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Oak Point Library: Predatory Journals

Predatory Nursing Journals

Predatory Journals and Publishers are an increasingly prevalent problem for researchers who are looking to publish their own work and students who are looking for accurate, peer-reviewed research. This page provides you with some resources to learn some of the warning signs of predatory publishers and journals.  By one estimate, there were 10,000 journals that qualified as predatory in 2015. (Shen and Björk, 2015)

Below you will find resources to help you assess the reliability of a journal and decide if a journal's publications are a good fit for publishing your own research.

No single definition of what a predatory journal or publisher actually is will cover all cases, but in a piece in Nature, 35 academics crafted a robust definition:

“Predatory journals and publishers are entities that prioritize self-interest at the expense of scholarship and are characterized by false or misleading information, deviation from best editorial and publication practices, a lack of transparency, and/or the use of aggressive and indiscriminate solicitation practices.”

Video Resources

This brief video by American Journal Experts provides characteristics of questionable journals. It should be noted that AJE works frequently with established publishers in the medical field and is a for-profit manuscript service-provider.

This brief video from the Office of Scholarly Communication at Cambridge reviews some tell-tale signs of predatory journals and some of the effects that their business practices can have on academics.

 

Nursing Specific Resources

General Resources for Finding Vetted, Peer-Reviewed Journals

Search Engines for Journal Impact Factors