Academic journal

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
There are different types of peer-reviewed research journals; these specific publications are about food science.

An academic journal or scholarly journal is a

research articles or other scrutiny from contemporaries competent and established in their respective fields.[1][2]

Concept

Content typically takes the form of articles presenting

original research, review articles, or book reviews. The purpose of an academic journal, according to Henry Oldenburg (the first editor of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society), is to give researchers a venue to "impart their knowledge to one another, and contribute what they can to the Grand design of improving natural knowledge, and perfecting all Philosophical Arts, and Sciences."[3]

The term academic journal applies to scholarly publications in all fields; this article discusses the aspects common to all academic field journals.

social sciences vary in form and function from journals of the humanities and qualitative
social sciences; their specific aspects are separately discussed.

The first academic journal was

Mémoires de l'Académie des Sciences (1666). The first fully peer-reviewed journal was Medical Essays and Observations (1733).[4]

History

Philosophical Transactions, showing a table

The idea of a published journal with the purpose of "[letting] people know what is happening in the

royal privilege from King Louis XIV on 8 August 1664 to establish the Journal des sçavans. The journal's first issue was published on 5 January 1665. It was aimed at people of letters, and had four main objectives:[5]

  1. review newly published major European books,
  2. publish the obituaries of famous people,
  3. report on discoveries in
    arts and science
    , and
  4. report on the
    secular and ecclesiastical courts
    , as well as those of universities both in France and outside.

Soon after, the

Mémoires de l'Académie des Sciences in 1666, which focused on scientific communications.[6] By the end of the 18th century, nearly 500 such periodicals had been published,[7] the vast majority coming from Germany (304 periodicals), France (53), and England (34). Several of those publications, in particular the German journals, tended to be short-lived (under five years). A.J. Meadows has estimated the proliferation of journals to reach 10,000 journals in 1950, and 71,000 in 1987. Michael Mabe wrote that the estimates will vary depending on the definition of what exactly counts as a scholarly publication, but that the growth rate has been "remarkably consistent over time", with an average rate of 3.46% per year from 1800 to 2003.[8]

In 1733,

megajournal.[4]

Scholarly articles

There are two kinds of

academia: solicited, where an individual has been invited to submit work either through direct contact or through a general submissions call, and unsolicited, where an individual submits a work for potential publication without directly being asked to do so.[10] Upon receipt of a submitted article, editors at the journal determine whether to reject the submission outright or begin the process of peer review
. In the latter case, the submission becomes subject to review by outside scholars of the editor's choosing who typically remain anonymous. The number of these peer reviewers (or "referees") varies according to each journal's editorial practice – typically, no fewer than two, though sometimes three or more, experts in the subject matter of the article produce reports upon the content, style, and other factors, which inform the editors' publication decisions.

Though these reports are generally confidential, some journals and publishers also practice

public peer review. The editors either choose to reject the article, ask for a revision and resubmission, or accept the article for publication. Even accepted articles are often subjected to further (sometimes considerable) editing by journal editorial staff before they appear in print. The peer review can take from several weeks to several months.[11]

Reviewing

Review articles

Main article: Review article

Review articles, also called "reviews of progress", are checks on the research published in journals. Some journals are devoted entirely to review articles, some contain a few in each issue, and others do not publish review articles. Such reviews often cover the research from the preceding year, some for longer or shorter terms; some are devoted to specific topics, some to general surveys. Some reviews are enumerative, listing all significant articles in a given subject; others are selective, including only what they think worthwhile. Yet others are evaluative, judging the state of progress in the subject field. Some journals are published in series, each covering a complete subject field year, or covering specific fields through several years. Unlike original research articles, review articles tend to be solicited or "peer-invited" submissions, often planned years in advance, which may themselves go through a peer-review process once received.[12][13] They are typically relied upon by students beginning a study in a given field, or for current awareness of those already in the field.[12]

Book reviews

Not to be confused with
Literary book review
.

Reviews of scholarly books are checks upon the research books published by scholars; unlike articles, book reviews tend to be solicited. Journals typically have a separate book review editor determining which new books to review and by whom. If an outside scholar accepts the book review editor's request for a book review, he or she generally receives a free copy of the book from the journal in exchange for a timely review. Publishers send books to book review editors in the hope that their books will be reviewed. The length and depth of research book reviews varies much from journal to journal, as does the extent of textbook and trade book review.[14]

Prestige and ranking

Main article: Journal ranking

An

acceptance rate low.[15] Size or prestige are not a guarantee of reliability.[16]

In the

Clarivate Analytics' Journal Citation Reports, which among other features, computes an impact factor for academic journals, draws data for computation from the Science Citation Index Expanded (for natural science journals), and from the Social Sciences Citation Index (for social science journals).[15] Several other metrics are also used, including the SCImago Journal Rank, CiteScore, Eigenfactor, and Altmetrics
.

