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As the global university sector continues to expand, ever more academic work is being published, including growing numbers of academic monographs. Digital technologies open up opportunities for pub...

PurposePredatory publishing is a growing and global issue infecting all scientific domains. Predatory publishers create counterfeit, not (properly) peer-reviewed journals to exploit the open access (OA) model in which the author pays. The plethora of predatory marketing journals along with the sophisticated deceptive practices of their publishers may create total confusion. One of the many highly likely risks of that bewilderment is when peer-reviewed, prestigious marketing journals cite these pseudo-marketing journals. This phenomenon is called citation contamination. This study aims to investigate the extent of citation contamination in the peer-reviewed marketing literature.Design/methodology/approachUsing Google Scholar as a citation gathering tool, this study investigates references to four predatory marketing journals in 68 peer-reviewed marketing journals listed in the 2018 version of the Academic Journal Guide by the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABSs).FindingsResults indicate that 59 of the 68 CABS-ranked peer-reviewed marketing journals were, up to late January 2021, contaminated by at least one of the four sampled predatory journals. Together, these four pseudo-journals received (at least) 605 citations. Findings from nonparametric statistical procedures show that citation contamination occurred irrespective of the age of a journal or its 2019 Journal Impact Factor (JIF). They also point out that citation contamination happened independently from the fact that a journal is recognized by Clarivate Analytics or not.Research limitations/implicationsThis study investigated citations to only four predatory marketing journals in only 68 CABS-listed peer-reviewed marketing journals.Practical implicationsThese findings should sound an alarm to the entire marketing community (including academics and practitioners). To counteract citation contamination, recommendations are provided for researchers, practitioners, journal editors and academic and professional associations.Originality/valueThis study is the first to offer a systematic assessment of references to predatory journals in the peer-reviewed marketing literature.

Educating authors and clinicians about predatory publishing and its consequences is vital to protect scholarship and evidence-based practice and is particularly important for those early in their h...

Navigating predatory publishers as an educator, course developer, author, and/or editor can be frustrating and sometimes complex. This article offers how to recognize, avoid, and check if one is be...

On the web it is very frequently found that good papers are published only in “Peer Reviewed Trusted Journals (PRTJ)”, while low quality papers are published in the “Predatory Publishing Journals”. Here we show that this is not true, because the quality of papers depends on the quality of the authors in the same manner that quality of teaching depends on the quality of professors. Since generally the authors are professors it is important to see the two sides of the “publishing medal”: authors and professors. We will use the SPQR Principle [«Semper Paratus ad Qualitatem et Rationem (Always Ready for Quality and Rationality)»] as the way to analyse papers, books and teaching; it seems that very few people have taken care of Quality of Methods (Deming, Juran, Gell-Mann, Shewhart, Einstein, Galilei). The cases analysed here are from PRT Journals and teaching documents.

Purpose To describe the newer predatory movement within academia: predatory conferences and its associated characteristics. Design Perspective Methods Literature review of currently published literature regarding the topic Results Although ophthalmology and vision science are often spared from falling prey to predatory organizations, it is important for scientists of all levels, from trainees to senior faculty, to be aware of the existence of for-profit conferences and their characteristics. Conclusion We discuss the details of predatory conferences and provide resources to help identify such meetings for all scientists and professionals.

Employing a conversational form, this article presents the views of three editors from established mainstream journals. They first discuss the rise of predatory publishing, then highlight the dangers of publishing in predatory journals, identifying some “red flags” that authors can look out for to avoid such journals. They then offer hints on how prospective authors can increase their chances of acceptance in mainstream journals and how they can get started in research and publishing. The purpose of this dialogue is to invite a re-envisioning of the current “publish or perish” perspective, which appears to be prevalent in most academic circles. Such negative framing is unhelpful and discouraging, especially to early-career academics who may be unfamiliar with the practices and processes involved. What is needed is a re-envisioning of academic publication from “publish or perish” to “publish and flourish”.

