Self-citation is a normal part of scholarly writing, but excessive or unjustified self-citation can inflate citation metrics, obscure a paper’s originality, and put a journal’s indexing status at risk. Reviewing reference lists manually to catch this pattern is slow, inconsistent, and hard to sustain as submission volumes grow. To address this challenge, Digital Science has launched Dimensions Citation Check, a new API-based editorial tool designed to help publishers safeguard against the issue of excessive self citations.
Editors upload manuscript PDFs exactly as received, and Dimensions Citation Check resolves author identities against the Dimensions database, the world’s largest interconnected research database. It then pinpoints self-citations at the sentence level and assesses whether each one is justified in context or appears gratuitous. The result is a clear, structured risk rating, delivered in minutes, with a formatted HTML report ready for the editorial record.
Because Citation Check connects to existing submission management systems via API and supports batch processing, it fits directly into the workflows editorial teams already rely on, even during peak submission windows. Importantly, Citation Check is built to support editorial judgment, not replace it. It gives editors an objective, evidence-based signal so they can ask the right questions and act with confidence, keeping final decisions firmly in their hands.
Dr Leslie McIntosh, VP of Research Integrity and Security at Digital Science, said the tool gives editorial teams an objective, evidence based signal, helping integrity screening become part of the normal workflow.
For publishers managing high submission volumes and growing pressure around research integrity, Citation Check offers a consistent, scalable way to catch self-citation risk before it becomes a bigger problem at peer review or beyond.
Learn more about Dimensions Citation Check and request a demo today. You could also join Leslie McIntosh and Bob Schijvenaars on Monday, July 27th for a live webinar, The Self-Citation Problem: How Publishers Can Protect Their Journals at Scale. In 45 minutes, we’ll unpack the self-citation challenge facing editorial teams and show Dimensions Citation Check in action, followed by a live Q&A. Register now.