Choosing a Publication Venue : Get Started

Welcome. In this guide, you will find resources and tips to help you choose a publication venue for your research. You will find information on open access journals, preprint servers, predatory publishers, as well as tools you can use to identify quality journals.
 

See related resources on the publication process below:

• How to submit a journal article (Spring Nature author tutorials)
• How to publish in scholarly journals (Elsevier)

Where to start:

• Look at your list of references! Journals you've cited in your work might be good places to submit.
• Search for articles on your topic in a subject-specific database, and make note of what journals appear frequently in your search results.
• Ask your subject librarian! She or he can help you find good quality journals that are relevant to your research area.
• If you've received an e-mail inviting you to submit your article to a journal, check the "What is a Predatory Publisher?" tab of this guide for help determining if the publisher is legitimate.

Next steps:

• Visit the journals' websites to review:
  • Scope (topics in which they are willing to accept submissions)
  • Author guidelines (formatting of manuscripts/illustrations/reference lists and other requirements for submission)
  • Turnaround time (how long it takes from submitting an article to receiving a decision)
• Prioritize your list. Most journals do not want to review submissions that are also under consideration elsewhere, so you will need to wait to receive a response from Journal #1 before submitting to Journal #2 and so on.
• Visit Thinkchecksubmit.org for more guidance on assessing journal quality.

Conference or Journal?

In some disciplines, like computer science and engineering, it is more common for researchers to submit papers to be presented at a conference than to submit an article to a journal.

Recommended reading:

• "Choosing a Venue: Conference or Journal?" (Michael Ernst, Computer Science professor at the University of Washington)
• Like "Think, Check, Submit" above, there is a similar tool for assessing conferences called "Think, Check, Attend"

Open-access journals differ from subscription-based journals in that their content is free for everyone to read.

There are two main models for open access publishing: green open access and gold open access. 

The gold open access model is centered on publication in an open access journal or a hybrid journal. In either case, the authors will likely have to pay an Article Processing Charge (APC) to the journal for publication. Hybrid journals are subscription journals which offer authors the option to make their article open access along the same lines as the gold open access model.

Read more about APCs and library support for open access publishing. 

The green open access model requires additional work on the part of authors, who must identify a subscription based journal which grants them the right to deposit their manuscript in an online repository. You can learn more about the different open access models and the implications for your research project here.

Legitimate open-access journals follow the same standards for rigorous publishing that traditional subscription-based scholarly journals do. Their inclusion in a subject-based literature index like Chemical Abstracts or a directory with strong inclusion criteria like the Directory of Open Access Journals means that they have been reviewed by experts and judged worthy. These journals will be transparent on their websites about their editorial oversight, affiliations, selection criteria, peer review process, and any charges to authors.

While some open access journals have questionable practices (see the "Predatory Publishers and Deceptive Publishing Practices" tab for more), open access publishing should not be regarded as inferior to traditional subscription-based journals.

Recommended reading:

• Common Myths About Open Access...Busted! (BioMed Central)
• "How Do I Find a Suitable Open Access Journal?" (Erin McKiernan, Biomedical Physics professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and OA advocate)
• Green vs. Gold Open Access (Northeastern University Libraries)
• Northeastern Library support for Open Access Publishing (Northeastern University Libraries)

Serving as a peer reviewer can be a great way to familiarize yourself with the scholarly publishing process. The American Psychological Association's Science Student Council has created a guide for grad students about becoming a peer reviewer:

• A Graduate Students’ Guide to Involvement in the Peer Review Process (PDF)

...And why should you have one?

An ORCID is a unique identifier assigned to an author, like a Social Security Number. It's a way of distinguishing between authors with similar names, and determining if two different versions of a name actually belong to the same author (eg. if a name changes due to marriage).

Publishers are starting to require that authors include their ORCID or sign up for one during the submission process. Why not create your ORCID now?