WHAT ARE PREDATORY JOURNALS AND HOW DO THEY OPERATE (original) (raw)

Predatory journals: Who publishes in them and why

This sequential explanatory mixed-methods study investigated where predatory/fake journals (PFJs) are founded, which countries' researchers publish more frequently in PFJs, the identity of the editors of PFJs, why researchers publish in PFJs, and what factors encourage such publications. A survey and semi-structured follow-up interviews were used to collect data. The results indicate that the majority of PFJs are located in developing countries ; 119 journals provided incorrect postal addresses; the greatest number of researchers who published in PFJs are from India, Nigeria, and Turkey, suggesting that most of the publications in PFJs are submitted by researchers in developing countries; the interviewed Turkish researchers submitted their articles to PFJs in pursuit of rapid academic promotion ; the incentive allowance system encourages researchers to publish in PFJs; and the well-known " publish-or-perish " pressure and unawareness are other potential factors that drive participants to submit their papers to PFJs.

Predatory Journals: Threat for Academicians Predatory Journals: Threat for Academicians

Library Philosophy and Practice, 2021

The publication journey for most of the researchers starts from the Ph. D. onwards. University guidelines for the Ph. D. enable the researchers to publish one or two papers in peer-reviewed journals. The inexperienced or young researchers are in a hurry in the process of publishing their articles. They are unaware of the predatory journals and they publish their articles in these predatory journals. The focus of the present paper is to create awareness among the young researchers and offer some basic knowledge so that they can avoid publishing in predatory journals.

Predatory Journals: Threat for Academicians

2021

The publication journey for most of the researchers starts from the Ph. D. onwards. University guidelines for the Ph. D. enable the researchers to publish one or two papers in peer-reviewed journals. The inexperienced or young researchers are in a hurry in the process of publishing their articles. They are unaware of the predatory journals and they publish their articles in these predatory journals. The focus of the present paper is to create awareness among the young researchers and offer some basic knowledge so that they can avoid publishing in predatory journals.

Predatory Journals: A Global Threat to the Scholarly Publishing Landscape

Journal of Postgraduate Medical Institute, 2020

There has been a major trend in academic publishing from traditional print publication to open access journals and online publication in recent times. The authors now find more avenues to publish their work than before, but at the same time vulnerable to become prey to predatory journals. The term ”Predatory Journals” was first coined by Jeffrey Beall 1 , Associate Professor and librarian at the university of Colorado Denver. According to Beall predatory publisher is one“which publish counterfeit journals to exploit the open access model in which the author pays.” The most recent clear, comprehensive and consensus definition of predatory journal was formulated in April 2019 in Ottawa, Canada by 43 researchers belonging to 10 different countries. 2 Their definition reads“ 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 prac...

Predatory Journals: What They Are and How to Avoid Them

Toxicologic Pathology, 2020

Predatory journals—also called fraudulent, deceptive, or pseudo-journals—are publications that claim to be legitimate scholarly journals but misrepresent their publishing practices. Some common forms of predatory publishing practices include falsely claiming to provide peer review, hiding information about article processing charges, misrepresenting members of the journal’s editorial board, and other violations of copyright or scholarly ethics. Because of their increasing prevalence, this article aims to provide helpful information for authors on how to identify and avoid predatory journals.

Now you have to pay! A deeper look at publishing practices of predatory journals

Learned Publishing, 2023

In this study, by using Beall's (Scholarly open-access, 2014; Beall's list of predatory journals and publishers, 2018) predatory journal lists as well as direct e-mail solicitations from journals, we intentionally submitted a poorly written manuscript to 58 open-access journals using counterfeit names and affiliations. Although there have been several studies examining the practices of questionable journals, there is a lack of research investigating the interactive processes in detail. Our analysis, then, was to provide a more comprehensive view of the underlying reasoning for the acceptance or rejection of a manuscript. Of the 31 journals acknowledging receipt of our manuscript, 21 accepted it either unexpurgated or asked only for cosmetic revisions. Regarding 'positive responses', we point to five common flaws associated with such journals, namely that (1) they lack any interest in the researchers who are submitting manuscripts; (2) they do not judge academic writing in accordance with expected conventions; (3) they appear to be indifferent to scholarship including research design, plagiarism issues, and citation quality; (4) their review process is opaque and overly hasty, and (5) the tone they use in correspondence e-mail messages is highly inappropriate. Based upon the investigation, it is clear that such journals' primary aim is in securing the article processing fee. Our findings paint a more comprehensive picture of questionable journal practices with the hope of disseminating such information to the broader scholarly community.

