Predatory Journals and Publishers

Educating researchers about predatory journals and publishers is essential to help prevent researchers mistakenly publishing in untrustworthy journals.

UKRIO has compiled a list of resources relating to predatory journals and publishers.

References

• Frandsen, T. F., Moher, D., Shamseer, L., Cobey, K. D., Lalu, M. M., Galipeau, J., … Gunsalus, C. K. (2019). Why do researchers decide to publish in questionable journals? A review of the literature. Nature. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/leap.1214
• Grey, A., Bolland, M. J., Avenell, A., Klein, A. A., & Gunsalus, C. K. (2020). Check for publication integrity before misconduct. Nature, 577(7789), 167–169. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-03959-6
• Grudniewicz, A., Moher, D., Cobey, K. D., Bryson, G. L., Cukier, S., Allen, K., … Lalu, M. M. (2019, December 12). Predatory journals: no definition, no defence. Nature. NLM (Medline). https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-03759-y
• Moher, D., Shamseer, L., Cobey, K., Lalu, M. M., Galieau, J., Avey, M. T., … Ziai, H. (2017). Stop this waste of people, animals and money. Nature. https://researchmgt.monash.edu/ws/portalfiles/portal/238960887/238948021_oa.pdf

Guidelines and Discussion Documents

• In this discussion document, COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) describes the impact of predatory journals on the relevant stakeholders, evaluates proposed interventions and solutions, and present COPE’s perspective on addressing the problem going forward: https://doi.org/10.24318/cope.2019.3.6
• A useful example of an institutional resource page giving guidance about predatory journals, from the University of Portsmouth,: https://library.port.ac.uk/predatory-journals-and-publishers.html
• From the University of Brunel’s library; the question, ‘How do I know whether a publisher or journal is genuine when publishing my work?’ is explored: https://libanswers.brunel.ac.uk/faq/52606
• Andy Nobes from the International Network for the Availability of Scientific (INASP) writing on the AuthorAID blog, ‘A beginner’s guide to avoiding ‘predatory’ journals (using your critical thinking skills’. Published 24 July 2018. https://www.authoraid.info/en/news/details/1310/
• Cambell Scholarly Analytics published an A-Z list of issues regarding predatory publishing practices, with one Tweet a week going through the entire alphabet. Simon Linacre republished all 26 tweets in one place, as a primer on how to successfully deal with the phenomenon. https://blog.cabells.com/2020/11/04/the-a-zs-of-predatory-publishing/

Checklist

• Check. Submit. Is an online resource that includes a checklist to help you determine if a journal is to be trusted: http://thinkchecksubmit.org/check/
• From the Howard-Tilton Memorial Library (USA), a resource page linking to several checklists to aid evaluation of journals and publishers quality: https://libguides.tulane.edu/predatorypublishers/warning
• From the Queen’s University Library (Canada) a useful checklist to help identify deceptive publishers: https://guides.library.queensu.ca/ld.php?content_id=34490666

Cases

• From COPE, case number: 16-22, discussing the withdrawal of an accepted manuscript from a predatory journal: https://publicationethics.org/case/withdrawal-accepted-manuscript-predatory-journal
• An useful independent and anonymous blog entitled ‘Predatory Publishing’, that links to resources and interesting discussion pieces What is Predatory Publishing? | … and should you care? – Predatory Journals and Conferences (predatory-publishing.com)

Video

• Check. Submit. Is an online resource that helps you determine if a journal is to be trusted? There is a short video which describes the concept of Think. Check. Submit.: https://thinkchecksubmit.org/
• This presentation looks at the problem of predatory publishers and how to spot a one. It was produced by the Office of Scholarly Communication at Cambridge University: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He9GJybTtUw&feature=youtu.be

Infographics

• An infographic evaluating predatory journals by Ruth Bueter, Serials Librarian at Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library (USA): https://guides.himmelfarb.gwu.edu/friendly.php?s=PredatoryPublishing/EvaluatingJournals
• An infographic highlighting the features of a journal’s website that offer clues as to whether the journal is to be trusted. Created by Peter Burns for Allen Press’s FrontMatter: https://library.stonybrook.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/29_infographic-expand.png

Slides

• From Predatory Publishing: COPE European Seminar, September 2019 a plenary lecture entitled ‘Perspectives on predatory publishing and thoughts about solutions’ by Deborah Poff, COPE Chair: https://publicationethics.org/files/European%20Seminar%202019-Predatory%20publishing.pdf

Last revised November 2024

Please note that this list of resources is not intended to be exhaustive and should not be seen as a substitute for advice from suitably qualified persons. UKRIO is not responsible for the content of external websites linked to from this page. If you would like to seek advice from UKRIO, information on our role and remit and on how to contact us is available here.

UKRIO would like to thank our Advisory Board and other volunteers for their help in putting this list together.