Non-scholarly sites showing up in Google Scholar

[Stacy Pober]

I know there have always been a few citations here and there that were not
scholarly, but they usually were in Scholar because some scholarly papers
had cited them.  In this case, most of the non-scholarly hits were not
cited in other papers.

Someone told me that there are sites that are trying to appear scholarly to
get indexed by Google Scholar but that's not the case for most of the hits
on the list for my test search.  I don't know how they got indexed in
Scholar.

The one book or article that is a complete dead end is a particular
mystery.  I thought that Scholar was a subset of the entire Google database
but this particular title produces zero hits when searched as a phrase in
Google:

> [CITATION] Reducing Nightshade Consumption May Improve Arthritic Symptoms
> A Johnson


I'm not worried that I will mistake a non-scholarly site for a scholarly
one, but I'm not going to recommend Google Scholar to undergraduates if
this lack of selectivity becomes common.

Stacy


On Fri, Sep 25, 2015 at 11:01 AM, John M Hubbard <hubbardj at uwm.edu> wrote:

> Hi Stacy, I think it's always been a limitation of Google Scholar that
> popular items cited in scholarly sources can show up in results:
>
> https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=pelican+brief
>
>
>
> Like not knowing the scope of what exactly is being indexed, it's one of
> those imperfections that isn't necessarily a deal-breaker, for
> non-librarians at least.
>
>
>
> --
>
> John Hubbard
> Web Services and Electronic Resources Coordinator
> UWM Libraries Webmaster
> University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee
> Golda Meir Library W241
> (414)229-7429
>
>
>
> *From:* Web technologies in libraries [mailto:WEB4LIB at LISTSERV.ND.EDU] *On
> Behalf Of *Stacy Pober
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 24, 2015 7:50 PM
> *To:* WEB4LIB at LISTSERV.ND.EDU
> *Subject:* [WEB4LIB] Non-scholarly sites showing up in Google Scholar
>
>
>
> I was looking at Google Scholar search results and noticed some results
> that do not normally fit the criteria most people would use for "scholarly
> publishing".
>
>
>
> The search terms were: nightshade arthritis
>
>
>
> 7 hits of the first 20 hits are questionable:
>
>
>
> #3: Childers, Norman Franklin. *A Diet to Stop Arthritis: The Nightshades
> and Ill Health*. Horticultural Publications, 1981.  [Not from a scholarly
> press.Author is a PhD who published in peer-reviewed journals, but this is
> apparently in the results because it was cited in a scholarly publication.]
>
>
>
> #5: Childers, Norman Franklin. *Arthritis, a Diet to Stop it: The
> Nightshades, Aging and Ill Health*. Norman F. Childers, 1993.
> [Self-published. Cited in a scholarly publication.]
>
>
>
> #8: Johnson, Anthony. "Reducing Nightshade Consumption May Improve
> Arthritic Symptoms."
>
> [Oddly, this  only seems to exist as a citation in Google Scholar. There's
> no source or publisher specified and no link to full text anywhere as far
> as I can tell.  It doesn't show up in a normal Google search as an exact
> title match.]
>
>
>
> #14: Read, Mark Forums. "Thread: Nightshade Foods." [from the site:
> anabolicminds.com <http://bit.ly/1izoQUN>  ]
>
>
>
> #16: TOP TEN TIPS, "How Deadly Are Nightshades?."  [from the website:
> 50symptomsgone.com <http://bit.ly/1izoTzM>  ]
>
>
>
> #18: Jackson, Steven. "Foods to avoid with arthritis." (2014). [from the
> website: global-partnerships.com <  http://bit.ly/1iP6G1Z>]
>
>
>
> #20: Windley, Steve. "Dr. Tara Skye Goldin's Newsletter, The Joint Issue
> Natural Medicine That Gets Results!." [from the website:
> www.taraskyegoldin.com   <http://bit.ly/1iP6y2p>  ]
>
>
>
> The results are a little better if I use the search terms: solanine
> arthritis
>
> but I still get a few of the non-scholarly links.
>
>
>
> It looks like Google Scholar is including any article that is cited in a
> scholarly article, including tabloid newspaper articles and some conspiracy
> websites.  There are some hits in that list  that are not cited by any
> scholarly source, and I can't figure out why those were included in the
> results.   I used to recommend Google Scholar to students all the time, and
> now I'm a little wary of it.
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Stacy Pober
> Information Alchemist
> Manhattan College Library
> Riverdale, NY 10471
> stacy.pober at manhattan.edu
>
> ============================
>
> To unsubscribe: http://bit.ly/web4lib
>
> Web4Lib Web Site: http://web4lib.org/
>
> 2015-09-24
>



-- 
Stacy Pober
Information Alchemist
Manhattan College Library
Riverdale, NY 10471
stacy.pober at manhattan.edu

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2015-09-25
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