Predatory Journals dent your credibility

Kabelo Kakolekabelo.kakole@nwu.ac.za

Open Access Week25 Oct. 2017

What is predatory publishing?

A predatory publisher is an opportunistic publishing venue that exploits the academic need to publish butoffers little reward for those using their services. Most of these publishers are promising to publish your articlein an open access platform (IOWA State university, 2017).

NOTE: It's important to realize that publishing open access does not make a publisher predatory, their badbehaviour does.

Predatory publishers exploit new publishing models by claiming to be legitimate open-access publishingoperations. They make false claims (such as quick peer-review) to lure unwary authors into submitting papers.While sending a predatory publisher a manuscript may see it "published" there is no guarantee that itunderwent peer review, is included in indexes like Web of Science and Scopus, or that it will be available in amonth much less in five years (IOWA State university, 2017).

Predatory journals often send thousands of e-mails asking researchers to submit their papers for quickpublication.

IOWA State university. 2017. What is a predatory publisher?. http://instr.iastate.libguides.com/predatory. Date of access: 17

Oct. 2017

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Spot a predatory journal

1. The journal asks for a submission fee instead of a publication fee or tries to keep the copyright to authors’ work.

2. The editorial board is very small or “coming soon.”

3. The journal says an issue will be available at a certain time, but the issue never appears.

4. The website is not professional in quality.

5. The journal title notes a national or international affiliation that does not match its editorial board or location.

6. There are fundamental errors in the titles and abstracts.

7. The content of the journal varies from the title and stated scope.

Prater, C. 2017. 8 Ways to Identify a Questionable Open Access Journal. http://www.aje.com/en/arc/8-ways-identify-

questionable-open-access-journal/. Date of access: 17 Oct . 2017

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Characteristics of good practice in scholarly publishing versus Predatory publishing

Legit

• Legitimate scholarly journals do not exist solely for profit.

• Authors usually submit manuscripts to journals of their own accord.

• Field- and discipline-appropriate titles.

• Peer review.

• Impact factor.

• Editorial boards.

• Contact information.

Predatory

• Predatory journals are open-access journals that exist for the sole purpose of making a profit.

• Spamming.

• Bizarrely broad titles.

• Impossible/unrealistic.

• Boast extraordinary.

• Editorial boards.

• Predatory journals often list false or insufficient contact information.

Mouton, J. 2017. Predatory publishing in South Africa: scale and challenges.

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Impact on researchers and the research community as a whole

• No academic gain

• Academic reputation

• Disregarded sound research

• Waste of your research funding

• NRF rating

• Hurt careers

• Visibility

https://www.slideshare.net/TaylorandFrancis_Africa/predatory-journals-and-the-impact-on-the-scholarly-publishing-

community-final-presentation

Damage caused in the scholarly journal publishing value chain

Author Manuscript

Peer Review compromised (NO

IMPROVEMENT ON YOUR RESEARCH

Readership, Citations

Predatory Journal

NRF Statement on predatory journals

The National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africa’s peer review and adjudication system has identified a number ofinstances where applications for research grants, scholarships and NRF rating include publications in predatory journals orcite invitations by deceptive publishers to serve on editorial boards of journals.

This practice is neither supported nor encouraged by the NRF as it challenges the integrity of the NRF’s scientific peer reviewprocess. The use of predatory journals and deceptive publishers compromises the creation and dissemination of rigorousscientific and scholarly work within the Digital and Open Access movement.

In order to protect the integrity of the NRF’s processes and reputation from these unethical and unscholarly practices, theNRF reserves the right to not consider applications where this practice is evident.

The NRF encourages its stakeholder community, including the NRF’s Business Units and its National Research Facilities (NFs),to:

• Ensure that its researchers and students adhere to the principles of research integrity and are aware of predatory journals and deceptive publishers; and

• Avoid publishing in journals that do not have a rigorous peer review system or scholarly publishing practices.

http://www.nrf.ac.za/media-room/news/nrf-statement-predatory-journals-deceptive-publishers

The extent of predatory publishing in SA

If we take Beall’s list as definitive, we end up with 57 Journal Titles in which 4246 SA-authored papers have appeared between 2005 and 2014.

Consider the following when choosing a journal

• If the journal is claiming to be open access, is it listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)?

• Is the journal accredited by a well known and official body (DHET)

• Is the publisher a member of recognised professional organisations that commit to best practices inpublishing, such as the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE); the International Association of Scientific,Technical, & Medical Publishers (STM); or the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA)?

• Is the journal indexed? Always check in UlrichsWeb ('Abstracting and Indexing' tab), or directly at one of thejournal databases (SA Online Publications).

• Is the journal transparent with the editorial and peer review processes, governance, and ownership?

University of Newcastle Library guides. 2017. Strategic publishing: quality & esteem.

http://libguides.newcastle.edu.au/publishing/articles-quality. Date of access: 4 Oct. 2017.

Why Predatory journals somehow increased?

• Pressure to publish: You do not get your name on the map if you don’t publish.

• False marketing: Researchers get hooked by attractive marketing and publication promises

Bibliography for further readings

1. Beall's List of PredatoryJournals and Publishers. http://beallslist.weebly.com/

2. GUIDE: How to spot predatory academic journals in the wild. https://africacheck.org/factsheets/guide-how-to-spot-predatory-academic-journals-in-the-wild/

3. Guide to Scholarly Writing, Publishing, and Research Impact. http://www.shsulibraryguides.org/publish/predatory

4. NRF Statement on predatory journals. http://www.nrf.ac.za/media-room/news/nrf-statement-predatory-journals-deceptive-publishers

5. Open Access, A2K & Scholarly Communication: predatory Publishers http://libguides.wits.ac.za/openaccess_a2k_scholarly_communication/Predatory_Publishers

6. The extent of South African authored articles in predatory journals. http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/sajs.2017/20170010

7. IOWA State university. 2017. What is a predatory publisher?. http://instr.iastate.libguides.com/predatory. Date of access: 17 Oct. 2017

8. https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2017/07/25/cabells-new-predatory-journal-blacklist-review/

Thank you