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The authors update prior studies that evaluated the publication output of faculty members in refereed logistics, supply chain management, and transportation journals to identify current trends and changes. In addition a new weighted average metric is used to allocate credit to universities for co-authored articles. The rankings among the top-tier schools show comparable changes to prior periods in terms of the number of new entrants to the top twenty-five ranked universities. However, for the first time, non-North American universities have entered the top five rankings, indicating the increased global interest in and importance of logistics and supply chain management publications.
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The authors provide an update of a research stream that began in 1981, and which examines the affiliation of authors who publish in logistics, supply chain management, and transportation journals (Vellenga et al. 1981). The journals included in this examination encompass primarily the managerial, economic, financial, and marketing facets of logistics, supply chain management, and transportation, as opposed to the engineering, operations research, and urban planning aspects. As was the case with the earlier studies (Allen and Vellenga 1987; Carter et al. 2001; Carter et al. 2005; Gentry et al. 1995; Vellenga et al. 1981), the present study addresses two research questions: (1) What are the relative contributions of authors from various affiliations to logistics, supply chain management, and transportation journals? and (2) Which universities' faculties are most productive based on the number of articles published in these academic journals?
The study investigates the time period from 2005 through 2007, and contrasts the findings from this period with the six earlier periods. This study differs from the prior five studies, and addresses potential gaps in the logistics and supply chain management literature, in two important ways. First, the current study uses a three-year as opposed to a six-year time period. This use of a three-year time period provides more timely and valuable feedback to faculty concerning the output of their respective institutions. While a six- or seven-year time frame has been used in the prior studies in this research stream, a three-year time period is commonly used in other business disciplines including accounting, finance, international business, management, marketing, and operations management. In addition, we perform sensitivity analyses to demonstrate the validity of using a three-year time period.
Second, the current study also contrasts the use of an un-weighted approach, found in the prior five studies and in other studies in the field of logistics and supply chain management (e.g., Carter and Ellram 2003), with a weighted approach in which the credit for a published article is divided by the number of authors of that article. The use of a weighted approach can be viewed as being more equitable, since it credits universities with the actual number of articles published, as opposed to the number of authors appearing on the cover pages of the articles.
In the next section of the article, the authors describe the study's methodology. This is followed by an investigation of the relative output of specific university faculties. The authors then perform a sensitivity analysis, comparing the approach of awarding multiple credits to universities for articles with co-authors from the same institution--the methodology used in the five prior studies--to the approach of crediting output in a weighted fashion, based on the number of authors per article--a methodology that is widely used in similar, extant studies of other business disciplines. The article concludes with an assessment of the study's findings, including changes between the 2005-2007 time period and the prior period, and broader trends that appear within the field.
METHODOLOGY
The majority of the earlier studies employed six-year time periods (Carter et al. 2005; Vellenga et al. 1981; Allen and Vellenga 1987; Gentry et al. 1995). However, the time period 2005-2007 (three years) was chosen for the present analysis (1) to provide a more timely update and feedback to faculty concerning the output of their institutions; (2) because a three-year time period has been used in the extant literature in other business disciplines including accounting (e.g., Brown and Gardner 1985), economics (e.g., Pieters and Baumgartner 2002), marketing (e.g., Zinkhan, Roth, and Saxton 1992), and operations management (e.g., Vokura 1996); and (3) a three-year time period still provides adequate data to smooth short-term fluctuations in publication patterns (Phillips, Baumgartner, and Pieters 1999). The current investigation examined the same eight journals that were employed in the two most recent studies: International Journal of Logistics Management, International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management, Journal of Business Logistics, Journal of Supply Chain Management, Journal of the Transportation Research Forum, Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, Transportation Research Part E, and Transportation Journal. The bases for the exclusion of specific journals (e.g., Transportation Research Record, Transportation Research, and International Journal of Transport Economics) can be found in the original study (Vellenga et al. 1981) and in Carter et al. (2001).
Next, data were collected concerning the general affiliation for each author across the eight journals and over the three-year time period. For authors with an academic affiliation, data were also amassed with respect to their institutional affiliations. Consistent with the five prior studies, the total number of articles per academic institution and departmental category was compiled. Also in keeping with the prior studies, each author's academic institution was initially credited with an article in the case of articles with two or more authors. In the event that faculty members were affiliated with separate campuses of a university, distinct institutional affiliations were assigned (e.g., University of Wisconsin versus University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire).
The methodological limitations of the present investigation were discussed extensively in the original study (Vellenga et al. 1981) and are therefore only briefly reexamined here. One limitation is that logistics, transportation, and supply chain management research that appears in economics and general business journals is excluded. This could potentially provide a bias against some universities based on the assumption that the faculty at these universities may have their articles published in widely recognized general journals such as Decision Sciences or the Academy of Management Journal. However, this limitation does not lessen the validity and relevance of the key findings of the study, as its main purpose is to examine the output of individual university faculties based on articles published in the primary journals dedicated to logistics, transportation, and supply chain management.
A second limitation relates to giving multiple credits to an academic institution for articles with co-authors from that same institution such that double (and even triple, quadruple, etc.) counting results. An alternative methodology, used in similar studies of other business disciplines, is to credit output in a weighted fashion, based on the number of authors per article (e.g., Aysen, Vitell, and Rose 2000 in marketing; Borokhovich et al. 1995 in finance; Dyckman and Zeff 1984 in accounting; Morrison and Inkpen 1991 in international business; Stahl, Leap, and Wei 1988 in management; and Young, Baird, and Pullman 1996 in operations management). Under this system, one point is credited to an institution for sole authorship, 0.5 points are given to each institution for an article with two authors, 0.33 points are credited to each author's institution for an article with three authors, etc. While there is no a priori basis for assuming that this methodology favors certain universities over others in terms of measuring output, we perform a sensitivity analysis using this more common, weighted approach, and present and compare the results of both approaches later in the article.
PRODUCTIVITY OF ACADEMIC INSTITUTIONS
As was expressed in the prior five studies, publications in top-tier journals continue to be the primary criterion in evaluating the research productivity of academic institutions. While books, monographs, and conference proceedings and presentations are also considered in faculty evaluations, refereed journal publications are clearly the most important standard. Table 1 displays the overall rankings of the top twenty-five academic institutions for the 2005-2007 time period, based on the number of times faculty from these institutions authored or coauthored articles in the eight journals.
Michigan State University continued to occupy the top ranked position during the 2005-2007 time period. However, the university's margin of published articles versus the next highest ranked schools during the 2005-2007 time period (29 percent more articles) is not nearly as high as was the case during the prior, 1999-2004 time period (64 percent more articles) (Carter et al. 2005, p. 59). One of the most notable changes displayed in Table 1 is the entrance of two non-U.S.-based universities into the top five ranked institutions. Cranfield University rose from sixth place to second place and Cardiff University rose four places to tie for fourth place with the University of Maryland. Also in the top five ranked institutions is the University of Tennessee, which rose from ninth place to second place.
Two schools in the top ten (University of Alabama and Imperial College of London) did not appear in the top twenty-five in the earlier (1999-2004) analysis. Unlike the prior time periods, there are not substantial declines or drop-offs within the table in terms of the number of articles published by institution. Rather, the decline in output is relatively gradual, with the exception of the decrease in output between Michigan State University and the second-ranked universities (Carter et al. 2005, 59).
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