Selecting the right journal for your academic paper is like meeting friends. You have to know what kind of scientific article and research you have, write the article with the necessary ingredients that are expected of it, be where editors and journals are, find an academic journal that publishes articles on the subject you have chosen, and when love arises, if necessary, insist a little.
However, there are still people who believe in the theory of probabilities when publishing in journals: sending the paper to a list of journals, one after the other until it is accepted. This is a fairly poor approach, because selecting an appropriate journal is as important as writing a good article.
http://howtopublishinjournals.com/2013/12/15/selecting-the-right-journal-for-my-recent-academic-paper/
That's true enough Rafael - and, literally, it can be like meeting friends. I have a handful of 'target' journals that i prefer to submit to; not just because I have a history of success with them but, often, the editorial teams are often colleagues, collaborators and sometimes friends - past and present. That doesn't mean 'favouritism' though; I still have to go through the same blind review processes. It's more that the journals and their scope are influenced by their professional philosophies which are often shared between us. OK - if I don't get accepted by one, then I do go down a list - but the list is not 'random' - nor based on the 'next one down'. There are one or two journals that i no longer submit to because the editors etc have changed (which is a good thing every now and then) but, so too, has the 'ethos' of the journals that i previously enjoyed submitting to.
At the same time - i'm willing to try new journals and 'suck it and see' and, of course, I would not recommend to anyone that they just stick with a few journals all of the time; that can be a bit limiting.
I see that someone has already voted your question down Rafael (not me - by the way) - so they must see it quite differently. I take it that they favour the notion of submitting to a 'list' until it gets accepted - but that, to me, is potentially not a good strategy or use of time (that's me with a down vote now). Submission to review to rejection to amendment to resubmission elsewhere can be a very lengthy and frustrating process. The 'laws of probability' are against those that don't target and tailor their manuscripts well.
The theory of probablities is not right in publication process: e.g. if you find out that the probablitiy of getting accepted to a particular journal is 5% (the rejection rate is 95%) it does not automatically mean that it will be 5% for your paper: if your paper is good and suits the journal very well, it can be much higher, while if it is not good and/or does not suit the journal well, it can be near 0%. I select journals for my papers depending on the nature of papers (literature, data, methodology etc.) and their potential fit with the journal. I prefer journals that have a good reputation in my field.
Most publishers of journals and books have a niche audience they address. I often will look at the references I've used in writing the journal article. Where those references have been published gives me a good idea about the journals most interested in publishing the topic on which I am writing.
I agree with Madelaine Lawrence's answer above, if you've read a reasonable amount of related literature, you should have a pretty good list of candidate journals.
It's easy to rank these candidates by impact factor, but that doesn't always correspond to a ranking by reputation (however you define that...), and might not correspond to a ranking of how likely your particular paper is to get cited in the different journals (e.g. a given article might get more citations from an open access journal than a closed access journal with a slightly higher IF; or you might get more citations from a journal whose readership more closely aligns with your work).
It's also hard to know how the different journals compare in terms of speed to decide or speed to publish (see my question on RG http://tinyurl.com/owz373t for some discussion/links relating to this).
If you don't have a list of decent candidates for some reason, then this tool might be helpful: http://biosemantics.org/jane/
I find Raphael's question interesting as we are living a period of change. I am a big fan of serious open source journals (BMJ Open, BMC Medicine, PLoS, and last but not least - Peer J) and highly dislike closed circles of publication with limited access (I would love to be able never to have to publish with Elsevier).
When I choose a journal, it is not because I feel friendship for the editing team, it is to target an appropriate audience and make my research as accessible as possible to other researchers and the public.
If I need a journal and an editor to do this, it is because I need someone to provide the guarantee that my article is methodologically sound and that my work is of quality. To do this, I do not need friends, I need professionals. I have never submitted an original research paper to an editor I knew beforehand. I also always suggest reviewers for the quality of their research and prefer not suggesting people I already know. This is my way of having people know me and I think it is much more efficient than shaking hands with a jet lagged researcher at a congress.
This also provides me the satisfaction of knowing my articles are accepted because of their quality. Furthermore, this spares me a lot of time as I do not need to spend it building networks at meetings and congresses. I can concentrate on consolidating networks and building transversal projects with people I can trust to also focus on excellency rather than ideals.
