Case Study: National Physical Laboratory uses Altmetric to measure research impact and publication performance

National Physical Laboratory finds Altmetric attention scores strongly correlate with impact case studies across 41,409 DOIs

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL), the UK's national measurement institute, wanted to better evaluate the impact of its research. The organization explored using alternative metrics to traditional citations as potential indicators of research quality and societal impact. They partnered with Altmetric to utilize its Explorer for Institutions platform to analyze data surrounding their publications.

Using Altmetric's platform, NPL conducted a large-scale analysis of publications submitted to a national research assessment exercise. They found that Altmetric attention scores showed a strong positive correlation with high peer-review judgments of research *impact*, even when controlling for other factors. Importantly, Altmetric data provided an early indicator of this impact compared to traditional bibliometrics. This evidence allows NPL to better understand how online discussion of research relates to its wider societal influence.

National Physical Laboratory