Citation Analysis of Computer Standards & Interfaces: Technical or Also Non-Technical Focus?

This paper analyses to which extent research published in the Computer Standards & Interfaces (CSI) has a technical focus. It addresses three questions: (1) To what extent does CSI stay within its aims and scope in terms of research in computer standards and interfaces? (2) Are publications in CSI technical and if so to what extent do they cite research from other technical and non-technical disciplines? (3) How is the research field computer standards and interfaces recognized by other technical and non-technical research fields? The research was carried out by collecting data about citations, references, and keywords listed in articles and categorizing these according to the Science and Social Science categories of Web of Science. We find that CSI has been following its scope very closely in the last three years and that the majority of its publications have a technical focus. Articles published in CSI constantly cite research from various technical disciplines, but there are also a limited number of references to non-technical literature. Mostly technical journals cite CSI papers, with a few exceptions of non-technical journals. We can conclude that CSI stays within its scope of computer standards and interfaces interpreted in a technical sense.