Data from: 120 Years of “Lemurology” - What has changed?
Data files
Mar 27, 2025 version files 483.81 KB
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120YL_Database_WoS_MFJ_(1).xlsx
477.84 KB
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README.md
5.97 KB
Abstract
Lemurs, a highly diverse primate group endemic to Madagascar, have captivated the attention of researchers for nearly 120 years. Here, we conducted a literature review and a bibliometric analysis to provide an overview of how various aspects of “Lemurology”, or the scientific studies of lemurs, have changed over time. Focusing only on original scientific articles, we described the trends in the topics and taxa studied, the publication languages, the authorship, and study sites. We used two datasets: one from the Web of Science (WoS; 2,223 articles) and another from three Madagascar-focused journals (MFJ; 329 articles). The observation of lemurs in the wild is the oldest form of Lemurology, starting under the French colonization, and remains the main data source for articles in both datasets. Microcebus and Eulemur are the most studied genera in WoS and Propithecus and Eulemur in MFJ. At this time, no articles are written in Malagasy, but English and French are the main languages used in Lemurology. Although Malagasy scientists are still underrepresented at the international level, there is a recent shift toward an increased number of Malagasy scientists as first and last authors. We found no gender bias in WoS but MFJ exhibited noticeable male author dominance. Most Lemurology has been conducted at the Duke Lemur Center (USA), followed by Kirindy and Ranomafana forests in Madagascar. Lemurology thus shows different portraits at international and local levels, suggesting that unequal access to resources and opportunities may hinder the effective investigation and conservation of lemurs.
https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.jm63xsjnf
Description of the data and file structure
General information
1. Title of Dataset: 120YL 
Database WoS MFJ.xlsx
2. Author Information
a) Principal Investigator Contact Information
• Name: Onja H. Razafindratsima
• Institution: UC Berkeley
• Email: onja@berkeley.edu
b) Associate Contact Information
• Name: Veronarindra Ramananjato
• Institution: UC Berkeley
• Email: veronarindra@berkeley.edu
c) Associate Contact Information
• Name: Finaritra Randimbiarison
• Institution: UC Berkeley
• Email: finaritra@berkeley.edu
3. Date of data collection: 1900 - September 2022
4. Geographic location of data collection: Various sites across the world
5. Information about funding sources that supported the collection of the data: No specific funding.
Files and variables
File: 120YL_Database_WoS_MFJ.xlsx
File description
1. File List: this one only
2. Sheet list:
a) WebOfScience: Database sourced from Web Of Science
b) MadafascarFocusedjournal: Database sourced from Madagascarfocused Journal (Lemur News, Madagascar Conservation and Development, and Malagasy Nature)
3. Relationship between files, if important: NA
4. Additional related data collected that was not included in the current data package: NA
5. Are there multiple versions of the dataset? No
Variable List
1. Variables common to “WebOfScience”, and “MadagascarFocusedJournal”
a) #Paper: Identification number of the paper
b) Year: Publication year
c) Journal/Book: Name of the journal
d) Language: Language in which the paper was written
e) #Authors: Number of authors
f) #MG Authors: Number of Malagasy authors based on their names or our knowledge from our acquaintance with the authors
g) MG 1st: Whether the first author is a Malagasy or not
h) 1st Gender: Gender of the first author based on information we found online and/or our acquaintance with the authors
i) 1st MG based: Whether the first author is based in Madagascar or not
j) 1st Affiliated **
Country**: Country of the institutional affiliation of the first author; first affiliation recored in case the author has multiple affiliations
k) Last MG based: Whether the last author’s institution is based in Madagascar or not
l) Topic: Topic addressed in the paper. We first categorized each article using Web of Science’s topics; then, we reclassified some of them to the most appropriate topic after we screened the abstract. We added a new category, “conservation human-lemur interactions”, for articles detailing any aspects of threats and pressures affecting lemurs, related to humans or not, and any aspects of conservation initiatives or projects leading to the preservation of lemurs.
m) Extant Status: Whether the species studied were extinct, extant, or both.
n) #Species: Number of species studied
o) Species Focus **1 to 10**: Name of the species studied, up to 10.
2. Variables unique to “WebOfScience”
a) Author name: Names of the authors
b) MG **
Last**: Whether the last author is a Malagasy or not
c) Last Gender: Gender of the last author based on information we found online and/or our acquaintance with the authors
d) Field/Captivity: Whether the research took place in a field or captive setting
e) Site Name: Name(s) of the field site(s)
f) Latitude & Longitude: Geographic coordinates of the sites. For each location in Madagascar, we identified and classified whether it is located within a Protected Area or its surroundings based on this information and using a map of Protected Areas across Madagascar (Map data from https://protectedareas.mg/, accessed January 2024). We were unable to identify or correctly classify some sites because these were mentioned only by localities where the study was performed and/or campsite names without geographic coordinates.
g) Collared: Whether the studied individual lemurs were collared or not.
h) Captured: Whether the studied individual lemurs were captured or not.
i) Last Affiliated **
Country**: Country of the institutional affiliation of the last author.
3. Variables unique to “MadagascarFocusedJournal”
a) First **
and Last Author**: Names of the first and last authors.
b) Volume: Volume of the journal.
NA- Not applicable
Sharing & Access Information
1. Licenses/restrictions placed on the data: NA
2. Links to other publicly accessible locations of the data: NA
3. Links/relationships to ancillary data sets: NA
4. Was data derived from another source? : Yes.
We searched for publications on Web of Science Core Collection (WoS) in September 2022. We used “LEMUR” as a keyword in “All fields” settings and did not set a time limit to review as much literature as possible. Our search was then refined to only include scientific articles, i.e., original peer-reviewed articles, excluding opinion pieces, conference and meeting proceedings, reviews, theses, books, and book chapters.
We downloaded and consulted all issues of the journal issues of Lemur News, Malagasy Nature, and Madagascar Conservation and Development in early 2023. We then built a dataset from these journals by reading the title and abstract of each scientific article and retaining only those about lemurs. This dataset comprised 329 articles published between 1993 and 2023.