PATENT BIBLIOMETRICS

In our 1975 monograph ''Evaluative Bibliometrics'' we discussed the ma ny uses of publication and citation analysis in the evaluation of scie ntific activities, and some of the basic statistical properties of the scientific literature, particularly the skewnness of the distribution s of publications and citations, reference time distributions, and var ious anomalies in the citation patterns from one country to another. O ver the last ten years we have devoted much of our energy to the devel opment of an analogous research base and infrastructure for patent bib liometrics, that is for the use of patents, and patent citations in th e evaluation of technological activities. There are remarkable similar ities between literature bibliometrics and patent bibliometrics, and t hey are both applicable to the same wide ranges of problems. This pape r will show that there are striking similarities between literature an d patent distributions of national productivity, inventor productivity , referencing cycles, citation impact and within country citation pref erences.