Introduction:
The World
Wide Web has now become one of the main sources of information on academic
and research activities, and therefore it is an excellent platform to
test new methods of evaluating webometric activities. However the world
scientific community has not yet accepted the Web as a full supplement or
a complement to traditional scientific publishing.
University
web sites in many countries are large multifaceted communication devices,
and are increasingly used for a wide variety of purposes, from attracting
new students to providing online library catalogues. In terms of
research, university web sites can announce the existence and promote the
achievements of individuals, research groups, institutes and departments.
They can also disseminate findings, either by hosting online articles or
by publishing summaries, data sets or tools. The pages themselves can be
created centrally, by administrators or webmasters, or locally by
individuals for themselves or their research team or projects. Potential
benefits of an effective web presence include greater research impact,
attracting students, media interest and commercial contacts. In this
context it is logical to investigate measures of the effectiveness of web
sites, both to study the communication activity that they represent and
to build useful evaluation metrics (Vaughan &
Thelwall, 2005).
Research objectives
and aims
In this
paper, we investigate the impact of Iranian university web sites as a
part of the World Wide Web, and we try to answer the following research questions:
- What is the impact of Iranian university
web sites on the overall information resource of the World Wide Web?
- Do the linguistic, cultural and
geographic area of origin of a web site contribute to the site
impact?
- To what extent are the Web information
resources of the Persian-language world recognised in the largely
English language world of the Web?
Many
students, faculties, institutions, the government and the public in
general are interested in rankings of universities for different purposes.
However, the quality or reputation of universities cannot be precisely
measured by mere numbers. It would be impossible to have a comprehensive
qualitative and not quantitative ranking of Iranian universities, because
of the huge differences in universities and the technical difficulties in
obtaining comparable data across universities. On the other hand, there
is no ranking of Iranian universities using multiple criteria. However,
the research unit of the Iranian Ministry of
Science, Research & Technology writes a report entitled "Iran's
national report on ranking universities based on their scholarly articles
indexed by ISI" every year. It is used as a national measure of
research productivity among Iranian universities.
We decided
to establish a kind of academic ranking of Iranian universities by
evaluating their WIFs. We hope the ranking will help the reader to
compare and identify Iranian universities by their WIFs. However, any
ranking is controversial and no ranking is absolutely objective.
Literature review
Bibliometric
research methodologies of library and information science have always
been used to provide tools for understanding the dynamics of disciplines,
developing policy, and justifying research funding. Cronin & McKim
(1996) have pointed out that the Web is becoming a significant
communication medium for science and scholarship, and bibliometric
studies of scholarly publishing are being extended to the Web. A growing
literature has emerged that applies bibliometric measures to cyberspace.
Terms applied to this new area of study include "webometrics" (Almind & Ingwersen,
1997), and "cybermetrics" (the title of a journal). Webometrics
is defined as: "the study of the quantitative aspects of the
construction and use of information resources, structures and
technologies on the Web, drawing on bibliometric and informetric
approaches" and cybermetrics is proposed as a generic term for:
"the study of the quantitative aspects of the construction and use
of information resources, structures and technologies on the whole
Internet, drawing on bibliometric and informetric approaches" (Björneborn, 2004).
A key to
webometric studies has been the use of large-scale search engines, such
as AltaVista and AlltheWeb that allow measurements to be made of the
total number of pages in a web site and the total number of backlinks to
the web site. These search engines provide similar possibilities for the
investigation of links between web sites/pages to those provided by the
academic journals citation databases by the Institute of Scientific
Information (ISI). But the content of the Web is not of the same nature
and quality as the databases maintained by the ISI (Noruzi, 2005a).
The Web
provides a fertile ground for the extension of the bibliometric
techniques developed for the conventional print environment. A number of
studies have been published, establishing the concept of webometrics (Larson, 1996; Almind & Ingwersen,
1997; Rousseau,
1997; Smith &
Thelwall, 2002; Björneborn,
2004; Björneborn
& Ingwersen, 2004). In particular, the WIF has been proposed by Ingwersen (1998)
as a method of gauging the influence of web sites on each other, and of
analysing links between institutions. Ingwersen proposed Web Impact
Factors by analogy with Journal Impact Factors (JIF), and Mike Thelwall
has developed the WIF in several papers in order to find possible
correlations to traditional research productivity indicators (Björneborn, 2004).
The WIF as
a useful measure of the overall influence of a web site, using the
backlinks or inlinks (links coming into a site from other sites) to the
web site, has been proposed independently by two bibliometric
researchers. It is an interesting illustration of the dominance of
English language research publishing that the concept of WIF was
published first in a Spanish language journal by Rodríguez i Gairín
(1997), but was not widely noticed until published in an English language
journal by Ingwersen
(1998).
The
Journal Impact Factor can be broadly defined as the ratio of a numerator
-the citations made to a journal, to the denominator -the number of
articles (or citable items) published in that journal (Garfield, 1994).
For the WIF, on the other hand, the numerator is the number of link pages
made to a web site and the denominator is a measure of the size of the
web site. In other words, a WIF is the number of pages linking to a web
site, divided by the number of pages in the web site at a given point in
time.
The time
periods for the WIF and the JIF are different. The JIF measures citations
made in journals published during one time period to articles published
in another time period while the WIF is a "snapshot" of
a search engine database at a specific time. Compared with the content of
a journal paper, the content of a web resource lacks peer review and thus
lacks quality control. The WIF is therefore not exactly the equivalent of
the JIF. However, the WIF was inspired by the JIF (Noruzi, 2005a).
Links to a web site can be made from within the web site, or from
outside, giving rise to three distinct WIFs: the overall WIF, combining
inlinks and self-links; the inlink (revised) WIF, reflecting the number
of pages linking from outside the web site being measured; and the
self-link WIF, reflecting the number of pages linking from inside the web
site.
Inlinks
can be seen as an indicator of the overall significance and importance of
a site. The number and the source of inlinks to a site are currently
being used by Google
to rank the relevance of retrieved results to the search queries. Google
employs a conventional text-based scan to create an index of the Web's
content, but the pages recommended in response to a query are ranked
according to information from the link analysis. A page is rated highly
if many pages point to it, and if many other pages point to those pages,
and so on (Hayes,
2000). Google uses link analysis data in its results ranking algorithm
and it appears likely that other search engines include this information
in their proprietary algorithms.
