Criteria for Selecting Journal for Publication
Categories Scientific Communication

Criteria for Selecting Journal for Publication

Introduction

Publishing an article in the journal adds to the academic performance of the researcher. Almost every researcher desire to publish their research articles in the reputed journal to ensure that it reaches maximum readers. Hundreds of journals are publishing the research article. This article will throw light on some criteria that will help you to select the best journal for your manuscript.

Criteria for Selecting Journal

There is no straight formula to determine the best journal to publish your manuscript. However, analyzing various parameters may help you to decide the journal that best suits you for publishing. Following are some of those criteria:

Impact factor: The impact factor is an important criterion to determine the importance of the journal. The impact factor of a journal is the measure of the average number of citations provided to the articles published in the last two years in that particular journal. The impact factor is a scientometric index.  The JCR impact factor is old and effective in providing the names of high impact journals. However, you should also have a look at other impact factor scores. It is important to note that you do not rely only on the impact factor as the high impact factor scores may also be vague.

Peer Review Process: The peer-review process is important to maintain the quality of articles. High-quality articles increase the reputation of journals. The quality journals have a strict peer-review process. All the details for the peer review process are available on the website of the journal. The journal will inform you about the peer review process, the selection of reviewers, the timeline of the peer-review process, and handling other information. Many poor-quality journals do not follow a strict procedure for peer review.

Right of the authors: While considering the target journal, also look into the policies of copyright and other rights mentioned on the website. High transparency of the journal about these rights indicates a high quality of the journal. Some good journals allow the author to have full rights over their manuscript and permit them to disseminate the research. Read the full copyright agreement while before signing.

Business model: The business model of the journal should be clearly stated on the website. All the related cost should be clearly mentioned, and the author should be surprised with any fee which was not mentioned. Further, the name of the sponsors and the mission statement of the journal should be clearly stated and should be followed.

The reputation of the journal: The reputation of the journal should not be seen in isolation and is viewed through various parameters. It includes the quality of articles published in the journal, the society under which the journal is published, the impact factor, the number of people in your circle knows about the journal and other factors.

Indexing: You should identify whether the journal is indexed in a reputed database. Indexing in the reputed database allows the article of the author to reach maximum readers. Some of the citation databases include CINAHL, MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Scopus. These databases list the journal based on various parameters, and their inclusion increases the reputation of journals.

Scope of the journal: You should get information about the scope of the journal and the research domain for publishing your manuscript. Ensure that the scope and aim of the journal are in a line similar to your research. This will help you to make information available to your target readers. Websites of many journals categorically indicate the domain of research that is not under their spectrum of publications.

Journal ethics: Ethical issues are important while publishing the original research. Many journals require detailed information related to ethical aspects of your research. These include conflict of interest, informed consent form, and confidentiality. Good journals are also concerned about data and conclusion manipulation. Journal also checks the manuscript for plagiarism, fraud, segmented publications, and review board approval.

Instructions for authors: You should read and understand the “author guidelines” in detail. You should target the journal and make your manuscript according to the requirement of the journal. Many journals have limited the number of pages, images, or word count. Check the complete list of requirements before drafting and submitting the manuscript.

Editors of the journal: Every good journal has an editorial board comprising of highly reputed reviewers who have credibility in their respective domains. The website of the journal must show the name, position, and contact information of the editors. In case you require more information about the editors, communicate with the journal before submitting your manuscript for peer review.

Conclusion

Various factors should be considered before sending the manuscript for peer review and subsequent publication. These factors are impact factor, the peer review process, aim and scope of the journal, and ethics.

How to avoid Duplicate Publication
Categories Scientific Communication

Medical Journal Articles: How to avoid Duplicate Publication and Simultaneous Submission?

For an honest and scholarly scientific research, you must follow the ethics of research and good publication practices. All the reputed journals expect the authors to know and comply with the ethics in publication.

Here, in this post, we discuss the two common and unethical publishing practices – duplicate publication and simultaneous submission, and how to avoid them with your manuscript.

1) Duplicate Publication

What is it?

When you publish a new paper similar to a published paper by another author or yours without acknowledging the source and without getting the permission of the original author, it is called a duplicate publication. Even if you change the title or the abstract, the data and the results remain the same.

Why is duplicate publication a problem?

