What mentions does Altmetric track?

 

Altmetric tracks Wikipedia references in certain languages (full list here) using the Wikipedia Events API. Mentions to research are identified when they are:

  1. In the "References" section of an article on one of those sites

  2. Using a properly-formatted Wikipedia citation tag

 

At the moment, we do not track mentions in any other languages as the ones mentioned above. We also don't track non-encyclopedic pages, such as:

  • User pages

  • Sandbox pages

  • Talk pages

  • Meta-wiki pages

 

 

What do valid citations look like?

 

In order for Altmetric to find a mention, the article cited must use a properly-formatted Wikipedia citation tag – just linking to an article isn't enough. We won't be able to track a mention of your research if a valid reference is not present in the article.

 

As an example, the Wikipedia page for Q Fever cites an article in the ASM Journal of Bacteriology

You should be able to find the reference to the article you want to add by searching for the title, Pubmed ID, DOI or other items from the paper. Our example Q Fever article includes the text:

 

Altmetric can only extract valid citations from Wikipedia. Any other format will not be collected by Altmetric and will not appear on your details page.

 

How do I add or edit a citation?

 

The process for adding a new citation has been updated to be easier to use and faster. There are multiple ways to add or edit citations. One way is to click the "edit" button on any subheading. Then put your cursor to the end of the sentence or paragraph that is relevant to your research.

 

You will then be prompted to enter the details of your citation. Simply add the URL, DOI, or PMID for your research output and click "Generate". 

 

 

You then click "Insert" and the citation is generated. 

 

You can then click "Save page", and your mention will be picked up by Altmetric.

It is also possible to add a citation by editing the source of the page.

 

If properly added, the citation should be picked up by Altmetric within 24 hours; however, a longer delay is possible, depending on whether the Wikipedia Events API is experiencing a backlog. Please note that if the mention is not automatically picked up, we will not be able to add it manually. 


What happens if a reference is removed?


If a reference is removed then the corresponding mention is also removed and the Altmetric Attention Score for the research output is recalculated.

 

Tracked languages in Wikipedia

  • English

  • French

  • German

  • Japanese

  • Spanish

  • Portuguese

  • Chinese

  • Italian

  • Persian

  • Arabic

  • Polish

  • Dutch

  • Ukrainian

  • Indonesian

  • Turkish

  • Hebrew

  • Czech

  • Swedish

  • Vietnamese

  • Finnish

  • Korean

  • Hungarian

  • Catalan

  • Norwegian

  • Hindi

  • Thai

  • Bangla

  • Greek

  • Romanian

  • Serbian

  • Swahili

  • Afrikaans

  • Egyptian Arabic

  • Uzbek

  • and many more to be added soon!