Webmasters
also want to get links and want to know how often they are linked and who
is linking them. Webmasters need to continue adding unique content to
their web sites, because high quality content is everything (Noruzi, 2004) for
reader attraction. It is important to understand that the more people
link a web site, the more WIF the site is getting. The importance of
inlinks are threefold: (i) more visibility on the Web and potentially
more traffic to the site; (ii) better coverage by search engines (Vaughan and Thelwall,
2004); and (iii) higher ranking in search results.
The most
convenient way of measuring links between institutional sites is to use
the advanced search facilities of large-scale search engines, several of
which include link data in their databases such as AltaVista, AlltheWeb,
and Yahoo. Several WIF studies (e.g. Rodríguez i Gairín,
1997; Ingwersen,
1998; Smith,
1999a,b,c; Smith
& Thelwall, 2002; Thelwall, 2002; Kousha & Horri,
2004; Smith,
2004; Noruzi,
2005b) have been carried out using the advanced search features of the
AltaVista search engine. However, commercial search engines are
restricted in their coverage (Lawrence and Giles,
1999) and are optimised for searching rather than for webometric studies.
Web link
analysis of university sites is promising in general terms, but in
practice web links are not entirely equivalent to citations in the
scholarly literature. Whilst much of the Web content of university sites
is research related, there is significant content that is administrative,
teaching, and recreational in nature. This is reflected in the links made
to a site. Also, links may be made to web sites for reasons other than
the citation of scholarly content: often links are part of directory
listings, and are to an institution as a whole rather than to a specific
research output (Smith
& Thelwall, 2002).
In this
context, there are some important questions about the WIF. For example,
is the visibility of a web site related to factors such as age of the web
site, language of the site, original country of the site, academic
disciplines, or information content provided on the site? One measure of
the visibility of a web site is the number of links that lead to the site
because the more links to a site, the more chances the site will be
visited and therefore the more potential impact the site will have within
the scholarly community (Vaughan &
Thelwall, 2003).
In the
case of Canadian universities, Vaughan and Thelwall
(2005) show that faculty quality and the language of the university were
the two most important factors or predictors for links to a university
web site. Higher faculty quality means more links. The most important
finding of their research is that cultural factors along linguistic lines
are a significant factor in inlink attraction. French-language
universities in Canada received a
significantly lower number of inlinks to their web sites than comparable
English-language universities in Canada.
For good
or for bad, English is the dominant international language, in some
senses a world language that many non-English researchers use to
communicate for scholarly purposes. For instance, Thelwall, Tang, and
Price (2003) found that English was a major web language for
international linking between universities throughout the European Union,
accounting for about half of pages in most cases. They also found that
French was not a particularly well-used language on the Web.
Moreover,
the age of a web site affects the number of inlink pages, with older ones
receiving more. Caution must be exercised when interpreting WIF findings,
however. In general, newly created links (e.g. links in the newest pages
on the Web or new links that have been recently added to old pages) are
less likely to have been indexed by AltaVista. This may introduce a
confounding variable into the study (Vaughan &
Thelwall, 2003). However, it is difficult to ascertain the age of a
web site. Furthermore, universities that are more productive in research
attract more inlinks (Vaughan &
Thelwall, 2005).
Evidence
has been found to indicate that web sites with more content are more
visible in that they attract more links and therefore potentially more
traffic to the sites. Web site age has been shown to affect site
visibility: older web sites are more visible. It could be reasoned that
changes of URL are not desirable because they can have a negative effect
on web site visibility and thus reduce visits to the site (Vaughan &
Thelwall, 2003).
The Dataset and
Methodology
The
Iranian web domains are relatively well organized: academic sites are all
in the domain ".ac.ir", where the pages of a specific
university are almost all in the same second level subdomain. For
example, the pages of the University
of Tehran
are all in domains whose names end with ut.ac.ir. Thus, the organization
is similar to the ac.uk domain in the UK or ac.jp domain in
Japan.
There are
about 205 universities in Iran
(see the list). We measured the WIFs for
the public universities, and only five non-public (private) universities.
In the case of Sharif University of Technology, Azarbaidjan University of
Tarbiat Moallem, Bushehr University of Medical Sciences, and Jahrom
University of Medical Sciences (which have mirror sites ending with
".edu" or ".com"), we ignored their mirror sites in
the current study. For the current study, we used a methodology for
calculating WIFs that we have developed specially to compare Iranian
university web sites.
When
undertaking a WIF study, it is necessary to select a suitable search
engine that will count the number of pages in the web site studied, and
the number of pages linking to the web site. It should have a large
database, covering as much of the Web as possible (Smith, 1999c). Currently,
AltaVista satisfies these requirements most fully, with one of the
largest databases (Notess,
2002) and search commands both for links and for number of pages at a web
site.
It has
been found in previous studies that commercial search engines such as
AltaVista return inconsistent results (for instance, equivalent Boolean
search statements may return different results). This appears to be due
either to the algorithm of the search engine, or to the priority placed
by the commercial search engine on returning useful results quickly
rather than precise results at any cost in terms of processing time. As
in past studies, we found AltaVista search results insufficiently
consistent between different times of searching (for example in a month)
and between different formulations of Boolean search statements.
Links to
Iranian universities were counted using the text mode (Text-Only Search)
of AltaVista (http://www.altavista.com/web/text). For each of the
universities, a search was carried out to determine the total number of
links, the number of inlinks, the number of self-links, the total number
of pages and the number of English pages (in the latter case by ticking
English language) at the site. The number of inlinks to the university
web site was determined by:
(linkdomain:xxx.ac.ir/
OR linkdomain:www.xxx.ac.ir/) NOT (host:xxx.ac.ir/ OR
host:www.xxx.ac.ir/)
where xxx
is the domain name of the university web site. The count of inlinks to
the university site and number of pages at the university site were used
to calculate the inlink (revised) WIF of the university.
A search was carried out on AltaVista
for total links:
linkdomain:xxx.ac.ir/ OR linkdomain:www.xxx.ac.ir/
where xxx
is the domain name of the university, as above. AltaVista was set to
search the worldwide for pages in all languages. Site collapse (which
means that only one page from each site is displayed) was turned off. The
searches and examination of sites was carried out in April 2005.
