How the “Most-Cited Authors by Subject” Ranking Is Calculated (ABA-Approved Law Schools)

Overview

This ranking highlights the scholarly impact of ABA-approved law schools by identifying the most-cited authors within twenty-five major legal subject areas. For each subject, citation and usage data are drawn exclusively from HeinOnline articles that are assigned one or more PathFinder Subjects mapped to that category. HeinOnline’s ScholarRank formula is applied separately for each subject to produce a top 100 list of influential authors.

Eligibility

Only authors that have an ABA-approved law school designated as their institutional affiliation on their HeinOnline Author Profile Page qualify for inclusion in this ranking. In addition, only the author’s articles that contain PathFinder Subjects mapped to the relevant ranking subject are counted. Each subject list presents the top 100 qualifying authors for that subject.

Subjects and Corresponding PathFinder Mappings

The following twenty-five subjects are included in this ranking. Each subject is defined by the PathFinder Subjects listed beneath it.

1. Administrative Law
   • PathFinder Subject: Administrative Law
2. Business and Corporations
   • PathFinder Subject: Business
3. Constitutional Law
   • PathFinder Subject: Constitutional Law, Generally
   • PathFinder Subject: First Amendment
   • PathFinder Subject: Fourteenth Amendment
   • PathFinder Subject: Second Amendment
4. Contracts
   • PathFinder Subject: Contracts
5. Courts and Jurisprudence
   • PathFinder Subject: Conflict of Laws
   • PathFinder Subject: Courts
   • PathFinder Subject: Criminal Law and Procedure
   • PathFinder Subject: Crimes against Justice
   • PathFinder Subject: Judges
   • PathFinder Subject: Jurisprudence
   • PathFinder Subject: Jurisdiction
   • PathFinder Subject: Law Enforcement
   • PathFinder Subject: Remedies
6. Criminal Law and Justice
   • PathFinder Subject: Criminal Justice
7. Economics and Taxation
   • PathFinder Subject: Economics
   • PathFinder Subject: Finance
8. Education
   • PathFinder Subject: Education
9. Environmental Law
   • PathFinder Subject: Earth Sciences
   • PathFinder Subject: Environmental Science
   • PathFinder Subject: Land and Resource Use
10. Estates and Trusts
    • PathFinder Subject: Estates and trusts
11. Evidence
    • PathFinder Subject: Evidence
12. Food and Drug Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Food, Beverages, and Drugs
13. Government
    • PathFinder Subject: Checks and Balances
    • PathFinder Subject: Crimes against the State
    • PathFinder Subject: Elections
    • PathFinder Subject: Executive Branch
    • PathFinder Subject: Government (general)
    • PathFinder Subject: Judiciary Branch
    • PathFinder Subject: Legislation
    • PathFinder Subject: Legislative Branch
    • PathFinder Subject: Local Government
    • PathFinder Subject: Military Government
    • PathFinder Subject: Political Systems and Governments
    • PathFinder Subject: Political Theories and Ideologies
    • PathFinder Subject: Politics (general)
    • PathFinder Subject: Public Administration
    • PathFinder Subject: State and Local Government Law
    • PathFinder Subject: State Government
    • PathFinder Subject: Voting
14. Health
    • PathFinder Subject: Health and Medicine
    • PathFinder Subject: Health Law and Policy
15. Human Rights Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Human Rights Law
16. Immigration Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Immigration Studies
17. International and Comparative Law
    • PathFinder Subject: International Law
    • PathFinder Subject: International Relations
18. Insurance Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Insurance
19. Labor Law and Employment
    • PathFinder Subject: Employment and Labor
20. Law, Science, and Technology
    • PathFinder Subject: Science and Technology
21. Legal Education and Practice
    • PathFinder Subject: Dispute Resolution
    • PathFinder Subject: Ethics
    • PathFinder Subject: Legal Education
    • PathFinder Subject: Legal Practice and Procedure
    • PathFinder Subject: Legal Profession
    • PathFinder Subject: Philosophy
    • PathFinder Subject: Professional Ethics in Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Research and Information
22. Legal History
    • PathFinder Subject: Legal History
23. Property
    • PathFinder Subject: Intellectual Property Law
    • PathFinder Subject: Property–Personal And Real
24. Social Justice and Public Interest
    • PathFinder Subject: Community and Society Studies
    • PathFinder Subject: Family Studies
    • PathFinder Subject: Gender and Sexuality
    • PathFinder Subject: Law and Society
    • PathFinder Subject: Race, Ethnicity, and Culture
    • PathFinder Subject: Social Welfare Law
25. Torts
    • PathFinder Subject: Torts

Metrics Used

Each subject-specific ranking is based on the following five metrics, drawn from subject-filtered faculty article data in HeinOnline:

1. Cited by Articles (0 to 5 Years)
   Counts the number of times an author has been cited by other articles in HeinOnline within the past five years, limited to citations of the author’s articles that fall within the subject category being evaluated. Citation style sources include the Bluebook, Prince’s Dictionary of Legal Abbreviations, and the Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations.
2. Cited by Articles (5+ Years)
   Counts the number of times an author has been cited by other articles in HeinOnline more than five years after publication, again restricted to articles classified within the subject category. Citation style sources include the Bluebook, Prince’s Dictionary of Legal Abbreviations, and the Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations.
3. h5-index
   Measures the productivity and citation impact of the author’s subject-related publications over the most recent five complete calendar years. The index reflects the number of papers (h) within the subject that have been cited at least h times during that period.
4. h-index
   Measures the overall productivity and citation influence of the author’s publications within the subject area. It is based on the author’s most cited subject-aligned papers and the citations they have received.
5. Accessed (Past 12 Months)
   Measures relevancy and recency by counting the total number of times an author’s articles within the subject have been accessed by HeinOnline users in the past twelve months. An article counts as accessed when it is clicked from search results, navigated to directly, or retrieved through the citation navigator.

Calculation Method

Z-scores are calculated for each of the five metrics within each subject. These Z-scores are averaged to generate the author’s overall subject score. The final average score is placed into the standard competition ranking to determine the top 100 authors for each subject.

Formula

Z-score Calculation:
Zx = (x – µ) / σ

Average Z-score:
Zµ = (Z1 + Z2 + Z3 + Z4 + Z5) / 5

Final ScholarRank:
Zµ, ranked using standard competition rules within each subject area.

Update and Refresh Schedule

Each subject ranking is refreshed with every monthly HeinOnline content release, at which point all citations are fully recounted. This ensures that the standings remain current as new scholarship is published and cited.

Additional Information and FAQs

For more details and answers to frequently asked questions, visit:
https://help.heinonline.org/kb/scholarly-impact-rankings-faq/