EconStor Usage Statistics

  1. Overview of Available Statistics

    1. Overall Statistics of Downloads on EconStor

      On the overall statistics page aggregated download numbers are provided for all documents on EconStor in a selected time span (data available since October 2012), a TOP 10 ranking list of most downloaded documents, the distribution of download over the selected time span and the countries of origin where the downloads have occurred.

    2. Download Statistics of Single Titles

      Usage statistics are available for any single title on EconStor through the link “Counter Statistics” in the detailed view of title data. These usage statistics show in the selected time span (data available since October 2012) the total number of downloads of each PDF document, the temporal distribution as well as the countries of origin where the downloads have occurred.

    3. Usage Statistics and Rankings of Institutions and Collections

      Detailed usage statistics are available for any institution or collection (series, journal) on EconStor through the link “Counter statistics”. These usage statistics show in a selected time span the total number of downloads, the TOP 10 ranking of most downloaded papers, the temporal distribution as well as the countries of origin where downloads have occurred. Based on aggregated download figures for any institution and collections the following rankings are available:

  2. Information on the data collection method

    1. COUNTER Code of Practice

      It is our aim to reflect the real usage of all documents on EconStor by natural persons. Furthermore we intend to provide usage statistics that are comparable to those from other Online databases with scientific content, e.g. subject based aggregators and databases from publishing houses. For that reason we have adopted the internationally recognized COUNTER codes of practice.

      COUNTER is an international initiative by database hosts (e.g. Thomson ISI, EBSCO, JSTOR), publishing houses (e.g. Elsevier, Springer, Nature) and library associations (e.g. Association of Research Libraries) aiming to establish standards that facilitate the collection, recording and processing of online usage statistics. Thus, the standards of COUNTER provide for objective collection and reliable comparability of download figures. The methods for assessing the EconStor download statistics are in accordance with the "COUNTER Code of Practice for e-Resources". EconStor download statistics according to COUNTER are available since October 2012. Only PDF-Downloads are measured whereas mere page views on EconStor are not taken into account.

    2. Additional Filtering of Outliers

      Even the standards of COUNTER do not completely filter all automated accesses on EconStor. Therefore as a rule a download from one specific IP address is only counted once per day and document. Beyond that logfiles are checked for outliers in regular terms. These measures will make sure that our download statistics correspond best to the real user behavior.