However,
AltaVista does not always provide consistent Boolean results. For
example, A ∩ C does
not always return the same result as C ∩ A. The sets retrieved by commands in
AltaVista sometimes include unexpected numbers. An example of the Boolean
inconsistency problem is illustrated by the following search results on
AltaVista:
|
A
|
linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR
linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/
|
46500
|
|
B
|
(linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR
linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/) NOT (host:ut.ac.ir/ OR host:www.ut.ac.ir/)
|
43100
|
|
C1
|
(linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR
linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/) AND (host:ut.ac.ir/ OR host:www.ut.ac.ir/)
|
421
|
|
C2
|
(host:ut.ac.ir/ OR host:www.ut.ac.ir/)
AND (linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/)
|
422
|
In this
case the two equivalent Boolean statements C1 and C2 differ by 2%, and
the sum of C1 and B (43521) is 6.41% less than A, though by strict
Boolean logic these should be the same.
Boolean
inconsistencies arise because of the nature of the search engine
algorithm: "the AltaVista search engine does not create full sets,
so there may be inconsistencies in the total numbers – in fact the
AltaVista search screen specifically states that the result is 'about n
web pages'. From a relevance searching point of view this may be of
little consequence: the relevancy algorithms are intended to provide the
most relevant items at the beginning of the results, and the timing out
only affects the less relevant items" (Smith, 1999c).
In this
study, searches were carried out to determine the following:
- the total number of pages linking to the
web site, A, for example
linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/
- the number of pages at the web site, D,
determined by the command:
domain:ut.ac.ir/ OR domain:www.ut.ac.ir/
- the number of inlinks (links from pages
outside the web site), B:
(linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/) NOT
(host:ut.ac.ir/ OR host:www.ut.ac.ir/)
- the number of self-links (links from
pages in the same web site), C, measured in the following way:
(linkdomain:ut.ac.ir/ OR linkdomain:www.ut.ac.ir/) AND (host:ut.ac.ir/
OR host:www.ut.ac.ir/)
The
observations selected were used to calculate
- the overall WIF: A/D
- the inlink (revised) WIF: B/D
- the self-link WIF: C/D
The WIFs
can be used to compare the impact of web sites from individual countries
on the Web, for instance by looking for links to Iranian web sites:
linkdomain:ir/
However,
the "linkdomain:" command used in AltaVista does not reliably
discriminate between links to a domain, such as ".ir/", and
links to URLs where the character string comprising the domain name
appears in other parts of the URL, for instance .../ir.html. As a result,
it is not possible to reliably calculate WIFs for top-level domains
(TLDs) with the currently available AltaVista searches, nor even for
lower level domains, such as ut.ac.ir/. However, it is possible to
calculate rough WIFs for top-level domains such as ".ir/" or
".ac.ir/" in AltaVista, by the following commands:
Table 1. Calculating WIF for .ir (Iran)
TLD (April 13, 2005)
omitted
Total WIF = A/D= 1.14
Revised WIF = B/D= 0.14
Table 2. Calculating WIF for ac.ir SLD (Sub-level domain) (April 13, 2005)
|
A
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/
|
6,230,000
|
|
B
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ NOT
domain:ac.ir/
|
6,080,000
|
|
C
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.ir/
|
207,000
|
|
D
|
domain:ac.ir/
|
251,000
|
Total WIF = A/D= 24.82
Revised WIF = B/D=24.22
It is
unlikely that the string will appear in a URL other than as a reference
to that web site, so the "linkdomain:" command provides a
reasonable estimate of the number of pages linking to the web site. Thus,
it is possible to reliably calculate WIFs for institutions in Iran,
and to regard these as one indicator of the overall influence of these
institutions on the overall World Wide Web.
Results
The main
objective of this paper is to compare different Iranian sources of links
rather than different counting methods, but this aspect is briefly
addressed here to indicate the reliability of the tables obtained. The
Iranian sources of link counts were tested at different times over a five
month period (once by "link:" command, and once by
"linkdomain:" command) and so, given the expanding nature of
the Web, the result can be expected to be considerably different from
each other. The issue of reliability is, therefore, of relative rather
than absolute magnitude.
If counts
of inlinks to an academic web site were compared over time, the changes
observed could be expected to include large increases, for example, if a
new large collection of pages were to be added; and large decreases if
sets of old pages were to be periodically deleted. Counts of links to the
same site should be steadier, at least in relative size, depending as
they do upon the contents of pages from a range of other sites. An
exception to this occurs when one university introduces or removes a
collection of pages with a disproportionately large collection of
inlinks. Anomalies are therefore to be expected in any comparison of
sources of link counts over time even if there is an otherwise linear
trend (Smith &
Thelwall, 2002). As proposed by Snyder &
Rosenbaum (1999) and Björneborn &
Ingwersen (2001) a time series WIF was calculated for the University
of Tehran
in order to monitor AltaVista search engine performance (see Table 3).
Table 3. Comparison of AltaVista search engine link counts to the
University
of Tehran
|
Date of search in AltaVista
|
W
(A/D)
Web Impact Factor (overall
WIF)
|
A
Links
to
web
site
(total)
|
B
Inlinks to site, without self-links
|
C
Self-links to web site
|
D
Web pages indexed by AltaVista
|
E
(B/D)
Revised Web Impact Factor
|
F
Inlinks coming from domains except IR (Iran)
