Convergent validation of peer review decisions using the h index

Hirsch [Hirsch, J. E. (2005). An index to quantify an individual's scientific research output. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 102(46), 16569–16572] has proposed the h index as a single-number criterion to evaluate the scientific output of a researcher. We investigated the convergent validity of decisions for awarding long-term fellowships to post-doctoral researchers as practiced by the Boehringer Ingelheim Fonds (B.I.F.) by using the h index. Our study examined 414 B.I.F. applicants (64 approved and 350 rejected) with a total of 1586 papers. The results of our study show that the applicants’h indices correlate substantially with standard bibliometric indicators. Even though the h indices of approved B.I.F. applicants on average (arithmetic mean and median) are higher than those of rejected applicants (and with this, fundamentally confirm the validity of the funding decisions), the distributions of the h indices show in part overlaps that we categorized as type I error (falsely drawn approval) or type II error (falsely drawn rejection). Approximately, one-third of the decisions to award a fellowship to an applicant show a type I error, and about one-third of the decisions not to award a fellowship to an applicant show a type II error. Our analyses of possible reasons for these errors show that the applicant's field of study but not personal ties between the B.I.F. applicant and the B.I.F. can increase or decrease the risks for type I and type II errors.