Predatory and Fake Scientific Journals/Publishers - A Global Outbreak with Rising Trend

In recent times some publishers are intensively exploiting the model of open access publishing. During the last several years, studies have shown that there was a substantial increase in the number of fake publishers and hijacked journals. These cyber criminals make money by stealing the identities of legitimate journals and collecting the article processing charges on the papers that are submitted. This is all accomplished by a well developed framework that includes web development steps, intensive e-mail marketing and victim selections. This review article strives to recommend that the Beall's list of predatory publishers and journals should be consulted every time when an author plans to submit scientific work to some of the journals that are indexed by Thomson Reuters/Institute for Scientific Information-ISI and covered by the Journal Citation Report. Also, the authors are advised to be "up to date" with new information regarding this controversial topic by informing themselves through various websites and specialized scientific portals. The review paper itself strives to summarize the most recent investigations on predatory and spurious journals/publishers which affect the entire scientific community, thus representing an outbreak with rising trend not only on national and regional level, but on global level as well.

Predatory journals: no definition, no defence

Nature

promise was doubtful and its validity unlikely to have been vetted. Predatory journals are a global threat. They accept articles for publication-along with authors' fees-without performing promised quality checks for issues such as plagiarism or ethical approval. Naive readers are not the only victims. Many researchers have been duped into submitting to predatory journals, in which their work can be overlooked. One study that focused on 46,000 researchers based in Italy found that about 5% of them published in such outlets 1. A separate analysis suggests predatory publishers collect millions of dollars in publication fees that are ultimately paid out by funders such as the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) 2. One barrier to combating predatory publishing is, in our view, the lack of an agreed definition. By analogy, consider the historical criteria for deciding whether an abnormal bulge in the aorta, the largest artery in the body, could be deemed an aneurysm-a dangerous W hen 'Jane' turned to alternative medicine, she had already exhausted radiotherapy, chemotherapy and other standard treatments for breast cancer. Her alternative-medicine practitioner shared an article about a therapy involving vitamin infusions. To her and her practitioner, it seemed to be authentic grounds for hope. But when Jane showed the article to her son-in-law (one of the authors of this Comment), he realized it came from a predatory journal-meaning its Leading scholars and publishers from ten countries have agreed a definition of predatory publishing that can protect scholarship. It took 12 hours of discussion, 18 questions and 3 rounds to reach.

Evolving strategies of the predatory journals

Along with the increasing use of the Internet, scholarly publishing was affected by the rise of 'predatory journals'. Many authors attribute the success of these journals to the open access provided to potential readers. While many authors have attempted to propose criteria for identifying predatory journals, very little research was directed to explaining their success, and underlying strategies. This study uses a biological sciences perspective, based on the five stages of predation, and examines the strategies accordingly. The results indicate that predatory journals use the same strategies as all Internet-based scams in identifying their prey. The largest number of strategies addresses approaching the authors. The recent trends include personalized call for papers, use of fake metrics, hijacking reputed journals, faking location and editorial structure, addressing a broad range of topics and providing fast services (at the expense of quality). In addition to these strategies, publishing fees are often hidden. In summary, the pressure to publish and metrics-based career advancement procedures are the main attractors driving authors to predatory journals, despite the efforts of scientists and Internet-based means of identifying these journals and publicizing their dishonest practices.

Predatory and Fake Scientific Journals/Publishers- A Global Outbreak with Rising Trend: A Review

In recent times some publishers are intensively exploiting the model of open access publishing. During the last several years, studies have shown that there was a substantial increase in the number of fake publishers and hijacked journals. These cyber criminals make money by stealing the identities of legitimate journals and collecting the article processing charges on the papers that are submitted. This is all accomplished by a well developed framework that includes web development steps, intensive e-mail marketing and victim selections. This review article strives to recommend that the Beall’s list of predatory publishers and journals should be consulted every time when an author plans to submit scientific work to some of the journals that are indexed by Thomson Reuters/Institute for Scientific Information-ISI and covered by the Journal Citation Report. Also, the authors are advised to be “up to date” with new information regarding this controversial topic by informing themselves through various websites and specialized scientific portals. The review paper itself strives to summarize the most recent investigations on predatory and spurious journals/publishers which affect the entire scientific community, thus representing an outbreak with rising trend not only on national and regional level, but on global level as well.