In the Anglo-American humanities, there is no tradition (as there is in the sciences) of giving impact-factors that could be used in establishing a journal's prestige. Recent moves have been made by the European Science Foundation (ESF) to change the situation, resulting in the publication of preliminary lists for the ranking of academic journals in the humanities.[15] These rankings have been severely criticized, notably by history and sociology of science British journals that have published a common editorial entitled "Journals under Threat".[17] Though it did not prevent ESF and some national organizations from proposing journal rankings, it largely prevented their use as evaluation tools.[18]

In some disciplines such as knowledge management/intellectual capital, the lack of a well-established journal ranking system is perceived by academics as "a major obstacle on the way to tenure, promotion and achievement recognition".[19] onversely, a significant number of scientists and organizations consider the pursuit of impact factor calculations as inimical to the goals of science, and have signed the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment to limit its use.

The categorization of journal prestige in some subjects has been attempted, typically using letters to rank their academic world importance.[citation needed]

Three categories of techniques have developed to assess journal quality and create journal rankings:[20]

  • stated preference;
  • revealed preference; and
  • publication power approaches[21]

Costs

Main article: Publishers and business aspects
See also: Cost

Many academic journals are subsidized by universities or professional organizations, and do not exist to make a profit. They often accept advertising, page and image charges from authors to pay for production costs. On the other hand, some journals are produced by commercial publishers who do make a profit by charging subscriptions to individuals and libraries. They may also sell all of their journals in discipline-specific collections or a variety of other packages.[22]

Journal editors tend to have other professional responsibilities, most often as teaching professors. In the case of the largest journals, there are paid staff assisting in the editing. The production of the journals is almost always done by publisher-paid staff. Humanities and social science academic journals are usually subsidized by universities or professional organization.[23]

The cost and value proposition of subscription to academic journals is being continuously re-assessed by institutions worldwide. In the context of the

open archives like PubMed Central.[25]

New developments

In the 21st century, journals are commonly accessed digitally

The

open access journal, which does not charge for subscriptions, being either subsidized or financed by a publication fee. Given the goal of sharing scientific research to speed advances, open access has affected science journals more than humanities journals.[27] Commercial publishers are experimenting with open access models, but are trying to protect their subscription revenues.[28]

The much lower entry cost of on-line publishing has also raised concerns of an increase in

publication of "junk" journals with lower publishing standards. These journals, often with names chosen as similar to well-established publications, solicit articles via e-mail and then charge the author to publish an article, often with no sign of actual review. Jeffrey Beall, a research librarian at the University of Colorado, has compiled a list of what he considers to be "potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly open-access publishers"; the list numbered over 300 journals as of April 2013, but he estimates that there may be thousands.[29] The OMICS Publishing Group, which publishes a number of the journals on this list, has threatened to sue Beall.[30]

Some academic journals use the

registered report format, which aims to counteract issues such as data dredging and hypothesizing after the results are known. For example, Nature Human Behaviour has adopted the registered report format, as it "shift[s] the emphasis from the results of research to the questions that guide the research and the methods used to answer them".[31] The European Journal of Personality defines this format: "In a registered report, authors create a study proposal that includes theoretical and empirical background, research questions/hypotheses, and pilot data (if available). Upon submission, this proposal will then be reviewed prior to data collection, and if accepted, the paper resulting from this peer-reviewed procedure will be published, regardless of the study outcomes."[32]

Electronic journals

Further information: Electronic publishing

Some journals are

born digital, such as the Electronic Journal of Combinatorics
, in that they are solely published on the web and in a digital format. Most electronic journals originated as print journals, which subsequently evolved to have an electronic version, while still maintaining a print component, while others eventually become electronic-only.

An e-journal closely resembles a print journal in structure: there is a table of contents which lists the articles, and many electronic journals still use a volume/issue model, although some titles now publish on a continuous basis. Online journal articles are a specialized form of

bibliographic databases
, as well as by search engines. E-journals allow new types on content to be included in journals, for example video material, or the data sets on which research has been based.

With the growth and development of the Internet, there has been a growth in the number of new journals, especially in those that exist as digital publications only. A subset of these journals exist as Open Access titles, meaning that they are free to access for all, and have

open access journals are listed in Directory of Open Access Journals
. Most continue to exist as subscription journals, for which libraries, organisations and individuals purchase access.

