Data from: National citation patterns of NEJM, The Lancet, JAMA and The BMJ in the lay press: a quantitative content analysis

Objectives: To analyse the total number of newspaper articles citing the
four leading general medical journals and to describe national citation
patterns. Design: Quantitative content analysis Setting/sample: Full text
of 22 general newspapers in 14 countries over the period 2008-2015,
collected from LexisNexis. The 14 countries have been categorized into
four regions: US, UK, Western World (EU countries other than UK, and
Australia, New Zealand and Canada) and Rest of the World (other
countries). Main outcome measure: Press citations of four medical journals
(two American: NEJM and JAMA; and two British: The Lancet and The BMJ) in
22 newspapers. Results: British and American newspapers cited some of the
four analysed medical journals about three times a week in 2008-2015
(weekly mean 3.2 and 2.7 citations respectively); the newspapers from
other Western countries did so about once a week (weekly mean 1.1), and
those from the Rest of the World cited them about once a month (monthly
mean 1.1). The New York Times cited above all other newspapers (weekly
mean 4.7). The analysis showed the existence of three national citation
patterns in the daily press: American newspapers cited mostly American
journals (70.0% of citations), British newspapers cited mostly British
journals (86.5%), and the rest of the analysed press cited more British
journals than American ones. The Lancet was the most cited journal in the
press of almost all Western countries outside the US and the UK.
Multivariate correspondence analysis confirmed the national patterns and
showed that over 85% of the citation data variability is retained in just
one single new variable: the national dimension. Conclusion: British and
American newspapers are the ones that cite the four analysed medical
journals more often, showing a domestic preference for their respective
national journals; non-British and non-American newspapers show a common
international citation pattern.