After the manuscript is ready then comes the desire for publication of the research paper by the author. The journey of research publication might feel overwhelming specially for a new researcher. Suddenly you find a journal that is claiming to help you publish your work immediately. You get tempted and pay the fee to avoid the tiring process of research publication. Once you do the payment then you never hear back from the publishers and well they are called “Predatory Journals”. In this blog we will be discussing how to check journal authenticity before submission of your research paper.
Following are the top tools to check journal authenticity before submitting your research paper.
1. Charging Fee Upon Submission
Majority of the high impact journals such as Scopus Journal Submission do not ask for a fee on submission of research paper. They have clear APCs that are article processing charges. Mid tier journals do ask for a fee but often it’s less. If you see a journal claiming guaranteed publication upon the submission of a research paper. If they ask for a hefty amount, know that it’s most likely one of the predatory journals. Another way to check the fee could be reviewing the authors segment. Check the journal to see the fee process or any hidden fee. Some predatory journals may avoid asking for a fee as well. Once you have submitted the research paper suddenly they mention charges. Remember no high impact and ethical journals hide their charging fee and give sudden surprises.,
2. Check If Journal Is Registered Or Not
This step is extremely important if you are thinking of publishing your research paper with a journal. Make sure to not get into their charming spell and trust them blindly. There are ways through which you can check if the journal is registered or not. Firstly check the ISSN portal, go to google and search it. Once the portal opens add journal name and ISSN number. If it does not appear then most likely you are dealing with scam publishers. ISSN stands for international standard serial number. It’s like the journal’s passport number. Consider that even if the journal appears on the portal still doesn’t trust the journal completely some predatory journals make their way to the ISSN journals. That’s why it’s important to find other ways to check the journal authenticity as well and here comes the next step to find the authenticity of the journal before submission.
3. Check Indexing Databases
So once you check if the journal is registered or not then comes the step of checking indexing databases. Let me help you understand why this step is crucial and what it’s all about. It is a database where all researches are accessible to be seen by researchers and funding agencies. If the journal does not appear here then most likely you are about to publish your research with someone who would provide you invisible publication and it can prove lethal to your academic development and future work opportunities which also means that you paid for no recognition in return. In addition to this mostly those journals appear here that follow the ethical guidelines. Keep in mind that journals listed in SCIE, SSCI, AHCI and ESCI are those that follow the ethical guidelines and if the journal you are willing to publish with does not appear here then it’s time to reconsider publishing with them.
4. Tempting Promises
If the journal is making promises like immediate publication and less time for peer review. Making other tempting promises its more likely a predatory journal. Keep in mind all the credible journals require a complete process of several months and not just few days. They have strict guidelines for the researchers to follow including strict plagiarism policies and formatting guidelines. Restraining yourself from following guidelines can result in rejection.
5. Vague Policies
If the journal does not have clear policies. Consider they claim to review your work in a timely manner but don’t mention the peer review type whether its single or double blinded. Additionally the duration, criteria and editors qualification is not mentioned then you are surely dealing with a predatory journal. Policies such as “the author may require to contribute to publication costs and not mention the exact fee amount and timing.
6. Check The Website
It’s necessary to first go through the website of that research journal and look for typos and grammatical mistakes, see if there are names mentioned with no institutional email or affiliation. In some cases real researchers are listed without consent and also unverifiable indexing claims are done like claiming to be indexed in major databases such as ISI, Scopus, PubMed with no links and proofs.
7. Overly Broad Scope
Remember every high quality journal has defined scope and they never claim to accept articles for every research field. Predatory journals claim to accept articles from all fields including medicine, humanities, engineering, law, management and sciences. It may appear as inclusive or interdisciplinary at first but it’s only a way to increase article intake and maximize profit. They often lack clear research domains that could be a sign for you to reconsider research publication with them.
8. No Mention Of Ethical Policies
Lastly when you check everything mentioned above you will get to know already if you are dealing with an authentic journal that is right for your research paper or with a predatory journal but i still want to add a quick tool that is to check if they have mentioned their ethical policy related to research publication including policies on plagiarism, conflict of interest, data falsification because credible journals adhere to COPE (committee On Publication Ethics).
Conclusion
In this blog i discussed whereas tools that can be utilised to check the journal authenticity before submission of manuscript involving checking if the journal is registered or not, asking fee on submission and claiming to have a broader scope with many other tools that can help you confirm that you are submitting to an authentic journal and not a predatory one.
