KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Unawareness and unethical motivations are the main reasons authors cite for publishing in predatory journals.
• Proposed strategies to combat predatory publishing include improving education on publication ethics, creating new, credible publishing platforms, enhancing accountability through open peer review, and tightening regulation of journal recommendation lists.

Predatory journals are a deep-rooted issue in open access publishing, contributing an estimated 420,000 articles in 2014 alone. Despite their widespread presence, the motivations that drive authors toward these journals remain largely unknown. The topic is explored in Chapter 7 of Simon Linacre’s book, The Predator Effect: Understanding the Past, Present and Future of Deceptive Academic Journals. An excerpt from the chapter is available on Retraction Watch.

A review of the limited literature on author motivations highlighted 2 main reasons authors opt for predatory journals:

• lack of awareness about a journal’s dubious reputation
• unethical motivations, including incentives tied to career advancement and disillusionment with traditional academic publishing.

Studies looking at why authors might be tempted to engage with predatory publishers identified several factors that likely influence their decisions.

• Push factors:
  • pressure to publish to meet institutional expectations or funding requirements
  • fear of career stagnation or job loss if publishing targets are not met
  • high costs associated with publishing in reputable open access journals
  • limited options for open access platforms
  • desire to avoid loss of work following unsuccessful submission to legitimate, indexed journals.
• Pull factors:
  • fast turnaround time
  • false claims; eg, that a predatory journal is indexed in a known database
  • soliciting emails
  • perception of higher acceptance rates compared with indexed journals
  • inclusion of predatory journals in lists used for publication recommendation (whitelists).

One proposed strategy to tackle the problem is to educate researchers about the issues with predatory journals and review how incentives can tempt authors to publish in them. Other recommendations include:

• establishing new, legitimate publishing outlets to provide safer platforms for researchers, especially those from developing countries
• enhancing accountability through open peer review
• treating predatory journal publication as misconduct to emphasise the importance of rigorous peer review
• strengthening regulations to prevent predatory journals from infiltrating whitelists.

Linacre suggests that third-party help may also be needed to support academic authors in successful research publication.

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