LibGuides: Research Support: Journal Impact

Publishing in High Impact Journals

Once you have completed your research and have it ready for publication there are a couple of steps you can take to ensure it has the greatest impact. If appropriate and possible, try to publish your research in journals that have a high impact. Use journal rankings to establish the top performing journals in your research field and submit your research to them. It should be noted that ranking information should always be combined with other factors such as judgments based on a researcher’s own expert knowledge, e.g. the credentials of the editorial board and a reading of the journal's statement of scope.

Shape of Science in Ireland 2016 with journal titles labelled - produced using Scimago Labs website https://www.scimagojr.com/shapeofscience/

Tools to Measure Journal Impact & Journal Rankings

Journal Impact Factor
The Journal Impact Factor is the original impact factor type metric and is based on Web of Science citation data. It is calculated by dividing the number of citations in one year by the total number of articles published in the two previous years. A Journal Impact Factor of 1.5 for a particular journal would mean that, on average, articles published in that journal during the previous two years have been cited 1.5 times. The Journal Impact Factor is a relative number and can only be used to compare journals in the same research field.
When choosing a journal an important factor to consider is its ranking in its subject category or categories e.g. whether it is ranked in the top 25% in the subject category by impact factor (Quartile 1 or Q1) or second 25% (Quartile 2 or Q2) etc.
CiteScore
This metric is based on Scopus citation data and is calculated similarly to the Journal Impact Factor except it is over a three year period instead of two years and all document types are included.
SCImago Journal and Country Rank (SJR)
The SJR uses citation data from Scopus. The SJR gives higher weight to citations from high impact journals and is calculated over a 3 year period. The SJR normalises for differences in citation behaviour between subject fields.
Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP)
SNIP uses citation data from Scopus. This indicator measures the average citation impact of the publications of a journal. The SNIP corrects for differences in citation practices between scientific fields, which allows for more accurate between-field comparisons of citation impact.
European Reference Index for the Humanities & Social Sciences (ERIH PLUS)
The European Reference Index for the Humanities and the Social Sciences (ERIH PLUS) was created and developed by researchers under the coordination of the European Science Foundation (ESF). Initially the ERIH listed only covered humanities disciplines and were first published by ESF in 2008 and revised in 2011-2012. In 2014, responsibility for the maintenance and operation of ERIH was transferred to the Norwegian Social Science Data Services (NSD). The reference index has been renamed ERIH PLUS in order to indicate that it has been extended to include the social sciences. ERIH PLUS does not allocate journals to particular categories but to be included, scientific journals in the humanities and social sciences must meet the benchmark standards.
Chartered Association of Business Schools (ABS) Academic Journal Guide 2018
The Academic Journal Guide is a guide to the range and quality of journals in which business and management academics publish their research. Its purpose is to give both emerging and established scholars greater clarity as to which journals to aim for, and where the best work in their field tends to be clustered.
Washington and Lee Law Journal Ranking
The purpose of the Law Journal Rankings Project is to give academic staff and researchers a resource to locate law journals by subject, country or publication, or ranking, to display journal editorial information, and to facilitate an author's article submission to those journals.
Harzing’s Journal Quality List
The Journal Quality List is a collation of journal rankings from a variety of sources. It is published primarily to assist academics to target papers at journals of an appropriate standard in subject areas including Business, Communication, Economics, Marketing, Management, Psychology, Sociology and Tourism.