Why We Publish Where We Do: Faculty Publishing Values and Their Relationship to Review, Promotion and Tenure Expectations

Authors

Meredith T. Niles, University of VermontFollow
Lesley A. Schimanski, Simon Fraser University
Erin Christy McKiernan, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de MéxicoFollow
Juan P. Alperin, Simon Fraser University

Date of this Version

2019

Document Type

Article

Citation

bioRxiv preprint first posted online July 21, 2019; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/706622. Available at https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2019/07/21/706622.full.pdf.

Comments

The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not peer-reviewed) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Abstract

Using an online survey of academics at 55 randomly selected institutions across the US and Canada, we explore priorities for publishing decisions and their perceived importance within review, promotion, and tenure (RPT). We find that respondents most value journal readership, while they believe their peers most value prestige and related metrics such as impact factor when submitting their work for publication. Respondents indicated that total number of publications, number of publications per year, and journal name recognition were the most valued factors in RPT. Older and tenured respondents (most likely to serve on RPT committees) were less likely to value journal prestige and metrics for publishing, while untenured respondents were more likely to value these factors. These results suggest disconnects between what academics value versus what they think their peers value, and between the importance of journal prestige and metrics for tenured versus untenured faculty in publishing and RPT perceptions.