Lists

See also: Lists of academic journals

The largest database providing detailed information about journals is

Informaworld also provide journal lists. Some sites evaluate journals, providing information such as how long a journal takes to review articles and what types of articles it publishes.[note 1]

See also

Explanatory notes

  1. ^ For example the Reviews of Peer-Reviewed Journals in the Humanities and Social Sciences

References

  1. ISBN 978-0-02-013085-7
    .
  2. S2CID 233798866
    .
  3. ^ "Royal Society journal archive made permanently free to access | Royal Society". 2019-02-12. Archived from the original on 2019-02-12. Retrieved 2023-04-30.
  4. ^ a b c Mudrak, Ben. "Scholarly Publishing: A Brief History". American Journal Experts. Archived from the original on 2019-05-17. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  5. ^ Académie des inscriptions & belles-lettres (France); Institut de France (1816). Journal des savants. Robarts – University of Toronto. Paris C. Klincksieck. pp. 1–2.
  6. ^ "History of Philosophical Transactions – The Secret History of the Scientific Journal". University of St Andrews. Archived from the original on 2019-05-17. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  7. ^ Kronick, David A. (1962). "Original Publication: The Substantive Journal". A history of scientific and technical periodicals:the origins and development of the scientific and technological press, 1665–1790. New York: The Scarecrow Press. Archived from the original on 2021-02-26. Retrieved 2018-06-18.
  8. S2CID 904752
    .
  9. ^ "Preface". Medical Essays and Observations (2nd ed.). Philosophical Society of Edinburgh: v–xvi. 1737.
  10. ^ Gwen Meyer Gregory (2005). The successful academic librarian: Winning strategies from library leaders.
    ISBN 978-1-57387-232-4
    .
  11. ^ Michèle Lamont (2009). How professors think: Inside the curious world of academic judgment.
    ISBN 978-0-674-05733-3
    .
  12. ^ a b Deborah E. De Lange (2011). Research Companion to Green International Management Studies: A Guide for Future Research, Collaboration and Review Writing.
    ISBN 978-1-84980-727-2
    .
  13. doi:10.1146/annurev.an.33.090204.100001. Archived from the original
    on 21 September 2021. Retrieved 21 September 2021.
  14. ^ Rita James Simon; Linda Mahan (1969). "A Note on the Role of Book Review Editor as Decision Maker".
    S2CID 144242155
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  15. ^ a b c Rowena Murray (2009). Writing for Academic Journals (2nd ed.).
    ISBN 978-0-335-23458-5
    .
  16. PMID 29515380
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  17. PMID 19190746
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  18. S2CID 53387400. Archived
    from the original on 2022-06-14. Retrieved 2019-07-05.
  19. ^ Nick Bontis; Alexander Serenko (2009). "A follow-up ranking of academic journals".
    doi:10.1108/13673270910931134
    .
  20. ^ Paul Benjamin Lowry; Sean LaMarc Humpherys; Jason Malwitz; Joshua Nix (2007). "A scientometric study of the perceived quality of business and technical communication journals".
    SSRN 1021608
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  21. doi:10.1002/cjas.214. Archived
    (PDF) from the original on 2016-07-12. Retrieved 2013-08-16.
  22. S2CID 8593095. Archived
    from the original on 2022-08-19. Retrieved 2019-01-12.
  23. ^ Day, Robert A.; Gastel, Barbara (2011). How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper (7th ed.).
    ISBN 978-0-313-39195-8
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  24. hdl:10612/11498. Archived
    from the original on 2020-09-27. Retrieved 2020-04-25.
  25. ^ Denise Wolfe (2020-04-07). "SUNY Negotiates New, Modified Agreement with Elsevier - Libraries News Center University at Buffalo Libraries". library.buffalo.edu. University at Buffalo. Archived from the original on 2020-12-06. Retrieved 2020-04-18.
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  27. PMID 21753913
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  28. doi:10.1109/MIS.2007.4338485. Archived
    from the original on 2022-10-05. Retrieved 2019-07-05.
  29. ^ Kolata, Gina (April 7, 2013). "Scientific Articles Accepted (Personal Checks, Too)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 20 June 2013. Retrieved 23 September 2013.
  30. ^ Deprez, Esme (August 29, 2017). "Medical journals have a fake news problem". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on 2019-01-25. Retrieved 30 August 2017.
  31. S2CID 28976450
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  32. ^ "Streamlined review and registered reports soon to be official at EJP". THE EJP BLOG. European Journal of Personality. 6 February 2018. Archived from the original on 24 July 2020. Retrieved 8 April 2018.

Further reading

External links

Wikisource has several original texts related to Research articles.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Academic journals.
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