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Measuring Your Research Impact

Journal Acceptance Rates

Where Should I Publish?

1. Find the right journal for your work

  • DOAJ - a community-curated online directory that indexes and provides access to high quality, open access, peer-reviewed journals.
  • Elsevier Journal Finder - Search Elsevier journals to find possible journals that match areas of research.
  • MATCH - is a tool within Endnote that finds the best fit journals for your manuscript. Click into Web of Science and select Endnote - create a log-in if needed - and select Match to enter your manuscript details.
  • Springer Journal Suggester - Search Springer and BioMed Central journals to find possible journals that match areas of research.
  • ERIHPLUS (European Reference Index for the Humanities and Social Sciences): The main aim of ERIH has been from its very beginnings to enhance global visibility of high quality research in the humanities published in academic journals in various European languages all over Europe. The index enables researchers to better understand and promote the national and international importance of their research.

2. Assess the journal's quality.

  • Think Check Submit - Follow this check list to help you choose trusted journals for your research.

3. Find the journal's impact score.

4. Consider Open Access (OA) journals.

  • Perpetual access to documents
  • Increased visibility of scientific literature
  • Increased impact of publications: increase in citations of authors and publications
  • Increased visibility of institutions

5. Be sure to look at the copyright license.

  • It is important to know what type of license you sign with your publisher concerning copyright. This license affects your ownership of your scholarship and any subsequent use of your article. More about author right from SPARC.

Assessing Discipline-Specific Journals

In order to determine the most appropriate journals in your field or discipline, you might want to consider the following factors:

  • Indexes: where is it indexed? Is it an open access journal?
  • Editorial board: who sits on the board? What is their standing?
    • What is the standing of other authors who have published in this journal?
  • Relevance: what does the journal cover and is it relevant for your discipline?
  • Journal quality: what is the journal's impact factor or its peer review system?
  • Discipline-specific: contact your liaison librarian

Resources to help you avoid predatory, suspicious, or pseudo-scholarly journals.