Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)

The Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) is Clarivate’s citation index scoped specifically to social-science journals — one of the six citation indexes bundled into the Web of Science Core Collection, and the direct sibling of the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), which covers the natural and physical sciences instead. SSCI and SCIE run on the same underlying citation-indexing model — recording each article’s cited references so scholarship can be traced forward and backward through the literature — but each is evaluated, curated, and reported on separately by Clarivate. A journal’s presence in one does not imply anything about its presence in the other.

What SSCI covers today

Per Clarivate’s own current SSCI product page, the Social Sciences Citation Index covers 3,541 actively publishing journals across 58 subject categories, with backfile coverage extending to 1900. Coverage figures move as journals are added, suspended, or delisted, so a researcher who needs a current number should check Clarivate’s Master Journal List (mjl.clarivate.com) directly rather than treat any fixed figure as permanent.

SSCI’s 58 subject categories span the social sciences broadly — fields such as sociology, psychology, economics, political science, education, law, and social-science-adjacent areas of public health and management — each functioning as its own Journal Citation Reports (JCR) ranking category (see “Why the distinction matters” below).

Journal-selection criteria

Inclusion in SSCI is not automatic and is not simply a matter of a journal requesting it. Clarivate applies the same general editorial-evaluation model it uses across the Web of Science Core Collection to SSCI specifically: independent, in-house editorial reviewers assess a candidate journal against publishing-standards criteria (peer review rigor, editorial board quality, publishing timeliness, ethical publishing practices, and safeguards against “predatory” or hijacked titles) and against impact criteria (citation influence within its field), before a title is accepted. Clarivate describes this evaluation as conducted by in-house experts specifically to keep the resulting dataset free of publisher or industry conflicts of interest. Once accepted, a journal is indexed cover-to-cover — full cited-reference, author, and affiliation data, with accurate subject classification — and its status is not permanent: continued inclusion depends on continuing to meet Clarivate’s criteria, and a title can be suspended or delisted later for quality or integrity concerns.

SSCI and its sibling indexes in the Web of Science Core Collection

SSCI is one of six citation indexes Clarivate bundles into the Web of Science Core Collection. Each is evaluated, curated, and reported on independently — a journal’s presence in one says nothing about its presence in another:

• Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) — natural and physical sciences, roughly 178 subject categories, back to 1900. See CASRAI’s Science Citation Index (SCI/SCIE) entry.
• Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) — social sciences, 58 subject categories, back to 1900 (this entry).
• Arts & Humanities Citation Index (AHCI) — arts and humanities, evaluated on its own separate criteria from SSCI and SCIE.
• Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) — a holding index for journals Clarivate has accepted onto the Web of Science platform but that have not (yet) been evaluated for, or have not (yet) met, the stricter selection criteria of SCIE, SSCI, or AHCI. ESCI inclusion is not the same as SSCI indexing, though a title can move from ESCI into SSCI later if it meets that index’s criteria.
• Conference Proceedings Citation Index (CPCI) — indexes conference-proceedings literature (split into CPCI-S for the sciences and CPCI-SSH for the social sciences and humanities) rather than journal articles.
• Book Citation Index (BKCI) — indexes scholarly books rather than journals or proceedings.

A journal indexed in SCIE is not thereby indexed in SSCI, and vice versa — each index has its own selection committee and its own criteria, even though a small number of interdisciplinary journals (for example, in areas bridging health policy and clinical medicine) can be evaluated for, and accepted into, more than one Core Collection index. For the broader relationship between SSCI and the platform it sits inside, see CASRAI’s Web of Science entry.

Scopus, Elsevier’s competing database, has no equivalent to the SCIE/SSCI/AHCI split — it applies a single selection process and subject-classification scheme across all disciplines. A social-science journal’s Scopus status (and its Scopus-derived CiteScore) is therefore a separate question from its SSCI status, decided by a different organization under different criteria. See CASRAI’s Getting a Journal Indexed in Scopus guide for how Scopus’s own evaluation (the CSAB) differs from Clarivate’s SSCI process, and CASRAI’s Scopus vs Web of Science vs OpenAlex comparison for the fuller picture.

How to check whether a specific journal is SSCI-indexed

The only authoritative way to confirm a journal’s SSCI status is Clarivate’s own Master Journal List (mjl.clarivate.com), not a publisher’s marketing claim or a badge on a journal’s homepage. Search by journal title or ISSN; the result shows every Web of Science Core Collection index that title currently belongs to (SSCI, SCIE, AHCI, ESCI, CPCI, BKCI, or some combination) along with its current subject-category assignment(s). See CASRAI’s Web of Science Master Journal List guide for the lookup steps in detail. A subscribing institution’s Web of Science platform search, or the journal’s entry in that year’s Journal Citation Reports, will show the same index membership once a title is accepted.

Because indexing status is not permanent, checking the Master Journal List directly — rather than relying on an older citation, a CV, or a journal’s own claim — is the only way to confirm current status. A title that was SSCI-indexed in the past can later be suspended or delisted for quality or integrity concerns; see CASRAI’s guide on why journals get delisted from Web of Science for the common reasons and the process.