I see your point Paul - but sounds a little cynical to me. In my experience, it is possible to have collegial 'friends, in the business - without bias or compromising the quality of the process. I've had instances whereby i send my manuscript to editors that I know - just to run it by them first. in a few instances, they've said 'no' (mainly because the topic is not of immediate interest at that time - or has already been well covered in the journal) . That, in my mind, has saved me a lot of time. If you look at my publication list - you would note that a significant proportion are through the likes of Elsevier, Science Direct etc. I'm not sure that i would have been as productive without them - so it's 'horses for courses' I suppose.
If you look at my publication list, I have published in Vaccine (Elsevier), and am very found of the International Journal of Osteopathic Medicine (Elsevier) for which I often write article reviews. This journal's editors are to me what I think you call "friends" in your post. I support them in their work and am grateful for what they have achieved with their journal. They have worked hard, and managed to improve the quality of publication in a domain I am very found of. I will publish article reviews in this journal to support them and all the good they are doing to my profession. I will accept to review articles because of their philosophy and for what they are bringing to other researchers. I only which they were doing all this with another group than Elsevier.
How can I be faithful to my "friends" and be ethical in my research policies? I think been a researcher also requires me to acknowledge that most of my financing arises from public funds and the least thing I can do is have my publications made accessible to those who payed for them.
Elsevier is one of the worst publishing groups for their control of authorship and their prohibitif rates for libraries to access to their articles. Many indexed journals from this group (not to say most) are not indexed by Pubmed for this very reason. They charge over $30 to access to a single article for which the editing costs are already most often covered by group subscription from professional societies or associations. They also charge universities millions to have access to all their publications and keep changing their contract restricting access in time. They have managed to put up an empire that has made over $2 billion benefits last year... and this without reattributing 1cent to those who work most for them, the researchers!
How did we let this happen... Well Elsevier has built a reputation by constructing high quality journals adapted to specialized groups interests. They nominated enthusiastic, engaged, friendly professionals as editors, trained them, and then relied on already constructed networks to support and finance their journals naming it the official journal of such and such group or society or association. They thereby managed to make these groups totally dependent of their rotten policies.
Well I say NO, I say STOP like many others (See http://thecostofknowledge.com) and I will not support such a system anymore. This is hard to do, but it is our duty as scientists. So I will not publish at Elsevier, and whenever I can afford it, I will not cite articles published there until Elsevier can clearly show who they are truly working for; the public.
Thank you helping me make this clear to myself--- I will now have to write a sad lettre to my friends telling them I will not review or write article reviews for their journal until all articles are made free of access at latest 12 months after publication.
I hope Dean, you might consider doing the same....
Hi Paul - good to dialogue. I'm not opposed to what you are saying. Some parts do resonate. For instance, I agree that publisher charges can be quite exorbitant. However, particularly with my book and book chapter work, with the likes of Elsevier, Palgrave MacMillan, Cambridge University Press etc - I've worked with their business managers as well - and they work to quite tight financial margins. It's more competative out there than i thought - particularly between the major publishing houses. I do agree though that the smaller publishing houses (as well as open access etc) do struggle to get a foot on the ladder - and that does stifle the competition. However, what margins the larger publishing houses make - I believe that they also look to reinvest that. The money may not go back directly to the author's (researchers) pockets (royalties aside) - but how much of the 2 billion might go back into other ventures that do benefit - i.e. scholarships, conferences, editors fees, good manuscript submission software development etc. Perhaps sometimes - 'you have to rob the poor to pay the devil'.
From a more mercenary perspective, I have chosen to work for universities that i know have good library subscription facilities - and are able to afford them. One way, or another, i can usually access the material that i need (and usually online) - or there is PubMed, RG etc. That may not be the case for everyone, but I'm also aware that many would be able to find at least a good proportion of the critical mass of literature that they need.
