historiographs as reported at the 2002 meeting of the AmericanSociety for Information Science and Technology. (http://garfield.library.upenn.edu/papers/asis2002presentation.html).These methods, when combined with the use of tools such as Reference Managermake the task of managing the literature by the individual researcher moreproductive. The ultimate purpose of citaton indexing and analysis is tofacilitate more creative information recovery as well as discovery.
