I have observed recently that some research papers published in predatory journals are available in google scholar. So, while searching for a research article in a particular topic, one can come across such a paper (published in a predatory journal) and maybe cite it too. Is there any way to avoid such circumstances? Or, is there any site like google scholar which has a huge database of research papers but doesn't contain papers from predatory journals?
Dear Khulna,
This is a very important issue that you have raised.
You are also correct to say that these articles could also be indexed in Google Scholar. What I usually do is to stick with publishers that I am very familiar with. Elsevier, Taylor Francis, Springer Nature, just to name a few. I am familiar with about 10 of such publishers and tr to remain faithful to these. Now if I happen to stumble to a paper published by an unfamiliar (to me that is) publisher, I use Bell's list to check its credibility https://beallslist.net/ or you can check the journal using this link https://predatoryjournals.com/journals/ that way you avoid citing such papers.
Hope this helps.
Dear Ferdinand C Mukumbang , thanks for the suggestion, I will try searching in validated publishers' website further. I had been citing from google scholar so far and the issue crossed my mind very recently. But the name you addressed me with, is actually the location of my workplace.
Dear Nushrat,
I would suggest citing trusted and well-known papers. Moreover, you can manually check the journal if it is predatory or not according to the given features that usually the predatory journals exhibit. Even if we might have such databases, still it does not mean that a journal that is not included in that base is not a predatory journal. In my opinion, it is always useful to manually check for certain properties.
Best
Ibrahim
Last one decade has seen an exponential rise in predatory journals. Many of them are indexed in Scopus also and disguise as open access journals. An author should exercise caution if the year of publication falls after 2010 and the volume number is less than 10. It is required that the author should read the whole article thoroughly before citing. It is a good practice to always refer to reputed journals in leading publishers in a field of research. Google Scholar search for literature survey will fetch all junks in the web. It is advisable to use Scopus database.
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