Why the SCIE-vs-SSCI distinction matters for researchers

The distinction is not academic trivia — it changes how journal quality gets assessed in social-science fields specifically:

• Journal Citation Reports (JCR) rankings are computed per index category. A social-science journal’s Journal Impact Factor quartile ranking is calculated within its SSCI subject category (e.g., where it ranks among SSCI’s Sociology titles), not within an SCIE science category. A researcher or committee comparing two social-science journals’ standing needs the SSCI-specific ranking, not a general Web of Science search result, to make that comparison meaningfully. See CASRAI’s Journal Impact Factor and Quartile Rankings and How to Look Up a Journal’s Impact Factor guides for how to find and read that ranking.
• JIF eligibility history. Through the 2022 JCR release, only SCIE- and SSCI-indexed journals received a Journal Impact Factor at all — a social-science journal that was Web of Science-indexed but not specifically SSCI-accepted (for example, ESCI-only) had no JIF. Clarivate extended JIF eligibility to all Core Collection journals, including ESCI and AHCI titles, starting with the 2023 JCR release. This means SSCI membership is no longer the sole gate to a social-science journal receiving a JIF, but SSCI-indexed journals still carry the longer, continuously-tracked JIF history and the more established subject-category rankings within their field.
• Tenure, promotion, and research-assessment use. Departments and funders evaluating social-science output sometimes use SSCI indexing status, or an SSCI-specific quartile ranking, as one input into journal-quality assessment — distinct from checking SCIE status, which is the wrong index for a social-science title in the first place. Research administrators supporting social-science faculty should confirm which index (SSCI, not SCIE) a policy or committee actually intends before applying an indexing requirement.
• The Journal Citation Indicator (JCI) enables comparison across SSCI’s diverse subject categories. JIF values aren’t directly comparable across differently-cited fields — a top economics journal and a top sociology journal don’t cite at the same rate. Clarivate’s field-normalized JCI, introduced in the 2021 JCR release (category average = 1.0), gives SSCI journals a metric that is more comparable across SSCI’s 58 subject categories than JIF alone.
• Discovery and citation tracking. SSCI’s cited-reference data feeds the same Web of Science citation graph used for author-level metrics and Current research information system (CRIS) integration; see CASRAI’s How to Search Web of Science Effectively guide for search mechanics that apply across the whole Core Collection, including SSCI.

As with any single index or journal-level metric, research administrators should avoid treating SSCI membership, or a JCR ranking computed from it, as a complete or sufficient measure of an individual article’s or researcher’s quality. The Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA) and the Leiden Manifesto both caution against using journal-level indicators as a proxy for the quality of specific research outputs. See also CASRAI’s What Does It Mean for a Journal to Be Indexed? guide for the broader context of what indexing status does and doesn’t signal.

Frequently asked questions

Is SSCI the same thing as Web of Science?

No. SSCI is one citation index within Clarivate’s Web of Science Core Collection, alongside the Science Citation Index Expanded, Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Emerging Sources Citation Index, Conference Proceedings Citation Index, and Book Citation Index. “Web of Science” refers to Clarivate’s overall platform, not to SSCI specifically.

What is the difference between SSCI and SCIE?

SCIE covers the natural and physical sciences (roughly 178 subject categories); SSCI covers the social sciences (58 subject categories). Both share the same backfile start date (1900) and the same general Clarivate editorial-evaluation model, but each index is evaluated and maintained separately — a journal accepted into one is not automatically part of the other.

How many journals does SSCI cover?

Per Clarivate’s own SSCI product page, 3,541 actively publishing journals across 58 subject categories, as of this entry’s last verification. This figure changes as journals are added or delisted; check Clarivate’s Master Journal List for a current count.

Does SSCI indexing guarantee a journal is high quality?

It signals the journal passed Clarivate’s editorial and impact evaluation at the time of acceptance — a meaningful filter, given Clarivate’s stated screening against predatory and hijacked titles — but organizations such as DORA and the Leiden Manifesto caution against treating any single index’s membership, or the journal-level metrics it enables, as a substitute for evaluating an individual article or researcher’s actual work.

Can a journal be indexed in both SSCI and SCIE?

It is possible for an interdisciplinary journal to be evaluated for, and accepted into, more than one Core Collection index, but this is decided separately for each index — acceptance into SCIE does not automatically extend to SSCI, or vice versa.

How do I check if a specific journal is indexed in SSCI?

Search Clarivate’s Master Journal List (mjl.clarivate.com) by journal title or ISSN — it shows every Web of Science Core Collection index the journal currently belongs to. See CASRAI’s Web of Science Master Journal List guide for the exact steps. Don’t rely on a journal’s own “indexed in SSCI” claim, since indexing status can change.

What’s the difference between SSCI and ESCI?

ESCI (Emerging Sources Citation Index) is a holding index for Web of Science journals that have not yet been evaluated for, or have not yet met, SSCI’s (or SCIE’s or AHCI’s) fuller selection criteria. An ESCI listing is not SSCI indexing, though a journal can graduate from ESCI into SSCI if it later meets SSCI’s criteria.

References

• Clarivate, “Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI)” product page.
• Clarivate, “Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE)” product page.
• Clarivate, “Web of Science Core Collection” product page.
• Clarivate, 2023 Journal Citation Reports release announcement (JIF eligibility extended to all Core Collection journals).
• DORA, San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment.