h-index
J.E. Hirsch, a physicist at the University of California San Diego, developed the Hirsch, or h-index, in 2005 as a method for measuring productivity and impact of a researchers' works.
- An index to quantify an individual's scientific research outputPaper written by J.E. Hirsch in which he proposes the index h, defined as the number of papers with citation number higher or equal to h, as a useful index to characterize the scientific output of a researcher.
In the simplest terms, a researcher has an index of h if h of their papers have been cited as least h times each.
Important points to keep in mind:
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an individual's h-index will vary based on the dataset. Your h-index in Scopus will most likely be different than your h-index in Web of Science because they are different datasets.
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there is currently no means for weighing an individual author's contribution to given article, i.e. did the 2nd author put in as much work as the 4th author.
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citation counts are not necessarily a measure of the quality of research.