|
G
English pages in the web
site
|
H
Links to site coming from English pages
|
|
13 April 2005, 11:30 a.m.
|
4.60
|
46500
|
43100
|
421
|
10100
|
4.27
|
26600
|
7430
|
26100
|
|
3 April 2005, 6:30 p.m.
|
4.48
|
45200
|
42300
|
418
|
10100
|
4.19
|
25700
|
7490
|
24900
|
|
24 March 2005, 3:00 p.m.
|
2.13
|
40800
|
40100
|
348
|
19200
|
2.09
|
20700
|
9250
|
22600
|
|
16 March 2005, 4:25 p.m.
|
3.12
|
40200
|
39900
|
361
|
12900
|
3.09
|
21000
|
9870
|
22200
|
|
9 March 2005, 7:30 p.m.
|
2.95
|
40100
|
39500
|
367
|
13600
|
2.90
|
20800
|
10600
|
22100
|
|
1 March 2005, 4:45 p.m.
|
2.87
|
41300
|
39300
|
385
|
14400
|
2.73
|
20900
|
11400
|
22900
|
|
21 February 2005, 6:15 p.m.
|
2.17
|
41800
|
39500
|
412
|
19300
|
2.05
|
20900
|
12300
|
23600
|
|
4 February 2005, 6:45 p.m.
|
2.06
|
20100
|
19500
|
406
|
9750
|
2.00
|
10300
|
7990
|
11400
|
|
21 January 2005, 6:30 p.m.
|
2.14
|
19900
|
19200
|
388
|
9290
|
2.07
|
10300
|
8070
|
11600
|
|
11 January 2005, 4:25 p.m.
|
1.91
|
19900
|
19200
|
8250
|
10400
|
1.85
|
10600
|
8150
|
11700
|
|
7 January 2005, 2:00 p.m.
|
1.90
|
19600
|
19100
|
8140
|
10300
|
1.85
|
10300
|
8020
|
11400
|
|
23 December 2004, 2:10 p.m.
|
1.94
|
19200
|
18900
|
7690
|
9900
|
1.91
|
10500
|
7790
|
11300
|
|
14 December 2004, 4:00 p.m.
|
2.07
|
16800
|
16700
|
6030
|
8130
|
2.05
|
10000
|
6270
|
9730
|
|
6 December 2004, 3:40 p.m.
|
2.04
|
16900
|
16500
|
6170
|
8290
|
1.99
|
10000
|
6510
|
9650
|
|
30 November 2004, 12:30 p.m.
|
1.89
|
16800
|
16300
|
6870
|
8870
|
1.84
|
9470
|
7080
|
9620
|
|
29 November 2004, 1:00 p.m.
|
1.89
|
16800
|
16300
|
6880
|
8870
|
1.84
|
9460
|
7080
|
9630
|
The WIFs
of Iranian universities are listed in the Appendix (Tables 6, 7, 8, and 9). Tables 6, 7, 8, and 9 show that
Iranian universities link most to themselves, which is expectable. They
also suggest that Iranian universities link to each other, with Iran
being a more popular target of links. The results overall suggest that
the academic web in Iran
is somewhat insular; relatively well interconnected, but less well-known
internationally. As shown by Kousha and Horri
(2004) universities with numerous scholarly publications (number of
published articles indexed by citation databases of ISI), receive
numerous academic inlinks from American universities or academic
institutions with domain names ending in .edu.
Interestingly,
although, Iran is one of the
most isolated nations, it is well connected to university web sites in
the USA,
Canada,
UK,
Germany,
France,
Italy,
Sweden,
Netherlands,
Switzerland,
Australia,
Japan,
Austria,
Turkey,
Brazil,
Norway,
Spain,
and etc. As shown in Table 4, it is American and Canadian universities
that link most to Iranian universities, perhaps because of the existence
of Iranian professors and students in American and Canadian universities
who create links on their personal homepages in American and Canadian
universities to their former degree-awarding universities in Iran.
We made this comparison by the following commands in AltaVista (see Table
4).
Table 4. Countries that link to Iranian
universities (April 13, 2005)
|
Country
|
Link
counts
|
Search command
|
|
USA
|
846
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:edu
|
|
Canada
|
296
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:ca
|
|
UK
|
177
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.uk
|
|
Germany
|
105
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:de
|
|
France
|
65
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:fr
|
|
Italy
|
51
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:it
|
|
Sweden
|
48
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:se
|
|
Netherlands
|
46
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:nl
|
|
Switzerland
|
44
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:ch
|
|
Australia
|
42
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.au
|
|
Japan
|
30
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.jp
|
|
Austria
|
29
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.at
|
|
Turkey
|
26
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.tr
|
|
Brazil
|
24
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:br
|
|
Norway
|
20
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:no
|
|
Spain
|
16
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:es
|
|
Finland
|
14
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:fi
|
|
Belgium
|
12
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.be
|
|
Lebanon
|
12
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.lb
|
|
Korea, Republic of
|
12
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.kr
|
|
Hungary
|
9
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:hu
|
|
India
|
9
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.in
|
|
Croatia/Hrvatska
|
8
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:hr
|
|
Czech Republic
|
8
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:cz
|
|
Israel
|
8
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.il
|
|
Portugal
|
8
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:pt
|
|
Thailand
|
8
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.th
|
|
Greece
|
7
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:gr
|
|
Ireland
|
7
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:ie
|
|
South
Africa
|
7
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.za
|
|
Denmark
|
6
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:dk
|
|
Mexico
|
6
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:mx
|
|
Argentina
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.ar
|
|
China
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.cn
|
|
Latvia
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:lv
|
|
New
Zealand
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.nz
|
|
Poland
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.pl
|
|
Sri
Lanka
|
3
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.lk
|
|
Colombia
|
2
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.co
|
|
Peru
|
2
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.pe
|
|
Slovenia
|
2
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:si
|
|
United
Arab Emirates
|
2
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.ae
|
|
Lithuania
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:lt
|
|
Malaysia
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.my
|
|
Romania
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:ro
|
|
Russia
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.ru
|
|
Senegal
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:sn
|
|
Slovak Republic
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND domain:sk
|
|
Taiwan
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.tw
|
|
Yugoslavia
|
1
|
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:ac.yu
|
For each
country, we searched with the generic TLD
(examples being ".ca", ".de", ".it" and
".fr") and then we removed non-university sites from retrieved
results. We tried to make this research as representative as possible and
tried to make the data more reliable. However, we faced the following
limitations in this research:
1. In the
case of Canadian Universities (which have not used sub-TLDs such as 'edu'
or 'ac'), the complexity of the Boolean statement required appeared to be
too great for AltaVista to handle. Therefore, we have divided search
query into two groups:
linkdomain:ac.ir/
AND (domain:carleton.ca OR domain:concordia.ca OR domain:dal.ca OR
domain:mcgill.ca OR domain:mcmaster.ca OR domain:mta.ca OR domain:mun.ca
OR domain:mun.ca OR domain:polymtl.ca OR domain:queensu.ca OR
domain:sfu.ca OR domain:ubc.ca OR domain:ucalgary.ca OR domain:ulaval.ca
OR domain:umanitoba.ca) = 159
linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND (domain:umontreal.ca OR domain:unb.ca OR
domain:uottawa.ca OR domain:uregina.ca OR domain:usask.ca OR
domain:utoronto.ca OR domain:uwaterloo.ca OR domain:uwindsor.ca OR
domain:uwo.ca OR domain:wlu.ca OR domain:yorku.ca) = 137
This is
also true for other countries in which universities have not used
sub-TLDs such as 'edu' or 'ac').
