IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/scient/v125y2020i1d10.1007_s11192-020-03619-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The hurdles of academic publishing from the perspective of journal editors: a case study

Author

Listed:
  • Maciej J. Mrowinski

    (Warsaw University of Technology)

  • Agata Fronczak

    (Warsaw University of Technology)

  • Piotr Fronczak

    (Warsaw University of Technology)

  • Olgica Nedic

    (Institute for the Application of Nuclear Energy (INEP), University of Belgrade)

  • Aleksandar Dekanski

    (Institute of Chemistry, Technology and Metallurgy - Department of Electrochemistry, University of Belgrade)

Abstract

In this paper, we provide insight into the editorial process as seen from the perspective of journal editors. We study a dataset obtained from the Journal of the Serbian Chemical Society, which contains information about submitted and rejected manuscripts, in order to find differences between local (Serbian) and external (non-Serbian) submissions. We show that external submissions (mainly from India, Iran and China) constitute the majority of all submissions, while local submissions are in the minority. Most of submissions are rejected for technical reasons (e.g. wrong manuscript formatting or problems with images) and many users resubmit the same paper without making necessary corrections. Manuscripts with just one author are less likely to pass the technical check, which can be attributed to missing metadata. Articles from local authors are better prepared and require fewer resubmissions on average before they are accepted for peer review. The peer review process for local submissions takes less time than for external papers and local submissions are more likely to be accepted for publication. Also, while there are more men than women among external users, this trend is reversed for local users. In the combined group of local and external users, articles submitted by women are more likely to be published than articles submitted by men.

