Some research databases provide a way to identify other publications that have cited a particular article. This feature can have two purposes:
Some databases serve one of these purposes better than the other, but in either case, it is important to remember that the information is not comprehensive; it is generated from the limited contents within the database. For example, if you want to see how many times others have cited a particular article you wrote using HeinOnline, both the article you wrote and the sources citing to it have to be in HeinOnline. Articles that cite your work but are not available in HeinOnline will not be included in Hein's citation count, nor will books that cite your article. Because of its connection with Fastcase, HeinOnline will capture available court opinions’ citations to your work.
Another caveat to bear in mind is possible errors. For instance, if an article was cited incorrectly or an author publishes under multiple name variations, the algorithm might miss citations. Similarly, false hits might be caught, particularly for authors without unique names. Setting up an ORCID ID, or at least publishing under a consistent name format, can minimize these issues. Some platforms also allow you to correct the list of articles associated with you or add citing references missed in their counts. Beyond the mechanics of how “cited by” lists are generated, using citation counts as a measure of scholarly impact raises other questions, such as the fact that an article can be influential without being highly cited or be highly cited but of poor quality.
This page notes some of the platforms that provide citation analysis features to help you conduct research and analyze and raise your scholarly profile.
The red check mark you see in the upper right when looking at an article on HeinOnline provides citation and access count information. The image above shows what that looks like after clicking on the button with the red checkmark.
The easiest way to bring up information in SSRN is by doing an advanced search for either the article or author you want. Within the search results, you can then see the number of downloads on the right and can also click on the author name to bring up that person's SSRN profile.
To search for newer sources that have cited a published piece, use the cited reference search. We recommend leaving the select a database menu at All Databases. Complete one or more lines of the search form, entering information about the publication of interest. Note that Cited Work means the journal title, whereas cited title means the article title. Click Search to execute your search.
The initial results will list any publications that meet your criteria. Click the boxes to the left of the relevant titles. Make sure not to click any that are not relevant. As you can see below, slight differences in citation (here, the way the journal name is presented) might mean that multiple listings refer to the same publication. Click Finish Search to get results.
After executing that search, you will get the list of sources that cite your publication. Because Web of Science is a citation index, not a full-text source, you will need to go elsewhere if you want to see the full text of a citing publication. Clicking the Check for Full Text @ Drake button will run a SuperSearch search to see if Drake has the full-text in the library's print collections or in many of our electronic collections. Note that Lexis and Bloomberg Law do not link their content to this tool.
When you have a particular article open, click the Shepardize document button to generate a Shepard's report of citing sources.
The default Shepard's view is Citing decisions.
Click on Other Citing Sources to see additional types of documents, including treatises and law reviews, that have cited your source.
In the list of results, find your article. Look for the red upward facing arrows to find sources citing this article. Again, many articles will not have this option.
Source: All screenshots on this page created by Drake Law Library.