2. We
found that the number of English pages reported by AltaVista for Iranian universities
is not correct. This appears to be due either to the lack of
"language meta tag" in Persian pages, which reported as English
pages, or to misuse of the "English language tag" in Persian
pages.
Table 5. Persian and English pages of Iranian universities
indexed by AltaVista
|
Language
|
Web pages
|
Percentage
|
|
English
|
65901
|
57%
|
|
Persian
|
49159
|
43%
|
|
Total
|
115060
|
100%
|
3. Some
Iranian universities are not indexed by AltaVista, while Google indexes
them. For example:
Moreover,
we found that Google has a better coverage of Iranian universities.
4. It
seems that the less prestigious universities are being ignored by their
Iranian peers and by foreign universities when it comes to being the target
of hyperlinks. In fact, the Tables (6, 7, 8, and 9) are consistent
with the hypothesis that research quality, content, age, and language of
university web site are the primary determining factors for links. It is
evident that old and well-known universities have more backlinks
(inlinks) and greater web site size than less prestigious ones. In other
words, larger Iranian universities are likely to have more web pages and
thus attract more inlinks to their sites (see Table 6).
Discussion
A
general-purpose search engine such as AltaVista is useful in webometric
studies. However this may not be because of better coverage, but could
also be due to the time factor, outdated or duplicate links being
included in the search or the inclusion of non-university academic web
sites. In summary AltaVista search engine:
- Uses a proprietary algorithm which is not
known to the researcher;
- Covers a wide range of domains, but it is
not clear to what depth it indexes a given domain;
- Is easily accessible and usable (Smith &
Thelwall, 2002).
While the
links between the Iranian universities are fairly predictable, there might
be potential for studying the links made by universities farther afield,
for example to explore if Asian universities have more links to Iranian
universities because of their relative proximity. We examined the
educational SLD of all Asian and Middle-Eastern countries with
".ac.ir" SLD (for example, linkdomain:ac.ir/ AND
domain:edu.pk), but the above-mentioned assumption was not confirmed (see
Table 4).
The
current study has revealed an issue in assessing university domains, i.e.
that some university domain names are not constant. For instance during
the period of the study we found that the name of Ahvaz
University of Medical Sciences and its domain name have officially
changed.
The
revised WIFs of Iranian universities also vary. While this may be a
useful indication of the influence of a university on the Web, it may
also indicate that, for the reasons noted previously, AltaVista is an
imperfect tool for determining the total number of pages at a site; and
also that the number of pages may be a poor measure of the information
content of a site.
There are
significantly different reasons for linking to one country rather than
others. A study has shown that the quantity of research produced by
academics is the main reason for attracting links (Thelwall &
Harries, 2004). It can be assumed that in the case of Iran,
the quantity of immigration of highly educated Iranians to continue
further education or to work in American and Canadian universities is the
main explanation for attracting links. It would be interesting to see how
motivation for international links vary by country, especially among
countries with higher brain drain rates and if there are significantly
different reasons for linking to one country than others (Kousha & Horri,
2004).
Conclusions
This study
has some important lessons for webmasters of Iranian university web
sites. First, web sites of Iranian universities are becoming a
significant body of Persian-language web space literature. Second,
webmasters of Iranian university sites need to be aware of different
measures of effectiveness, and visibility of web sites.
Some other, perhaps more minor, points relate to how the Iranian
university web sites are constructed and managed. Webmasters of Iranian universities
have been keen to have high link counts. Recognition on the Web,
particularly by the Google PageRank, can be promoted by links. Links from
sites that are themselves highly linked promote visibility on the Web,
for example when searching Google.
A methodological issue that arose in this study was the structure of
university URLs: WIF studies of Iranian university sites could be aided
by webmasters having a standard “root” URL for the university and
faculties, and changes of URL increase the complexity of tracking links.
One
objective of this paper was to ascertain whether there was any evidence
for differing patterns of link creation to Iranian universities from
foreign universities and between themselves. The propensity to link
between Iranian universities showed that national links are much more
likely than international links. Iran
also appeared to be relatively insular, interlinking well, but being less
well linked to. According to AltaVista retrieved results, American
universities make more backlinks (approximately 846) to Iranian
universities. The data was not clear enough to reveal any more specific
pattern that could be linked to the type of universities considered. This
study has been exploratory, and there is scope for future webometric research
in this area. It would be useful to carry out a more comprehensive study,
comparing more Iranian institutions, sub-TLDs, and comparing the Web with
conventional scholarly publication output and indicators of economic and
technological development of Iran.
A
comparison of Iranian university web sites raises interesting questions
about the place of different languages and cultures on the Web. Iran
is outside the main Web area, dominated by the USA,
Canada,
Europe, Australia,
India, Japan,
and etc. It appears that Iranian (Persian-language) web sites may achieve
a lower visibility on the Web because their language and culture are
different from the current mainstream of the Web, which is dominated by
English-speaking countries. It also appears that Iranian sites which are
in English may achieve greater recognition than those in
Persian-language. This is a warning to cybercitizens. If the Web is
dominated by English language sites, important knowledge created in
non-English speaking areas may be missed, or recognition may be delayed.
Further
research is needed to gain a better understanding of the nature of web
links, and further research may be necessary to find reasons for the
limited number of Iranian (Persian-language) university web pages.
Acknowledgements
The author
wishes to thank Mrs. Marjorie Sweetko for her helpful comments.