Duplicate publication is unethical because:

  1. It violates the copyright for the paper.
  2. Researchers who study the subject may count the same set of results twice, and thus distort the empirical evidence. Since empirical studies form the base of many health policies, it becomes a serious problem.
  3. Republication of your own work without attribution surmounts to “self-plagiarism”.
  4. It leads to the wastage of editorial and review resources.
  5. Republication of the same work unjustly takes up the limited journal space and denies other authors’ right to publish their work.

What do journals say about the issue? 

The editorial committees of the academic journals instruct the authors do not submit the papers or variations of papers already published elsewhere. They design stringent policies and ask the authors to send copies of older, related articles along with their submitted paper.

However, republication is allowed in some cases:

  • A follow-up on a published preliminary report (e.g., an abstract, poster, or conference presentation)
  • A paper with a list of the guidelines prepared by professional societies or governmental agencies
  • A paper that re-analyses or re-interprets the findings of the study for a different audience
  • A translation of the original paper
  • e-prints of the paper in repositories

Despite these exceptions, authors must adhere to the following guidelines:

  • Get permission from the copyright holders.
  • Get approval from the editor of the journal in which the paper was first published and the editor of the journal in which they will republish it.
  • Acknowledge the source of your republication by providing its full citation.

Dos and don’ts to avoid duplicate publication

  • Do not replicate content from any of your other published papers.
  • Do not offer preliminary reports about the published papers to any company without the permission of the journal.
  • When quoting data from your published work, include only a few sentences, and place the text in quotation marks and cite the source.
  • If you write more than one manuscript by using a single dataset, ensure:
    • Each manuscript addresses separate and important questions
    • You cross-reference the manuscripts
    • Inform the journal editors about this in a cover letter
  • While submitting your paper to the journal editor, provide copies of your published and related papers for complete transparency.

2) Simultaneous Submission

What is it?

The practice of submitting the same manuscript to two or more journals at the same time without informing the respective scientific journal editors is known as simultaneous or multiple or dual submission.

Why is simultaneous submission a problem?

The journals consider simultaneous submission as unethical because:

  1. If more than one journal publishes the paper, it can lead to a copyright dispute.
  2. Since two publication houses will carry out the same task, it is a waste of academic and scientific resources.

However, simultaneous submission is acceptable in following cases:

  • When the editors of the two or more journals agree to publish the paper simultaneously or jointly in the larger interest of the society.
  • When scientific conferences allow the authors to simultaneously submit their papers to other meetings with overlapping submission periods.

Dos and don’ts for the authors 

  • Do not submit the same manuscript to more than one journal.
  • If you wish to submit a paper that is “under consideration” at one journal to another journal:
    • Get a written consent from your co-authors.
    • Inform the first journal editor asking about the paper withdrawal.
    • Do not submit unless you get a formal notification from the first journal editor regarding the paper withdrawal.
    • Submit this notification to the second journal along with your paper.
  • If you have written two related papers and wish to submit them to two different journals:
    • Disclose the details of each paper to both the journals.
    • Inform both the editors that you have a similar paper under review at another journal (even if they are in different languages).
    • Enclose the copies of both the papers along with your submission.

Conclusion

Thus, duplicate publication and simultaneous submission are a serious offence and you can spoil your research career by indulging in such practices. We recommend you to contact our professional journal publication services experts to understand and follow ethical submission practices for the welfare of the society and your career.

Rejection of a Manuscript
Categories Scientific Communication

5 Common Errors that Lead to the Rejection of a Manuscript

You have written your research manuscript with diligence, and now, you are ready to submit it for publication. You are worried if it gets rejected.

This is common with novice research scientists. However, if you know what makes the journal editors reject your manuscript, you can take care of such errors before submission.

So, here’s a glimpse of the common errors that can lead to the rejection of your manuscript:

1) Selection of a wrong journal

The foremost reason your manuscript gets rejected is that your research study doesn’t fit the scope of your selected journal. So, you will waste your valuable time if you select a journal out of your paper’s scope.

To avoid any mistake in selecting the right journal for your paper:

  • Carefully read the scope of the journal on its Homepage and also the section on “Instructions to Authors”.
  • Search for the similar articles in the journal.

 2) Plagiarism

Plagiarism is an act of presenting other’s work as your own. It is a serious offence in the research paper writing. Journal editors are not fools. With a plethora of plagiarism detectors, it’s easy to recognise plagiarised content in your paper.

Even self-plagiarism or reproducing your own work in another journal without citing the original can lead to the rejection of your manuscript.

