The journal that an article appears in can be more important to researchers than what is in the paper.
A team including Adrian Barnett (QUT) asked health and medical researchers where they prefer to publish.
The answer was in prestige journals where they will be favourably noticed, as measured by a publication’s impact factor.
Findings include;
- the preferences were journals with high, or moderate impact factors, especially experienced researchers
- women were slightly more inclined to journals with helpful reviews
- in editing there was a preference for format and wording changes rather than cutting results
- authors are willing to wait for a helpful review
- “despite … the extensive debate on the negative consequences of using impact factors for evaluating researchers, the highest possible impact factor is a target for many researchers.”
The team also found researchers were focused on publishing in a preferred journal even if it meant cutting content or accepting referee comments they know are misleading or incorrect.
“An important implication is that the journals with the highest impact factors potentially have the most partial evidence, as researchers are more willing to ‘hold their nose’ to satisfy the editors at influential journals.”
“The competition for funding and promotion never ends and researchers are always looking to earn academic currency,” Barnett and colleagues write.
Overall, researchers are sold on impact factors, “participants suggested that its importance relied on self-serving purposes like job promotions, grants, and funding, but also it was perceived as a reflection of the excellence of the researcher and a way to quantify the worth of their work. Related to the impact factor was the idea of predatory journals, which raised strong feelings of aversion due to reputational damage.”
the take-out: The research community’s fixation on journal prestige is harming research quality, as some researchers focus on where to publish instead of what to publish.