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Table 6. Web Impact Factors for Iranian university web sites with
more than 1000 pages indexed by AltaVista
|
University
|
W
(A/D)
Web Impact Factor (overall
WIF)
|
A
Links
to
web
site
(total)
|
B
Inlinks to site, without self-links
|
C
Self-links to web site
|
D
Web pages indexed by Alta Vista
|
E
(B/D)
Revised Web Impact Factor
|
F
Inlinks coming from domains except IR (Iran)
|
G
English pages in the web
site
|
H
Links to site coming from English pages
|
|
Iran University
of Science & Technology
|
16.19
|
23800
|
21500
|
367
|
1470
|
14.63
|
2500
|
1170
|
2370
|
|
University of Tehran
|
4.60
|
46500
|
43100
|
421
|
10100
|
4.27
|
26600
|
7430
|
26100
|
|
Isfahan University
of Technology
|
12.86
|
19800
|
4620
|
720
|
1540
|
3.00
|
2690
|
1260
|
1880
|
|
Sharif University
of Technology
|
2.79
|
34900
|
33200
|
236
|
12500
|
2.66
|
27100
|
11000
|
11700
|
|
Ferdowsi University
of Mashad
|
3.21
|
26700
|
21700
|
2160
|
8320
|
2.61
|
2210
|
1450
|
2140
|
|
Shiraz University
of Medical Sciences
|
11.76
|
22000
|
2990
|
1000
|
1870
|
1.60
|
2190
|
1590
|
2750
|
|
Isfahan University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.50
|
1550
|
1220
|
318
|
1030
|
1.18
|
417
|
746
|
943
|
|
Shiraz University
|
3.05
|
10600
|
3130
|
1670
|
3470
|
0.90
|
1610
|
2790
|
4850
|
|
University of Tabriz
|
1.53
|
2350
|
1250
|
923
|
1540
|
0.81
|
982
|
900
|
1050
|
|
Imam Sadiq
University
|
1.64
|
1930
|
701
|
1140
|
1180
|
0.59
|
571
|
360
|
537
|
|
Tehran University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.26
|
9950
|
2280
|
1940
|
4400
|
0.52
|
1350
|
1660
|
1850
|
|
Shahid Chamran
University
|
1.04
|
1640
|
656
|
925
|
1580
|
0.42
|
518
|
1410
|
1080
|
|
Mashhad University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.12
|
1380
|
430
|
904
|
1230
|
0.35
|
306
|
748
|
752
|
|
Tabriz University
of Medical Sciences
|
0.97
|
2100
|
722
|
1280
|
2170
|
0.33
|
545
|
1110
|
923
|
|
University of Kashan
|
0.70
|
3490
|
1470
|
1290
|
4980
|
0.30
|
506
|
2820
|
2200
|
|
Shahid Beheshti
University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.43
|
3680
|
501
|
2430
|
2570
|
0.19
|
344
|
1760
|
2000
|
|
Tarbiat Modarres
University
|
1.71
|
22400
|
2260
|
8900
|
13100
|
0.17
|
1680
|
7170
|
7440
|
|
University of Isfahan
|
0.93
|
12600
|
2110
|
5470
|
13600
|
0.16
|
1280
|
7640
|
8900
|
|
Payame
Noor University,
Tehran
|
0.94
|
8320
|
1430
|
2210
|
8870
|
0.16
|
1200
|
2560
|
1880
|
|
Baghyatoolah Medical
Sciences University
|
1.12
|
1930
|
221
|
1640
|
1730
|
0.13
|
163
|
662
|
710
|
|
Arak University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.10
|
1370
|
143
|
1220
|
1240
|
0.12
|
99
|
10
|
65
|
Table 7. Web Impact Factors for Iranian university sites with 500-1000 pages indexed by AltaVista
|
University
|
W
(A/D)
Web Impact Factor (overall
WIF)
|
A
Links
to
web
site
(total)
|
B
Inlinks to site, without self-links
|
C
Self-links to web site
|
D
Web pages indexed by Alta Vista
|
E
(B/D)
Revised Web Impact Factor
|
F
Inlinks coming from domains except IR (Iran)
|
G
English pages in the web
site
|
H
Links to site coming from English pages
|
|
Khaje-Nassir-Toosi University
|
8.10
|
4530
|
3400
|
181
|
559
|
6.08
|
2420
|
459
|
925
|
|
Bu Ali
Sina University
|
3.04
|
2430
|
1880
|
451
|
799
|
2.35
|
1230
|
785
|
1270
|
|
Amir Kabir University of
Technology
|
4.04
|
3900
|
2070
|
814
|
966
|
2.14
|
1750
|
586
|
1420
|
|
Petroleum University
of Technology
|
1.88
|
1390
|
821
|
524
|
740
|
1.11
|
650
|
605
|
723
|
|
University of Guilan
|
1.95
|
1410
|
743
|
633
|
724
|
1.03
|
565
|
150
|
811
|
|
Urmia University
|
1.82
|
1210
|
646
|
544
|
664
|
0.97
|
450
|
367
|
580
|
|
Shahid
Bahonar University
of Kerman
|
1.43
|
912
|
567
|
320
|
637
|
0.89
|
265
|
475
|
557
|
|
Kerman University
of Medical Sciences
|
0.78
|
619
|
491
|
101
|
794
|
0.62
|
171
|
482
|
209
|
|
Zanjan University
|
1.12
|
632
|
330
|
287
|
565
|
0.58
|
262
|
417
|
585
|
|
Zahedan University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.18
|
1130
|
531
|
562
|
955
|
0.56
|
396
|
637
|
595
|
|
University of Sistan &
Baluchestan
|
1.23
|
918
|
404
|
497
|
744
|
0.54
|
292
|
499
|
416
|
|
Alzahra University
|
1.30
|
730
|
272
|
455
|
560
|
0.49
|
161
|
514
|
572
|
Table 8. Web Impact Factors for Iranian university sites with 100-500 pages indexed by AltaVista
