[AISWorld] Correction to the Journal of Information Technology 2016 Impact Factor

[Chris Sauer]

The Journal of Information Technology wishes to advise the Information Systems community of an error in the calculation of its impact factor.

The Journal Citation Report (JCR) for 2016 published in mid-2017 incorrectly stated the Journal of Information Technology’s 2 year impact factor as 6.953.

This was not consistent with the Editors’ expectations. Following an investigation by the Editors and Palgrave Macmillan (the Journal’s publisher), Clarivate (the publisher of the JCR) has acknowledged that it made an error.

Clarivate has stated, “The JCR team estimates at [sic] about 100 citations were incorrectly assigned to the numerator”.

Clarivate has declined to recalculate the Journal’s impact factor data. It has undertaken to correct the cause of the error so that the 2017 impact factor results to be published in 2018 should be correct.

The company has said, “The publisher is welcome to recalculate an unofficial Impact Factor by removing 100 citations from the numerator.”

On this basis, the Journal’s unofficial 2 year impact factor for 2016 would be 4.6. The Journal’s web site has been amended to give this figure as the best available estimate.



Chris Sauer & Leslie Willcocks

Joint Editors-in-Chief

The Journal of Information Technology

January 2018