Suggested Citation

  • Maciej J. Mrowinski & Agata Fronczak & Piotr Fronczak & Olgica Nedic & Aleksandar Dekanski, 2020. "The hurdles of academic publishing from the perspective of journal editors: a case study," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 125(1), pages 115-133, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:125:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-020-03619-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-020-03619-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-020-03619-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11192-020-03619-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Björk, Bo-Christer & Solomon, David, 2013. "The publishing delay in scholarly peer-reviewed journals," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 914-923.
    2. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of Greece," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 7(4), pages 7-93.
    3. Vincent Larivière & Chaoqun Ni & Yves Gingras & Blaise Cronin & Cassidy R. Sugimoto, 2013. "Bibliometrics: Global gender disparities in science," Nature, Nature, vol. 504(7479), pages 211-213, December.
    4. Jeffrey Beall, 2012. "Predatory publishers are corrupting open access," Nature, Nature, vol. 489(7415), pages 179-179, September.
    5. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of the United Kingdom," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 7(3), pages 7-114.
    6. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of Denmark," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 8(4), pages 7-125.
    7. Tove Faber Frandsen, 2017. "Are predatory journals undermining the credibility of science? A bibliometric analysis of citers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(3), pages 1513-1528, December.
    8. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of the European Community," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 8(4), pages 127-261.
    9. Kendall Powell, 2016. "Does it take too long to publish research?," Nature, Nature, vol. 530(7589), pages 148-151, February.
    10. Marco Seeber & Alberto Bacchelli, 2017. "Does single blind peer review hinder newcomers?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(1), pages 567-585, October.
    11. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of the United States," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 7(4), pages 95-200.
    12. Maciej J Mrowinski & Piotr Fronczak & Agata Fronczak & Marcel Ausloos & Olgica Nedic, 2017. "Artificial intelligence in peer review: How can evolutionary computation support journal editors?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(9), pages 1-11, September.
    13. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of the Netherlands," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 7(3), pages 115-214.
    14. Martijn Arns, 2014. "Open access is tiring out peer reviewers," Nature, Nature, vol. 515(7528), pages 467-467, November.
    15. Jory Lerback & Brooks Hanson, 2017. "Journals invite too few women to referee," Nature, Nature, vol. 541(7638), pages 455-457, January.
    16. Michail Kovanis & Raphaël Porcher & Philippe Ravaud & Ludovic Trinquart, 2016. "The Global Burden of Journal Peer Review in the Biomedical Literature: Strong Imbalance in the Collective Enterprise," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(11), pages 1-14, November.
    17. Vivian M Nguyen & Neal R Haddaway & Lee F G Gutowsky & Alexander D M Wilson & Austin J Gallagher & Michael R Donaldson & Neil Hammerschlag & Steven J Cooke, 2015. "How Long Is Too Long in Contemporary Peer Review? Perspectives from Authors Publishing in Conservation Biology Journals," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(8), pages 1-20, August.
    18. Maciej J. Mrowinski & Agata Fronczak & Piotr Fronczak & Olgica Nedic & Marcel Ausloos, 2016. "Review time in peer review: quantitative analysis and modelling of editorial workflows," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 107(1), pages 271-286, April.
    19. Oecd, 2008. "DAC Peer Review of Canada," OECD Journal on Development, OECD Publishing, vol. 8(4), pages 263-387.
    20. Ausloos, Marcel & Nedic, Olgica & Dekanski, Aleksandar, 2016. "Day of the week effect in paper submission/acceptance/rejection to/in/by peer review journals," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 456(C), pages 197-203.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lokman Tutuncu & Recep Yucedogru & Idris Sarisoy, 2022. "Academic favoritism at work: insider bias in Turkish national journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(5), pages 2547-2576, May.
    2. Lokman Tutuncu, 2023. "All-pervading insider bias alters review time in Turkish university journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(6), pages 3743-3791, June.
    3. Besim Bilalli & Rana Faisal Munir & Alberto Abelló, 2021. "A framework for assessing the peer review duration of journals: case study in computer science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(1), pages 545-563, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lucas Rodriguez Forti & Luiz A. Solino & Judit K. Szabo, 2021. "Trade-off between urgency and reduced editorial capacity affect publication speed in ecological and medical journals during 2020," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 8(1), pages 1-9, December.
    2. Besim Bilalli & Rana Faisal Munir & Alberto Abelló, 2021. "A framework for assessing the peer review duration of journals: case study in computer science," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(1), pages 545-563, January.
    3. ederico Bianchi & Flaminio Squazzoni, 2022. "Can transparency undermine peer review? A simulation model of scientist behavior under open peer review [Reviewing Peer Review]," Science and Public Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 49(5), pages 791-800.
    4. Sun, Zhuanlan & Clark Cao, C. & Ma, Chao & Li, Yiwei, 2023. "The academic status of reviewers predicts their language use," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 17(4).
    5. Siddarth Srinivasan & Jamie Morgenstern, 2021. "Auctions and Peer Prediction for Academic Peer Review," Papers 2109.00923, arXiv.org, revised May 2023.
    6. Zhao, Zhi-Dan & Chen, Jiahao & Lu, Yichuan & Zhao, Na & Jiang, Dazhi & Wang, Bing-Hong, 2021. "Dynamic patterns of open review process," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 582(C).
    7. Maciej J Mrowinski & Piotr Fronczak & Agata Fronczak & Marcel Ausloos & Olgica Nedic, 2017. "Artificial intelligence in peer review: How can evolutionary computation support journal editors?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(9), pages 1-11, September.
    8. Stephen A Gallo & Afton S Carpenter & Scott R Glisson, 2013. "Teleconference versus Face-to-Face Scientific Peer Review of Grant Application: Effects on Review Outcomes," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(8), pages 1-9, August.
    9. José Cendejas Bueno & Cecilia Font de Villanueva, 2015. "Convergence of inflation with a common cycle: estimating and modelling Spanish historical inflation from the 16th to the 18th centuries," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 48(4), pages 1643-1665, June.
    10. Lin Zhang & Yuanyuan Shang & Ying Huang & Gunnar Sivertsen, 2022. "Gender differences among active reviewers: an investigation based on publons," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(1), pages 145-179, January.
    11. Zhang, Lin & Shang, Yuanyuan & HUANG, Ying & Sivertsen, Gunnar, 2021. "Gender differences among active reviewers: an investigation based on Publons," SocArXiv 4z6w8, Center for Open Science.
    12. Lokman Tutuncu, 2023. "All-pervading insider bias alters review time in Turkish university journals," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(6), pages 3743-3791, June.
    13. Monica Aniela Zaharie & Marco Seeber, 2018. "Are non-monetary rewards effective in attracting peer reviewers? A natural experiment," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 117(3), pages 1587-1609, December.
    14. Louise Bedsworth, 2012. "California’s local health agencies and the state’s climate adaptation strategy," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 111(1), pages 119-133, March.
    15. Vincent Raoult, 2020. "How Many Papers Should Scientists Be Reviewing? An Analysis Using Verified Peer Review Reports," Publications, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-9, January.
    16. Ana Teresa Santos & Sandro Mendonça, 2022. "Do papers (really) match journals’ “aims and scope”? A computational assessment of innovation studies," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(12), pages 7449-7470, December.
    17. Nicholas Yee Liang Hing & Xin Ci Wong & Pei Xuan Kuan & Mohan Dass Pathmanathan & Mohd Aizuddin Abdul Rahman & Kalaiarasu M. Peariasamy, 2022. "Scientific Abstract to Full Paper: Publication Rate over a 3-Year Period in a Malaysian Clinical Research Conference," Publications, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-13, October.
    18. Andreas Ortmann & Benoît Walraevens, 2012. "Adam Smith, Philosopher and Man of the World," Post-Print halshs-00756341, HAL.
    19. Thomas Feliciani & Junwen Luo & Lai Ma & Pablo Lucas & Flaminio Squazzoni & Ana Marušić & Kalpana Shankar, 2019. "A scoping review of simulation models of peer review," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(1), pages 555-594, October.
    20. Tove Faber Frandsen, 2017. "Are predatory journals undermining the credibility of science? A bibliometric analysis of citers," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 113(3), pages 1513-1528, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:125:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1007_s11192-020-03619-x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.