Over the past few years, the number of journals that engage in unfair activities in the scientific publishing sphere has increased many times over. This has become a serious problem for the global academic community. "Predatory journals" pretend to be scientific journals, but are in fact fraudulent. Let's take a look at the main types of predatory journals and the signs that can be used to recognize predatory journals.
What are predatory journals?
Predatory journals are publications that pretend to be respectable scientific journals, but in fact do not respect the principles of scientific ethics and standards of academic publishing.
These publications pretend to be scientific journals, but their purpose is not related to the advancement of science. The main motivation of such journals is to profit from publication fees without providing peer review and publication of articles.
Types of "predatory" publications
All non-predatory publications fall into three main categories:
- Predatory journals - these are publications that once had a good reputation in the scientific field and were included in global scientometric databases such as Scopus. However, over time, having violated academic standards and ethical principles, they lost their status and were excluded from these databases
- Clone publications are journals that mimic the appearance of current scholarly publications. They often copy the titles, format and style of well-known scientific journals to mislead authors. The main purpose of such publications is to obtain publication fees, while the review process is either absent or reduced to a formality
- Fake journals - pseudo-publications that pretend to be real scientific journals, but in fact do not adhere to scientific standards and do not conduct proper peer review. These journals often use flashy titles and false impact factors to attract the attention of scientists, but their main goal is to profit from publication fees, not to advance science.
How to recognize a "predator"?
Here are the most characteristic signs of predatory journals:
- absence of peer review - the first and obvious sign of fraud in the scientific publishing sphere
- rapid acceptance of scientific papers for publication: ranking publications usually have a queue for publication of materials for several months in advance. Remember that it is not possible to publish within days or weeks in highly ranked publications
- over- or underestimating publication feesis one of the main signs of an unscrupulous publication
- Quality of content. Read articles previously published in the publication. If the content does not meet academic standards, this may be a sign of a low-quality journal
- lack of indexing in the scientific metric databases Scopus and Web of Science
- the journal is on the list of unscrupulous publications Beall's List. The list includes publications that do not adhere to ethical norms in the scientific publishing environment
- Publishing articles that show signs of plagiarism or self-plagiarism
- Unrealistic promises: predatory journals often promise fast publication, high visibility and citations, but in reality articles are posted without peer review or not published at all.
How can you avoid publishing in predatory journals? Tips for academics
- Check the publication before submitting an article to the editorial board. Carefully familiarize yourself with the journal's website, its activities, previous issues, and check the scientific journal for indexing in global databases such as Web of Science and Scopus.
- Examine the composition of the editorial board. Editorial boards of reputable journals usually include well-known and respected scholars. If the composition of the editorial board is questionable or information about the editors is not available, this may be a red flag.
- Pay attention to publication fees and requirements. In reliable journals, publication fees, if any, are reasonable and clearly stated. If the journal requires unreasonably high fees or additional charges at every stage, this is a reason to question the publication.
- Ask for help from a scientific consulting company. Experts in the field of science and scientometrics will help to select the appropriate publication and make the publication visible to a wide range of researchers.
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