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When a research article X cites another article Y, it could be because of any of the following:

  • X develops the ideas of Y
  • the ideas presented in X bear a degree of resemblance to those of Y
  • X compares its results to those of Y
  • etc.

When I study the literature in my research area, I would like to categorize the relationships between papers in a way similar to the above example. However, I would prefer to use an existing categorization that people have thought through instead of inventing a wheel. I performed a few searches, but have not discovered any such categorization. Do such categorizations exist? I would appreciate some pointers.

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    You may want to look for "bibliographic relationships", "citation function", or "citation types". There are many different annotation schemes, for example see here. – 101010111100 Jun 11 '17 at 21:37
  • @101010111100 I looked at quite a few papers, but have not found any categorization that is simple and straightforward. Most modern studies seem to be interested in automated categorization and fit their categories to that need in artificial ways. The studies on manual categorization are old and not freely available. So, what schemes for annotating citations do people actually use? – AlwaysLearning Jun 11 '17 at 22:53
  • I do not know. But I also do not see the problem in using the classes described in papers about automated classification (e.g. this one). If you want something simple, just look through a few papers and compile yourself a list of classes you like. Then use these classes to manually classify your data. – 101010111100 Jun 11 '17 at 23:27
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    WHY do you want to categorize the citing literature in this way? I ask because without understanding your purpose, it is difficult to offer you a helpful answer. Personally, I think that automatic bibliographic citation mapping has very limited usefulness for most purposes, but without knowing your own purpose, it's hard to guess what you might consider useful. Also, what is your domain of research? The purpose of literature reviews varies somewhat depending on the domain, so knowing that would be helpful. – Tripartio Jun 12 '17 at 7:01
  • @Tripartio Right. I want to do it manually (i.e. to specify the type of citation next to each citation in my notes). The area is heuristic search (a sub-area of artificial intelligence). – AlwaysLearning Jun 12 '17 at 8:11
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CiTO is a "Citation Typing Ontology" which enables RDF-type assertions differentiating (just to name the Ps):

parodies, plagiarizes, provides assertion for, provides conclusions for, provides data for, provides excerpt for, provides method for, provides quotation for

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