Introduction

Highly cited researchers are scientists or scholars who have published a significant number of papers that have been cited by other researchers in their field. These individuals are considered to be experts in their field and their research is often considered to be highly influential and important. The use of highly cited researchers is to identify influential and respected members of a particular field, and to help identify key research areas and trends within that field. Additionally, highly cited researchers is also referred by institutions and funding agencies to identify and support researchers who are making important contributions to their field, as well as by journals to identify potential reviewers and editorial board members.
One of the most foremost list is Highly Cited Researchers compiled by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) that identifies scientists and social scientists who have published a high number of papers that are among the top 1% most cited in their respective fields. The list is based on data from the Web of Science, a database that indexes and tracks scientific literature and conference proceedings. The Highly Cited Researchers list is updated periodically, and it is considered to be a measure of the impact and influence of a researcher’s work within their field. Scientists who are included on the list are considered to be among the leading researchers in their field, and their work is often considered to be highly influential and important.
As a competition, Stanford University has published a new ranking of the world’s top 2% most influential scientists across all fields using Scopus citation data [1,2]. This database, created by Prof. John PA Ioannidis and his team at Stanford, is widely regarded as the largest collection of citation data and the most esteemed of its kind. This ranking aims to avoid misuse and misinterpretation of citation metrics as a measure of impact or excellence. To make it transparent and supposedly better than the ISI Highly Cited Researchers, the Stanford ranking uses “standardized citation metrics” to systematically rank the most-cited scientists in each field and provides standardized information on citations, h-index, co-authorship adjusted hm-index, and a composite indicator (c-score) to rank the top scientists in the world [1].
The top 2% or Stanford list was first published in 2019 to provide a ranking of scientists who have published a high number of papers that are among the top 2% most cited in their respective fields. The list is updated annually and the latest version, version 5, was published in September 2022 [1,2,3].
This Top 2% list is widely considered to be a prestigious list and is often used as a metric of a researcher’s productivity and influence in their field. However, it is important to evaluate the list and its methodology critically. Some criticisms of this kind of highly cited list include that it relies heavily on the number of citations a researcher has received, which may not always be an accurate measure of the quality or impact of their work. Additionally, the list may be biased towards researchers from developed countries and institutions with strong research programs. Another critique is that the list may be biased towards quantity over quality of research, and having many publications does not necessarily mean that the researcher is doing high-quality research.
Despite its limitations, the Highly Cited Researchers and the Stanford Top 2% most influential scientists list is still widely used as a measure of a researcher’s productivity and influence, and being named to the list is generally considered a significant achievement. Universities around the world proudly paraded their researchers when this list was announced every year. University news pompously reported that dozens of their researchers were included on Stanford University’s list of the world’s top 2% of scientists.
This top 2% list, is widely accepted without critical analysis. As there is no such analysis to this date, this study is the first to judiciously examine and critique the list by analyzing the outliers of the database. By studying the characteristics of this top 2% database, this study aims to gain insight into the factors that contribute to the database and identify potential misreporting and misuse. This paper goes all the way to suggest ways to improve it, to prevent further misuse. This is the first in the world known study that critically analyses the world’s top 2% of scientists list.