Academic publishing has been increasing greatly with the spread of open access journals and the shift to online publishing. However, authors must be aware of predatory journals and publishers while submitting their academic works for publication. Publishing in predatory journals is just a waste of efforts, money, and time as it does not add any scientific merits to the authors. The practice of predatory publishing can also damage the reputation of institutions and funding agencies. Therefore, there is an urgent need for awareness among researchers regarding predatory publishing. Local, national and international regulatory bodies should take stern actions against predatory publications while granting research funds and evaluating the researchers’ performance for job promotion and academic degrees

OBJECTIVE. The objective of our study was to help academic researchers avoid predatory publishers by characterizing the problem with respect to radiology and medical imaging and to test an intervention to address aggressive e-mail solicitation. MATERIALS AND METHODS. In total, 803 faculty from 10 U.S. academic radiology departments and 193 faculty in the senior author's department were surveyed about their experiences with soliciting journals. To document the characteristics of these journals and their publishers, we retrospectively reviewed the academic institutional e-mail box of one radiologist over 51 days. Journals' bibliometric parameters were compared with those of established medical imaging journals offering open access publishing. We tested filters for selected syntax to identify spam e-mails during two time periods. RESULTS. Of 996 faculty, 206 responded (16% nationally, 42% locally). Most (98%) received e-mails from soliciting publishers. Only 7% published articles with these publishers. Submission reasons were invitations, fee waivers, and difficulty publishing elsewhere. Overall, 94 publishers sent 257 e-mails in 51 days, 50 of which offered publishing opportunities in 76 imaging journals. Six journals were indexed in PubMed, and two had verifiable impact factors. The six PubMed-indexed journals had a lower mean publication fee ($824) than top medical imaging journals ($3034) (p < 0.001) and had a shorter mean duration of existence (9.5 vs 49.0 years, respectively; p = 0.005). The e-mail filters captured 71% of soliciting e-mails during the initial 51-day period and 85% during the same period 1 year later. CONCLUSION. Soliciting publishers have little impact on scientific literature. Academicians can avoid soliciting e-mails with customized e-mail filters.

PurposeIn 2017, one study (Derek Pyne; Journal of Scholarly Publishing; DOI: 10.3138/jsp.48.3.137; University of Toronto Press) in the “predatory” publishing literature attracted global media attention. Now, over three years, according to adjusted Google Scholar data, with 53 citations (34 in Clarivate Analytics' Web of Science), that paper became that author's most cited paper, accounting for one-third of his Google Scholar citations.Design/methodology/approachIn this paper, the authors conducted a bibliometric analysis of the authors who cited that paper.FindingsWe found that out of the 39 English peer-reviewed journal papers, 11 papers (28%) critically assessed Pyne's findings, some of which even refuted those findings. The 2019 citations of the Pyne (2017) paper caused a 43% increase in the Journal of Scholarly Publishing 2019 Journal Impact Factor, which was 0.956, and a 7.7% increase in the 2019 CiteScore.Originality/valueThe authors are of the opinion that scholars and numerous media that cited the Pyne (2017) paper were unaware of its flawed findings.

Predatory publishing is now rapidly growing and becoming a global challenge to scientific communities. Predatory publications pose a danger that could undermine the quality, integrity, and reliability of published scientific research works. They harm the career of those authors who published on them. The researchers should be aware of the quality of journals while publishing their research results. In this review, we briefly summarize the ways to spot out predatory publications, theirharmful effects, and strategies to stop them. Authors should know the lists of predatory journals/publishers which are available on Beall’s list on the internet. Predatory journals take advantage of authors by asking them to publish for a fee without providing peer-review or editing services. The young and inexperienced authors are easy victims of predatory publications. The predatory publications are worthless, just a waste of time, resources, money, and efforts. The objective of this review paper was to create awareness about predatory journals among researchers and scholars.

Predatory publishing is an emerging but worrisome trend among academics, including librarians, in Nigeria. It is in line with this that the paper investigated the awareness and knowledge of predato...

Predatory journals pose a global threat to science. Young scientists and scholars are easy victims of the predatory publications. Predatory publications reduce the accuracy, reliability, and validity of the scientific works published. The predatory publications are worthless, just a waste of time, resources, money, and efforts. Predatory publications undermine the value of legitimate publications. In order to discourage predatory publications, educational and research institutions should set the rules for publication in the journals that must be indexed in web of science, Journal Citation Reports (JCR, Clarivate Analytics, formerly Thomson-Reuters) or other famous scientific databases such as Scopus, DOAJ, PubMed, and MEDLINE. Citation of articles from predatory journals should be discouraged. The students, academics, and researchers should be careful to avoid predatory publications to maintain their credentials.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual review of the literature pertaining to predatory publishing, so as to derive cornerstone themes for an ongoing research agenda to eliminate pred...

