Making good choices about publishing in the journal jungle

Five (bad) reasons to publish your research in predatory journals

“…While it may be alluring for established researchers to exclaim that they ‘had 20 publications this year’, chasing ready paper acceptances (such as predatory journals provide) provides a guaranteed means to chalk up another rapid resume entry, but at what cost? Counting your publications was valid when all publications counted, but not every publication counts anymore (Clark & Thompson ). Academic reputation is built mostly on what is published and where it is published, not how much is published (Clark & Thompson ).…”

“…Counting your publications was valid when all publications counted, but not every publication counts anymore (Clark & Thompson ). Academic reputation is built mostly on what is published and where it is published, not how much is published (Clark & Thompson ). While few internal disincentives may exist for publishing in predatory journals and some department processes may still reward chalking up ever more publications irrespective, this comes at considerable external cost to external academic reputation of the individual, their department, and nursing.…”

Predatory Publishing and the Psychology Behind it

“…For the publishers of predatory journals acceptance of manuscripts is a norm, and not an exception, as they publish the vast proportions of the papers they receive (Clark & Thompson, 2012). Also, the acceptance decision is announced very soon after the submission, often within 48 hours.…”

False gold: Safely navigating open access publishing to avoid predatory publishers and journals

“…Those who are desperate to have a paper accepted after several rejections are also vulnerable to the promise of publication by predatory publishers (Jones & McCullough, 2014;Shamseer et al, 2017). The risks posed by predatory publishers to the Gold OA process raise serious concerns for the quality of nursing and midwifery publications, as nurses and midwives are expected to contribute to and practice in a way that reflects current evidence-based research (Clark & Thompson, 2012;Oermann et al, 2016). Poor quality papers published without appropriate peer review have the potential to compromise scholarship in these disciplines (Clark & Thompson, 2016;Oermann et al, 2016), while information that is not very accessible (such as papers published in predatory journals) may impede the advancement of scientific evidence (Shamseer et al, 2017;Stone & Rossiter, 2015).…”