On a related note, a few months ago - i remember a thread on RG with something to do about the Mendeley situation - and someone proposing that if RG got much bigger - then the likes of Elsevier may step in and take it over. I would imagine, if that were to happen, it would be as a result of their profits taking a nose-dive due to 'green' open-access - such as RG. Mind you - RG may be happy to sell - for a 'tidy sum'. It's all business out there - and we're the consumers caught up in the middle. Personally, I'm not sure that making moral stands will change things that much - but I could be wrong.
Dear @Rafael, there are many good tools for choosing appropriate Journal for your paper. I am free to attach some of them. Hope it will be helpful.
http://journalfinder.elsevier.com/
http://journalselector.com/
http://cofactorscience.com/journal-selector
http://www.edanzediting.com/journal_selector
I tend to send to the journal that I had cited from. But recently I reflected that it may be better to publish on a journal based near home where the readers may have more concern about what is happening in the education of students. This may help the acceptance of a paper by the journal.
https://www.researchgate.net/post/Why_do_researchers_in_the_tropics_not_support_journals_published_in_the_tropical_regions_of_our_world?_sg=VT3Bh5zPJ2akz615wtry3jup0HFzZSajl%2By9MVsZsgN3Vabq3yqgxtAfbDPaAgLy_K1iHTPTmR5ihkK4mWSF%2FRdXNDks9NbAM8Kqul2YW1zh8QFLt%2FTSEhq8ln1eS%2FI4F_ccMjLG7laeVJmb7i8%2B40eogjf49V5cFEadtASL3O79nWOGegGKiog7YO49iRDE2t&_tpcectx=search
The "right" choice of journal depends on more factors than can be listed here. It depends on things like:
a) Are you a junior (unknown) or a senior (more known) scientist? This has indeed a bearing to where you would be most welcome - if you are unknown you might be better off trying a less prestigious journal, unless you have astonishing research results to present. If you - on the other hand - co-write the publication with a much more senior supervisor then you can hope that your supervisor has a good publication strategy - in particular which journal(s) fit the subject the best.
b) I agree with some comments from before - in particular that it is a bad idea to send a manuscript to the best one first, and after a (probable) rejection sending it to the next in line, according to a ranking list. One simple investigation is based on a quick search in the reference list of the paper you have written - if one journal is more common than the others then it is often a sign that that particular journal is a suitable one, because it evidently covers the subject of your work.
Dear Rafael Hernandez Barros , this is very fine, long thread related to your research question, 650 answers, many resources....
https://www.researchgate.net/post/How_to_find_a_suitable_journal_to_publish_your_work#view=600c44361f117a39667460c1
Be aware of hijacked journals in order to avoid them.
So far, a number of reputable sites of indexing journals have been got deceived by journal forgers. Among these indexed websites, we can mention Cite Factor (http://www.citefactor.org) that has indexed almost all hijacked journals together with their forged address...
In the increasing development of research and academic centers, number of research conducted has also increased. Meanwhile, it is necessary for researchers to carefully select and authenticate their target journals for publishing their papers. We present a simple approach for detection of hijacked journals based on main feature of these journals that can be used by researchers without any special knowledge. This feature can be combined with other methods for future research work. (11) (PDF) How Can We Identify Hijacked Journals?. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271589634_How_Can_We_Identify_Hijacked_Journals [accessed Mar 06 2021].
... And, in the end, the "friends" from the journal don't like your country of origin ... What to do then?
Choosing which journal to publish your research in can seem like an overwhelming task. So, for all the details of how to navigate this important step in publishing your research paper, take a look at our choosing a journal guide. This will take you through the selection process, from understanding the aims and scope of the journals you’re interested in to making sure you choose a trustworthy journal...
https://authorservices.taylorandfrancis.com/publishing-your-research/choosing-a-journal/
The easiest of the simplest techniques to find the right journal for your manuscript is to select the target journal from the list of references used in the manuscript;
The online journal finders may create more confusions with various defocusing hyperlinks
Master Journal List Manuscript Matcher is the ultimate place to begin your search for journals. It is a free tool that helps you narrow down your journal options based on your research topic and goals...
Journal Citation Reports is the most powerful solution for journal intelligence. It uses transparent, publisher-neutral data and statistics to provide unique insight into a journal’s role and influence. This will help you produce a definitive list of journals best-placed to publish your findings, and more...
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