Journal impact factor is an important index for quantitative evaluation of journals, which was first put forward by E. Garfield, the founder of American SCI, and has been widely used. At present, scholars all over the world are discussing the evaluation function of impact factors. The central topic of discussion is: Can impact factors be used to evaluate scientific research activities [1 ~ 5]? Are the impact factors directly related to the quality of journal papers [6]? Can the influencing factors explain the academic quality of journals [7, 8]? This paper tries to explain through analysis that: (1) impact factor is one of the important quantitative indicators to characterize the academic quality of journals; (2) There is a certain correlation between the influencing factors and the quality of periodical papers; (3) Whether the paper quality can be evaluated by impact factors depends on the evaluation purpose. 1 the premise of discussion 1. 1 The quantitative research on the relationship between the general and the individual is based on a large-scale statistical sample, and the conclusions drawn can explain the general phenomenon and conform to most facts. Individual phenomena or a few facts that are contrary to the conclusion of quantitative research must be adjusted or explained through qualitative analysis, and individual phenomena or a few facts should not be used to deny the conclusion that quantitative research can explain general phenomena. The problem to be demonstrated in this paper is just a general problem. 1.2 quantitative analysis and research using data provided by the database should follow the principle of similar comparison. This is because it is difficult for each database to make the subject structure reasonable when selecting the source periodicals. According to statistics, medical journals account for 33.7 1% of nearly 5,000 journals reported by JCR (Journal Citation Report) in the United States. For disciplines with obviously more source journals, the influencing factors are necessarily higher than those with fewer source journals. Judging from the impact factors of journals in various disciplines listed by JCR in 1997, the highest impact factor in medical field is 37.796, while the highest impact factor in mathematics field is only 2.467. The research also shows that each discipline has its own characteristics in scientific research scale, research methods, cooperation degree and citation behavior, which determines the overall level difference of citation frequency among disciplines. Therefore, homogeneous comparison is a principle that must be observed in quantitative research. This is also the premise of this article. 2 About the impact factor 2. 1 The essential meaning of the impact factor is to count the average citation rate of periodical papers in a certain time domain. Here, the number of papers, time and the number of citations are the three basic elements to calculate the impact factor. The number of papers refers to the number of papers published in journals in a certain period of time. The time span depends on the reference peak period. Price, an internationally renowned scientometric institution, has come to the conclusion after a lot of literature statistics that the two years after the publication of scientific papers are the peak of citation. Therefore, the current international practice is to set the reference year for calculating the impact factor as two years. Among these three basic elements, cited frequency is a variable. When the number of papers is constant and the citation time is fixed, the impact factor depends on the citation frequency. The influence factors of periodicals reveal the depth and breadth of academic thought dissemination through the average citation rate of periodical papers, so that the evaluation of academic quality of periodicals can be measured by quantitative methods. This is the essential meaning of influencing factors [9]. 2.2 Citation relationship: Basic scientific papers with influential factors are the main output form of scientific research activities, and also the starting point for scientists' personal academic thoughts and opinions to spread to the society and eventually transform them into social science wealth. However, no scientific research is conducted in isolation, and scientific research must be improved and developed on the basis of inheritance, reference and accumulation. Newton's famous saying "Standing on the shoulders of giants" is a profound revelation of the inheritance relationship in scientific activities. In scientific activities, innovation and development are expressed through the elaboration of the text of the paper, while the inheritance, reference or criticism of previous academic thoughts is usually expressed through the quotation after the text. The relationship between reference and referenced is the referenced relationship. It can be seen that citation relationship is an objective relationship in scientific activities, which forms an academic relationship that no individual scientist can control through mutual citation of scientific papers. The journal impact factor is based on this objective academic relationship. Compared with other indicators (circulation index, abstract index, publication index, replication index, etc.). ), the impact factor is a journal evaluation index that directly reflects the citation relationship. 2.3 The relationship between influencing factors and periodical quality. Are the influencing factors directly related to the academic level of journals? Scholars have different opinions on this. Some scholars believe that the impact factor is an index to measure the usefulness or popularity of a periodical. This paper holds that the impact factor is not only an index to measure the usefulness and exhibition of periodicals, but also an important index to measure the academic level of periodicals. This is because, in a certain discipline, the journals with great influence factors are not only the journals that researchers in this discipline often read (reflecting the usefulness and exhibition of journals), but also the important journals that people often consider when submitting papers. Therefore, these journals have rich manuscript sources and strict peer review system (peer review of paper quality), which has laid a good foundation for them to publish high-level papers. Most journals with high impact factors are famous journals with high paper quality [10]. Here, the influence factors and the quality of papers (referring to the average quality level of journal papers) are mutually causal. It can be seen that the usefulness and exhibition of journals reflected by impact factors are based on the content of journals, that is, the quality of papers. Without high-quality papers, how can journals be useful and displayed? In our opinion, the usefulness and presentation of the paper are closely related to the quality of the paper. 3 The relationship between the academic level of journals and the quality of papers On the premise of affirming that influencing factors are important indicators to measure the academic level of journals, let's discuss the relationship between the academic level of journals and the quality of papers. The academic level of periodicals can be composed of many factors, the most important of which are two aspects: first, the purpose and policy of running periodicals; The second is the academic quality of the thesis. This paper focuses on the analysis of the relationship between the academic level of journals and the quality of papers. As we all know, periodical is not an abstract concept, but a carrier of scientific papers. The quality of scientific papers determines the academic level of journals. In this causal relationship, the evaluation of the quality of scientific papers has become a decisive factor. There are two main methods to evaluate the quality of scientific papers, one is peer review, and the other is citation times. Peer review mostly occurs in the review process of papers before publication. In the peer review system of natural science academic journals, there are usually three stages: preliminary review, evaluation and final review. During the preliminary examination, the responsible editor makes a preliminary evaluation of the manuscript and selects reviewers. The process of peer review is also a process of peer review. Reviewers should judge the academic level of the manuscript and make suggestions on its content and basis. On this basis, the responsible editorial board finally decides whether the manuscript can be published. The responsibility of preliminary examination, review and final examination is to judge whether the paper is academic, mainly from the scientific significance of the paper and the credibility of the results to evaluate the quality of the manuscript and decide whether to accept it. It can be seen that the process of editing and reviewing manuscripts is the process of peer review, which is an extremely important link in the quality evaluation of papers. Through peer review, according to the purpose and policy of running the journal, outstanding people are selected from many contributions, and even hot issues are seized when necessary, and well-known scientists are actively invited to contribute. Peer review is an important means to control the quality of periodical papers in the early stage. The level of reviewers is directly related to the quality of journal papers. Citation is the basis of calculating the impact factor, and it is also a generally accepted way to evaluate the quality of papers in the later period. As far as a paper is concerned, the more times it is cited, the higher the attention of the paper and the greater its academic influence. High-frequency papers often show that the research content of this paper is a research hotspot in this field in a certain period, and even an important event in the process of scientific development. The cited amount of periodicals is the sum of the cited amount of periodical papers. The impact factor is an index to represent the average citation rate of periodical papers in recent two years. The greater the impact factor, the higher the average citation rate of journal papers. If the editorial department of the journal can review high-quality papers (including papers with different views on academic issues, etc.). ) in the early peer review stage and aroused widespread concern, then the journal will naturally get a higher impact factor. It can be seen that peer review and the number of papers cited are important means to evaluate the quality of papers. High-level peer review is the guarantee of paper quality, high-quality papers are the basis of high cited frequency of journals, and high cited frequency is the decisive variable for calculating impact factors. Source: Innovative Medical Network >> Learn more. Click www.yixue360.com.