Peter D. Crittenden: meta-analysis of an exceptional two-decade tenure as senior editor of The Lichenologist, the flagship journal of lichenology

Abstract

AbstractPeter D. Crittenden served as senior editor of The Lichenologist, the flagship journal in the field of lichenological research, for a period of two decades, between 2000 and 2019. A review of the development of the journal and the publication output during this period is provided. The number of papers published during this period (1197) matches that of all papers published under the three previous senior editors, Peter W. James, David L. Hawksworth and Dennis H. Brown, during a much longer period of 42 years from 1958 to 1999. Peter oversaw important editorial changes to the layout and content of the journal: an increased size with a modern cover design, leaving behind the classic mint-coloured cover of more than 40 years; the addition of ‘thematic issues’ and encouragement of large monographs; implementation of substantial changes to the Code, such as effective electronic publication and obligate registration of new fungal names; and more recently a new policy to reject so-called ‘single naked species descriptions’. Shortly before Peter took over as senior editor, The Lichenologist had received its first impact factor, and Peter managed to continuously increase this measure from around 0.9 to lately up to over 1.5, higher than most other competing journals. The 1197 papers between 2000 and 2019 were published by a total of 1138 different authors, more than half of whom appeared just once as author, whereas a small number participated in numerous (up to 93) papers. There was a continuous increase in the mean number of authors per paper per year, from below 2.5 to around 3.5, the highest numbers ranging between 11 and 30; still, c. 75% of all papers between 2000 and 2019 were single-authored or had up to three authors. Based on affiliations at the time of publication, two thirds of author contributions came from Europe (66%), 13% from North America, 9% from Asia and 7% from Latin America. Likewise, almost half of the study areas were located in Europe and around 10% each in North America, South America and Asia. The countries with the highest number of studies included, in descending order, the United States, Spain, the United Kingdom, Norway and Sweden. North America and Europe were over-represented in terms of author contributions, whereas Africa, Latin America, Australia and Oceania were over-represented in terms of study areas. The 1197 papers analyzed encompassed a broad diversity of topics, classified into 32 categories. Taxonomy of lichenized fungi was the most frequent component, representing the focal point in almost half of all studies, followed by phylogeny and evolution, ecology, and the taxonomy of lichenicolous fungi. Around two thirds of the currently accepted genera of lichenized fungi were treated, with a significant correlation between known species richness and the number of papers in which a genus was treated, underlining the taxonomic representativity of papers published in the journal during the past two decades. Examples of genera that were treated more frequently than expected included commonly studied model organisms, such as Lobaria, and those frequently featured in ecological or other non-taxonomic studies, such as Xanthoria. Species-rich tropical genera, particularly in the Graphidaceae, were generally under-represented. Mean number of authors per paper per volume and total number of country origins of authors per volume were the best predictors of impact factor, followed by diversity of study countries per volume, mean number of study countries per paper per volume, mean number of topics per paper per volume, and proportion of studies with phylogenetic components per volume. Individual papers that contributed to high impact factors included broad-scale revisionary treatments and worldwide keys to species-rich taxa, substantial phylogenetic reclassifications of known taxonomic groups, papers dealing with novel methodological approaches of broad interest, and broad-scale studies related to environmental change and lichen biomonitoring.