In this paper, we examine the evolution of the impact of older scholarly articles. We attempt to answer four questions. First, how often are older articles cited and how has this changed over time. Second, how does the impact of older articles vary across different research fields. Third, is the change in the impact of older articles accelerating or slowing down. Fourth, are these trends different for much older articles. To answer these questions, we studied citations from articles published in 1990-2013. We computed the fraction of citations to older articles from articles published each year as the measure of impact. We considered articles that were published at least 10 years before the citing article as older articles. We computed these numbers for 261 subject categories and 9 broad areas of research. Finally, we repeated the computation for two other definitions of older articles, 15 years and older and 20 years and older. There are three conclusions from our study. First, the impact of older articles has grown substantially over 1990-2013. In 2013, 36 of citations were to articles that are at least 10 years old; this fraction has grown 28 since 1990. The fraction of older citations increased over 1990-2013 for 7 out of 9 broad areas and 231 out of 261 subject categories. Second, the increase over the second half (2002-2013) was double the increase in the first half (1990-2001). Third, the trend of a growing impact of older articles also holds for even older articles. In 2013, 21 of citations were to articles >= 15 years old with an increase of 30 since 1990 and 13 of citations were to articles >= 20 years old with an increase of 36 . Now that finding and reading relevant older articles is about as easy as finding and reading recently published articles, significant advances aren't getting lost on the shelves and are influencing work worldwide for years after.
Chen's data for the raw frequency of use of 138 physics journals in the science library at M I T are re‐examined and converted to densities of use‐per‐metre of shelf. Other units of size for obtaining densities, and their measurement, are discussed. There is no evidence for synchronous obsolescence in the 1955 to 1968 volumes of these journals: instead there is some statistically significant evidence of greater density of use with greater age. Similar evidence elsewhere is cited. The ranking order for heaviness of use is also radically altered by converting raw frequencies to densities of use. It is suggested that, for comparing the relative values of different journals, or age groups, in library use or citation studies, analyses of raw frequencies are valueless, and indeed potentially dangerously misleading, until they are converted to allow for the numbers of available items in each group examined.