# Keeping Score: A Quantitative Analysis of How the CHI Community Appreciates Its Milestones

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.02456 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.02456/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 5 Jan 2025.

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [What Do We Mean by 'Pilot Study': Early Findings from a Meta-Review of Pilot Study Reporting at CHI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.13488/) (2026)
- [15 Years of Augmented Human(s) Research: Where Do We Stand?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.03715/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The ACM CHI Conference has a tradition of citing its intellectual heritage. At the same time, we know CHI is highly diverse and evolving. In this highly dynamic context, it is not clear how the CHI community continues to appreciate its milestones (within and outside of CHI). We present an investigation into how the community's citations to milestones have evolved over 43 years of CHI Proceedings (1981-2024). Forgetting curves plotted for each year suggest that milestones are slowly fading from the CHI community's collective memory. However, the picture is more nuanced when we trace citations to the top-cited milestones over time. We identify three distinct types of milestones cited at CHI, a typology of milestone contributions, and define the Milestone Coefficient as a metric to assess the impact of milestone papers on a continuous scale. Further, we provide empirical evidence of a Matthew effect at CHI. We discuss the broader ramifications for the CHI community and the field of HCI.