%0 Article %T Structure and development of publishing activity in Finnish Forest Sciences in 1909–1978 %A Leikola, Matti %D 1981 %J Acta Forestalia Fennica %V 0 %N 175 %R doi:10.14214/aff.7622 %U https://silvafennica.fi/article/7622 %X

This study examines the extent, structure and development of the publishing activity of Finnish forest sciences between 1909–1978. The subject comprises the four main forestry series; Acta Forestalia Fennica, Silva Fennica, Communicationes Forestales Fenniae and Folia Forestalia. Collectively, 532 authors produced 1,715 publications containing 90,134 pages.
The total number of pages of forest science publications doubled every 25 years. Only a small number of short research reports (few pages) and long monographs (over 200 pages) were published. The median age class of the authors was 36–40 years. The so called Lotka’s law, which describes the productivity of the researchers, proved to be valid in forest sciences. According to this law, among other things, one tenth of the researchers produced approximately half of all publications. Despite changes, the structure of the publisher community remained roughly constant. Every year approximately 30% of the author community was composed of new members, whilst 19–26% of authors stopped publishing.