Pharmaceutical Sciences Research in Universities in Nigeria: The Collaboration and Citation Nexus, 2016-2025

This study analysed pharmaceutical sciences research output from universities in Nigeria between 2016 and 2025 to examine the extent of collaboration and correlation between author count and citation count. The study was guided by four research questions and one hypothesis. The objectives of the study include determining the annual growth rate of Pharmaceutical Sciences research publications from Universities in Nigeria, the annual citation rate of their publications, examining the extent of collaboration among pharmaceutical science researchers in universities in Nigeria and the relationship between citation counts and the extent of authorship collaboration. A bibliometric research design was adopted, and a census of 633 articles in pharmaceutical sciences produced by researchers affiliated with Nigerian universities, as indexed in the Dimensions database, was analyzed. A coding instrument validated by experts and tested for inter-rater reliability using Cohen's Kappa (values greater than 0.81) was used for data extraction. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and Pearson's Product Moment Correlation. Findings revealed a steady annual growth rate of 4.35% in publications over the period, while mean citations per article rose from 0.14 in 2016 to 10.01 in 2025, representing a total citation growth of 13,750% and an average annual growth rate of 91.7%. The degree of collaboration among researchers was high at 97.95%, with international collaboration accounting for 40.44%. A statistically significant but weak positive correlation was found between citation counts and the extent of authorship collaboration. Conclusively, The Pharmaceutical Sciences research in universities in Nigeria is overwhelmingly collaborative, maintain strong global engagement but concentrated in few countries- USA, South Africa, UK and India. In addition, statistically significant but weak positive correlation exists between co-authorship extent and citation counts. It was recommended that universities and funding agencies establish funded centres for international research collaboration.