|
University
|
W
(A/D)
Web Impact Factor (overall
WIF)
|
A
Links
to
web
site
(total)
|
B
Inlinks to site, without self-links
|
C
Self-links to web site
|
D
Web pages indexed by Alta Vista
|
E
(B/D)
Revised Web Impact Factor
|
F
Inlinks coming from domains except IR (Iran)
|
G
English pages in the web
site
|
H
Links to site coming from English pages
|
|
Islamic Azad
University, Tehran
(South)
|
6.33
|
1710
|
1450
|
226
|
270
|
5.37
|
1190
|
0
|
787
|
|
Semnan University
|
4.48
|
484
|
407
|
70
|
108
|
3.77
|
325
|
0
|
140
|
|
Kermanshah University
of Medical Sciences
|
4.08
|
812
|
730
|
92
|
199
|
3.67
|
515
|
90
|
314
|
|
Iran University
of Medical Sciences
|
3.54
|
1280
|
940
|
295
|
362
|
2.60
|
869
|
331
|
655
|
|
Yazd University
|
3.28
|
708
|
477
|
214
|
216
|
2.21
|
362
|
178
|
340
|
|
Shahrood University
of Technology
|
2.97
|
617
|
409
|
182
|
208
|
1.97
|
301
|
141
|
247
|
|
Zanjan University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.39
|
667
|
460
|
54
|
279
|
1.64
|
339
|
111
|
164
|
|
Sahand University
of Technology
|
2.03
|
268
|
198
|
64
|
132
|
1.50
|
116
|
79
|
150
|
|
Guilan University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.26
|
1110
|
648
|
360
|
492
|
1.32
|
464
|
329
|
460
|
|
Shahrekord University
|
1.92
|
309
|
212
|
95
|
161
|
1.32
|
120
|
159
|
187
|
|
Hadith Science
College
|
2.00
|
240
|
155
|
85
|
120
|
1.29
|
136
|
0
|
15
|
|
Kurdistan University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.24
|
191
|
162
|
29
|
154
|
1.05
|
60
|
47
|
66
|
|
Kerman
Khaje-Nasir Higher Education
Center
|
1.84
|
773
|
383
|
390
|
419
|
0.91
|
376
|
384
|
573
|
|
Shahid Sadoughi
University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.56
|
289
|
131
|
152
|
185
|
0.71
|
78
|
39
|
91
|
|
Razi University
|
1.55
|
660
|
273
|
385
|
425
|
0.64
|
221
|
136
|
279
|
|
University of Mazandaran
|
1.28
|
551
|
258
|
293
|
429
|
0.60
|
141
|
216
|
253
|
|
Malek Ashtar
University
of Technology
|
1.43
|
181
|
75
|
108
|
127
|
0.59
|
60
|
67
|
73
|
|
University of Social
Welfare & Rehabilitation Sciences
|
1.55
|
559
|
198
|
350
|
360
|
0.55
|
178
|
200
|
350
|
|
Babol University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.08
|
373
|
181
|
191
|
344
|
0.53
|
113
|
112
|
145
|
|
Semnan University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.03
|
161
|
81
|
79
|
157
|
0.52
|
51
|
124
|
95
|
|
Kashan University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.50
|
386
|
127
|
254
|
258
|
0.49
|
104
|
77
|
124
|
|
Sabzevar School
of Medical Sciences
|
0.80
|
117
|
68
|
51
|
146
|
0.47
|
47
|
20
|
20
|
|
Lorestan University
|
0.97
|
196
|
74
|
125
|
203
|
0.36
|
61
|
43
|
21
|
|
Ardabil University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.08
|
184
|
58
|
126
|
170
|
0.34
|
36
|
68
|
74
|
|
Yasuj University
|
1.23
|
200
|
47
|
148
|
162
|
0.29
|
34
|
156
|
161
|
|
Islamic Azad
University,
Hamedan
|
1.19
|
531
|
90
|
433
|
448
|
0.20
|
76
|
4
|
38
|
Table 9. Web Impact Factors for Iranian university sites with
less than 100 pages indexed by AltaVista
|
University
|
W
(A/D)
Web Impact Factor (overall
WIF)
|
A
Links
to
web
site
(total)
|
B
Inlinks to site, without self-links
|
C
Self-links to web site
|
D
Web pages indexed by Alta Vista
|
E
(B/D)
Revised Web Impact Factor
|
F
Inlinks coming from domains except IR (Iran)
|
G
English pages in the web
site
|
H
Links to site coming from English pages
|
|
Hamedan University
of Medical Sciences
|
231.50
|
463
|
463
|
0
|
2
|
231.50
|
355
|
1
|
111
|
|
Hormozgan University
of Medical Sciences
|
230.67
|
692
|
692
|
0
|
3
|
230.67
|
566
|
2
|
159
|
|
University of Birjand
|
60.00
|
120
|
117
|
3
|
2
|
58.50
|
89
|
2
|
66
|
|
Kurdistan University
|
57.00
|
57
|
57
|
1
|
1
|
57.00
|
23
|
0
|
11
|
|
Kish University
|
38.67
|
116
|
115
|
1
|
3
|
38.33
|
87
|
3
|
65
|
|
Shahed University
|
44.00
|
44
|
36
|
0
|
1
|
36.00
|
35
|
0
|
26
|
|
Shahid Beheshti
University
|
34.62
|
1800
|
1750
|
29
|
52
|
33.65
|
1470
|
46
|
748
|
|
Allame Tabataba'ee University
|
32.10
|
321
|
305
|
18
|
10
|
30.50
|
296
|
5
|
126
|
|
ValiAsr University
of Rafsanjan
|
30.00
|
30
|
30
|
1
|
1
|
30.00
|
18
|
0
|
12
|
|
Shahid Rajaee
Teacher Training
University
|
26.50
|
53
|
51
|
2
|
2
|
25.50
|
43
|
1
|
38
|
|
Mofid University
|
20.86
|
146
|
140
|
8
|
7
|