Therefore, you should:

  • Always acknowledge your sources of reference
  • Not submit the results of a published literature even in a lower-ranked journal
  • Change the text copied from another source to make it different and also acknowledge the source.

3) Insignificant or false findings in the research results

The journals accept only those manuscripts that present an original research study, those which report high-quality and novel work and make significant contributions to their desired field.

Thus, if your manuscript fails to meet this criterion, or it reports a routine or trivial or false finding which doesn’t contribute significantly to the progress of Science, it will be outwardly rejected.

To avoid rejection:

  • Search the published literature related to your research topic and see their results.
  • Publish only those findings which are new or significant to your field of research.
  • Highlight the novel properties of your research study
  • Compare your article with the previous work in the field and justify your improvements with a clear statement

4) Technical errors

With one or two technical flaws, you will receive a request for revision. However, rejection occurs if it contains many technical flaws such as:

  • Discrepancy between the Abstract and the remaining manuscript
  • Study of the wrong groups
  • Wrong statistics
  • Clinically insignificant results
  • Absence of a relation between the results and their discussion
  • Contradictory/false data
  • If the conclusion doesn’t answer the research question
  • Poor use of language with grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors

There lies the importance of proofreading and editing your manuscript before you submit it to the journal.

5) Failure to follow “Instructions for Authors”

If you do not follow the “Instructions for Authors” prescribed by a specific journal, it will either delay the peer review process or lead to your manuscript rejection. So, you should always:

  • Carefully read the instructions a number of times. Best, take a print out of the journal guidelines and highlight the key instructions you have to follow.
  • Before submission, check whether you have incorporated all the instructions in your writing.
  • If you do not understand the instructions or are short of time, take help from a professional scientific editor.

Last, but not the least. Do not hurry to submit your paper to the journal publication. Take time and carefully check if you have fulfilled all the requirements as an author.

Submitting your Research Paper
Categories Scientific Communication

Dos and Don’ts when Submitting your Research Paper

Do you think journal publication is an easy process?

You write a research paper, submit it to the journal office and Voila! The editors will publish your paper.

If you think so, you are mistaken. Submitting your paper for publication in your desired journal can be tedious as many things need to be taken care of.

Therefore, we are here to make your journal publication easy and successful through our publication support services experts. By keeping in mind a checklist of do’s and don’ts when submitting your paper, you can register as a good author in the eyes of the journal editors.

Do’s

  • Examine the scope of the journal and the description of its contents. The Homepage of the journal gives you an idea of its scope. Still, you must scroll through the articles published in the journal and see whether they match yours. If in doubt, send the title and the abstract of your paper to the journal office for their quick opinion.
  • Read the “Instructions for Authors” section carefully.
  • Evaluate the format of your paper. Do not keep the formatting for the last stage. Give regards to the appropriate format as per the journal guidelines right from the beginning to reduce your burden.
  • Clarify with your journal about the expenses on paper submission, coloured photos, or reprint charges.
  • Write an appropriate cover letter. A cover letter is not only for saying you are submitting a paper, but it should also contain a summary of your novel findings and why you consider your work as appropriate for the journal. Do not forget to cross-check that you address the editor of that journal only where you are submitting your paper.
  • Make sure you submit all the required items with your paper at the journal office.
  • Enlist the name of your English-speaking colleague if you take his help in preparing your manuscript.
  • Proofread your manuscript several times before you submit.
  • Include the names of all the authors with their comments on the manuscript before submitting. Set a deadline for all the co-authors to give their comments on the manuscript.

Don’ts

  • Assume things and sit back after submitting. After submitting your paper, wait for few days. If you don’t get an acknowledgement about the reception of your paper, email the journal office. Similarly, if you get no status update on your paper in 6 weeks to two months, contact the journal office.
  • Take the reviewer’s comments personally. Peer reviewers are not your critic but help to give your research paper a finishing touch. Usually, they don’t use personal language to comment on your paper but sometimes it slips through. So, don’t take their comments to heart.
  • Delay the revision of your paper. Most journals follow a two-month rule where they require you to submit your revised paper. Take the reviewer’s comments seriously and make the necessary changes as early as possible.
  • Confuse the editors and the reviewers with your revisions. Thank them for their suggestions and respond to each point in a clear and logical way so that they don’t have to fish about whether or not you adequately addressed the issues.
  • Include the data that has been published previously except when citing their reference.
  • Rely heavily on the grammar and plagiarism checking tools. Use a human eye for the second opinion.