Citation analysis of grey literature reflected in social science ETDs submitted in two state universities of Haryana, India

Purpose This paper aims to study the extent of grey literature (GL) cited in PhD theses submitted to two state universities of Haryana, India, during 2011-2018. Design/methodology/approach This paper is the result of citations analysis of 14,547 citations appended in 126 PhD theses of Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra and Maharshi Dayanand University, Rohtak, India. The primary data was collected by downloading title pages and bibliographies of the theses from “Shodhganga”, Indian National Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD) Repository. Findings A total of 14,547 citations from 43 different forms of literature were cited by the researchers of all the departments in their PhD theses. Out of which, 4,606 citations (31.7%) were from 40 different forms of GL. Books/book chapters were the most preferred form of literature with 4,818 citations (33.12%), followed by 4,623 citations (31.77%) of journal articles and 1,344 citations (9.23%) of reports. The reports were the most preferred form of GL among the researchers in every field, followed by government publications, working papers and websites. Remaining forms of GL citations were less than 10%. Originality/value During the study, enormous literature was available on citation analysis of PhD theses submitted in different subjects to various universities. Most of the studies on citation analysis were conducted to ascertain the authorship patterns, ranking of the journals by citations frequency and forms of the literature cited by researchers, etc. These studies did not highlight the use and importance of GL in research and academic activities. This paper is original, as it studies GL cited in PhD theses on the basis of primary data, collected from the Indian National ETD database.