Perspectives on Psychological Science

TOUGH: The Measure of Merit in Psychological Science

Abstract

Scientific careers depend largely on the evaluation of one’s merit. Yet scientists agree that the measurement of merit is quite a complex endeavor. Some indicators exist, such as Hirsch’s well-known h index, but none can fully capture the complexity of the notion of merit. We propose that the h factor should be complemented with additional useful measurements: the t, o, u, and g indexes.