20.00
|
111
|
7
|
65
|
|
Imam Hossein
University
|
18.22
|
164
|
149
|
0
|
9
|
16.56
|
110
|
9
|
60
|
|
Bushehr University
of Medical Sciences
|
16.00
|
16
|
16
|
0
|
1
|
16.00
|
8
|
1
|
6
|
|
Gorgan University
of Agricultural Sciences & Natural Resources
|
16.33
|
147
|
139
|
7
|
9
|
15.44
|
126
|
6
|
53
|
|
University of Zabol
|
18.00
|
54
|
46
|
8
|
3
|
15.33
|
39
|
1
|
15
|
|
Arak University
|
13.31
|
346
|
326
|
25
|
26
|
12.54
|
242
|
3
|
82
|
|
International University
of Chabahar
|
12.70
|
127
|
119
|
9
|
10
|
11.90
|
100
|
10
|
56
|
|
Comprehensive University
of Applied & Practical Sciences, Khorasan
|
12.00
|
12
|
11
|
1
|
1
|
11.00
|
6
|
0
|
4
|
|
School of International
Relations
|
11.93
|
179
|
164
|
16
|
15
|
10.93
|
137
|
5
|
50
|
|
Qazvin University
of Medical Sciences
|
10.14
|
71
|
67
|
4
|
7
|
9.57
|
45
|
4
|
35
|
|
University
of Art, Tehran
|
10.77
|
280
|
237
|
33
|
26
|
9.12
|
171
|
24
|
126
|
|
Lorestan University
of Medical Sciences
|
9.78
|
88
|
81
|
7
|
9
|
9.00
|
46
|
0
|
32
|
|
Imam Khomeini
International University
|
9.58
|
230
|
207
|
22
|
24
|
8.63
|
168
|
13
|
54
|
|
Ilam University
|
7.71
|
131
|
121
|
9
|
17
|
7.12
|
92
|
0
|
33
|
|
Bagher Aloloum
University
|
6.75
|
27
|
24
|
4
|
4
|
6.00
|
22
|
0
|
6
|
|
Islamic Azad
University, Shiraz
|
6.00
|
48
|
43
|
5
|
8
|
5.38
|
39
|
7
|
25
|
|
Islamic Azad
University, Tehran
Medical Sciences
|
5.96
|
167
|
147
|
29
|
28
|
5.25
|
105
|
2
|
71
|
|
University
of Mohaghegh Ardebili,
Ardebil
|
13.00
|
13
|
5
|
0
|
1
|
5.00
|
1
|
0
|
0
|
|
Hormozgan University
|
5.71
|
97
|
81
|
16
|
17
|
4.76
|
53
|
17
|
46
|
|
Qom University
of Medical Sciences
|
5.50
|
11
|
9
|
2
|
2
|
4.50
|
4
|
0
|
6
|
|
Qom University
|
4.00
|
40
|
38
|
2
|
10
|
3.80
|
21
|
3
|
21
|
|
Urmia University
of Medical Sciences
|
3.38
|
189
|
144
|
45
|
56
|
2.57
|
93
|
43
|
103
|
|
Shomal University
|
2.73
|
194
|
152
|
41
|
71
|
2.14
|
149
|
33
|
62
|
|
Damghan University
of Basic Sciences
|
3.00
|
60
|
40
|
20
|
20
|
2.00
|
32
|
0
|
21
|
|
Ashrafi Isfahani Academic
Institute
|
3.00
|
18
|
12
|
6
|
6
|
2.00
|
9
|
0
|
3
|
|
Tarbiat Moallem
University
|
2.95
|
271
|
174
|
87
|
92
|
1.89
|
152
|
75
|
130
|
|
Gonabad University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.95
|
16
|
13
|
3
|
7
|
1.86
|
5
|
3
|
13
|
|
Islamic Azad
University, Tehran
(Central)
|
3.11
|
59
|
35
|
5
|
19
|
1.84
|
32
|
0
|
16
|
|
Tarbiat Moallem
University
of Sabzevar
|
2.18
|
135
|
109
|
26
|
62
|
1.76
|
85
|
24
|
37
|
|
School of Economic Affairs
|
2.09
|
48
|
40
|
10
|
23
|
1.74
|
24
|
19
|
21
|
|
Shiraz University
of Applied Science & Technology
|
2.33
|
35
|
21
|
13
|
15
|
1.40
|
20
|
1
|
5
|
|
Mazandaran University
of Sciences
and Technology
|
1.63
|
13
|
11
|
1
|
8
|
1.38
|
6
|
0
|
3
|
|
Yasuj University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.07
|
145
|
84
|
64
|
70
|
1.20
|
53
|
0
|
17
|
|
Rafsanjan University
of Medical Sciences
|
2.05
|
78
|
45
|
33
|
38
|
1.18
|
29
|
18
|
29
|
|
Fasa Faculty of Medical Sciences
|
1.69
|
127
|
85
|
46
|
75
|
1.13
|
51
|
67
|
85
|
|
Comprehensive
University of Applied
& Practical Sciences, Tehran
|
2.03
|
79
|
43
|
35
|
39
|
1.10
|
40
|
0
|
9
|
|
Payame
Noor University,
Shiraz
|
1.84
|
46
|
24
|
23
|
25
|
0.96
|
19
|
9
|
12
|
|
Birjand University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.43
|
96
|
59
|
36
|
67
|
0.88
|
40
|
18
|
31
|
|
Sadjad Institute of Higher
Education
|
1.71
|
168
|
84
|
86
|
98
|
0.86
|
73
|
12
|
25
|
|
Jahrom University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.80
|
36
|
17
|
13
|
20
|
0.85
|
6
|
1
|
15
|
|
University College
of Nabi Akram, Tabriz
|
0.83
|
34
|
34
|
1
|
41
|
0.83
|
10
|
37
|
19
|
|
Persian Gulf University
|
1.47
|
47
|
25
|
22
|
32
|
0.78
|
19
|
27
|
32
|
|
Qeshm Institute of Higher
Education
|
1.23
|
81
|
41
|
43
|
66
|
0.62
|
19
|
46
|
52
|
|
Ahvaz Jondishapour
University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.01
|
98
|
55
|
43
|
97
|
0.57
|
6
|
10
|
5
|
|
Azarbaidjan University
of Tarbiat Moallem
|
0.96
|
23
|
13
|
9
|
24
|
0.54
|
10
|
11
|
12
|
|
Ilam University
of Medical Sciences
|
0.63
|
19
|
5
|
14
|
30
|
0.17
|
4
|
0
|
3
|
|
Golestan University
of Medical Sciences
|
0.69
|
20
|
5
|
15
|
29
|
0.17
|
4
|
1
|
9
|
|
Mazandaran University
of Medical Sciences
|
1.04
|
85
|
4
|
80
|
82
|
0.05
|
2
|
0
|
0
|
|