Application of Lotka’s Law in Current Science Journal

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to examine the application of Lotka’s law in current science journals. Aim: To investigate the scientific productivity of authorship patterns in current science journals. To verify the Lotka’s law using general power method (n≠2) and inverse square method (n=2) and to analyse the frequency distribution of author’s productivity by applying non parametric Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Chi-square goodness-of-fit test. Methodology: Data for the present study retrieved and downloaded from Web of Science (WoS) bibliographical database [accessed on 20.12.2019] using the term “current science” in the publication field. Total of 4298 papers published by 777 authors during 2014 to 2018. Egghe suggested four methods to count author distribution from that straight counting method used in this study to calculate author distribution of the dataset. Findings: Lotka’s law didn’t fit the current science publication using general power method as well as inverse square method and the calculated value of ‘n’, ‘c’ and critical value are 0.41, 0.058 and 0.0585. The maximum deviation and observed frequency of the author’s productivity is greater than that of the critical value by applying Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and Chi- square goodness-of-fit test. Conclusion: The study concluded that current science journal publication during the study doesn’t confirm the applicability of Lotka’s law.