Scholarly Communication

Once you have decided you want to publish your work, it's time to start looking for an appropriate journal to submit it to. Here are some things to consider when looking for a journal:

• What journals do you read?
• What are you citing? Check the articles cited in your literature review — where were they published?
• What journals have your colleagues, or other researchers in your field, published in?
• Try browsing databases, like Scopus or Web of Science, for journals in your subject area.
• Try a journal recommender tool — these are tools that automatically suggest journals based on your abstract or keywords. See the list on the left of this page for some examples.

Once you have found a journal, you will need to evaluate the journal to make sure that it's suitable for your work. Here are some things to consider:

Scope of the journal

Look for a section on the journal website called 'Aims & Scope' or 'About the Journal'. Here you will find information about what kind of topics and subject areas that are covered in the journal.

Look through the tables of contents of previous issues of the journal. If you see other articles that are on a similar topic to yours, that might mean that this journal is a good fit in terms of scope.

Audience of the journal

Choosing the right audience for your article is important, as it can determine the future impact of your work. Decide whether you are looking for a journal with a specialised, field-specific audience, or if your research would be of interest to a broader audience.

Publisher copyright policy

It's important to consider what the publisher of the journal will let you do to share your article once it's published. If you are publishing in a non-Open Access journal, then the publisher might place restrictions on how you can share your article. Some publishers allow authors to deposit their work in repositories, like TARA, and share them online immediately after publication. Others require an embargo period to pass before you can share your work openly.

You can check the journal's copyright policy on the Sherpa Romeo database. Read more about Open Access here.

Review process

Check that the journal has a peer review process in place and that it is clearly explained on the journal website. There are a few different types of peer review that you may encounter:

Double blind peer review The reviewers and the authors are both anonymous. The aim of this anonymity is to prevent reviewer bias, but it can sometimes be possible to guess the identity of the author, especially in smaller subject areas.

Single blind peer review: The reviewers are anonymous, but the author's name and affiliation is shown to the reviewer. The aim of this method  is to allow the reviewer to remain anonymous so that they can provide honest criticism, but to also consider the author's previous research in their review. There is potential, however, for overly-critical reviewing or even discrimination based on gender or nationality. 

Open peer review: Neither the reviewers nor the authors are anonymised. The aim of open peer review is to be completely transparent. Some, however, have raised concerns that reviewers might be less critical when their name is attached to the review.