Abstract
This study introduces nation diffusion breadth and nation diffusion intensity by adapting the notions of field diffusion breadth and field diffusion intensity as defined by Liu and Rousseau, and a variation on the total cited influence indicator introduced by Hu et al. Knowledge diffusion across countries in the field of management is then analyzed as a case study. Main countries in the field of management studies are considered as centers in their own ego-centered citation networks. The three indicators mentioned above are then calculated for these ego-centered citation networks. They measure the scientific impact each of these countries has on other nations. A general picture of the knowledge diffusion process is given by the three indicators at the country level over four periods 1992–1996, 1997–2001, 2002–2006, and 2007–2011. The validity of the proposed indicators is verified by the calculated results.




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Acknowledgments
This study is supported by a grant from National Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 71373254). The authors wish to thank Professor Ronald Rousseau for his great guidance, constructive suggestions and careful English corrections of the article, which significantly improved the quality of the paper.
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J. Guan and W. Zhu are contributed equally to this paper.
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Guan, J., Zhu, W. How knowledge diffuses across countries: a case study in the field of management. Scientometrics 98, 2129–2144 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-013-1134-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-013-1134-1