Predatory journals and conferences have little or no peer review. Their raison d'être is for making money through the article processing charges and the conference registration fees. Without a critical evaluation, predatory journals publishing flawed results and conclusions would cloud the existing scientific literature. Predatory conferences are the offshoots of predatory publishing. The conferences are not organised by learned societies, but by profit-making event organisers. There is a need for awareness among researchers and clinicians regarding predatory publishing. The scourge of predatory publishing and conferencing should be more often highlighted during scientific meetings and publication courses.

This article aims at analyzing the impact of predatory publishing in ophthalmology, criteria to identify a legitimate journal, red flags of a predatory journal, sources, and checkpoints available before publishing scientific work in a standard ophthalmology journal. A retrospective review was performed and a list of suspected Ophthalmology predatory journals was extracted through four major so-called blacklists: Beall's, Cabell's, Manca's, and Strinzel's list. This list of journals was then cross-referenced with the UGC CARE and vetted whitelist of vision science journals to remove the legitimate journals. Moreover, as all the predatory journals are supposed to be open access, all possible types of open-access journals on the Scimago webpage were also searched. A gross estimate in terms of publication cost was searched for, and a list of authentic links to find out a legitimate journal was prepared. Additionally, the methodology by which these predatory journals penetrate legitimate indexes such as PubMed was also evaluated. A total of 51 ophthalmology predatory journals were enlisted. Thirty-eight out of 124 Ophthalmology journals listed on Scimago were open access, and the cost of publishing in predatory journals ranged from USD50–500, which is substantially lower than that in legitimate journals (USD 50–3000). A total of 13 open-access platforms exist, with 10 characteristic red flags to identify a predatory journal. These journals have penetrated legitimate indexes such as PubMed by similar-sounding names to the legitimate journals and have published articles with external funding, which needs indexing. Predatory publishing impacts the quality of research in every field, including Ophthalmology, and must be discouraged.

A predatory journal could be provisionally defined as one masquerading as a genuine academic publication but offer little, if any, rigorous peer review. Predatory journals or publishers place a focus on maximising financial profit, as opposed to regulated dissemination of scientific advancements. As a result, authors can often get their work published in such journals with little scrutiny on quality. Although generally warned against and discouraged, universally practiced sanctions against researchers’ submission to and publication in predatory journals are not common. Predatory publishing thus remains prevalent, particularly in places where academic success is measured by the quantity rather than quality of publication output, which feeds the journal’s business model that thrives upon significant market demand. However, such an undesirable enterprise has the potential to flood the scientific literature with unsound research that could be misleadingly perceived as authoritative. This may result in or add to the confusion of policy makers and the layperson, consequentially bringing disrepute to science and all parties involved. Here, we argue that wilfully submitting one’s manuscript to a predatory journal may constitute an active act of avoidance of rigorous peer review of one’s work. If such is the intention, it would be a questionable research practice and could be considered an, albeit covert, form of scientific misconduct. If labelled as such, and with institutional and funding rules erected to discourage the practice, predatory publishing could be effectively put out of business through diminishing the consumer demand.

Researchers from Uzbekistan are leading the global list of publications in predatory journals. The current paper reviews the principles of implementation of the “publish or perish policy” in Uzbekistan with an overarching aim of detecting the factors that are pushing more and more scholars to publish the results of their studies in predatory journals. Scientific publications have historically been a cornerstone in the development of science. For the past five decades, the quantity of publications has become a common indicator for determining academic capacity. Governments and institutions are increasingly employing this indicator as an important criterion for promotion and recruitment, simultaneously, researchers are being awarded Ph.D. and D.Sc. degrees for the number of articles they publish in scholarly journals. Many talented academics have had a pay rise or promotion declined due to a short or nonexistent bibliography, which leads to significant pressure on academics to publish. The “publish or perish” principle has become a trend in academia and the key performance indicator for habilitation in Uzbekistan. The present study makes a case for re-examining the criteria set by the Supreme Attestation Commission of the Republic of Uzbekistan for candidates applying for Ph.D. and D.Sc. as well as faculty promotion requirements in the light of current evidence for the deteriorating academic performance of scholars.

Librarianship typically discusses the virtues of open access publishing; this session will focus on its darker side. We will discuss the experiences of challenging a predatory publisher who appeared to violate the Creative Commons Licensing attached to our published journal article. Next, we will outline how we discovered this apparent copyright infringement, sought legal advice, and share perspectives on the issue from other involved authors, the journal’s editorial team, and other interested parties. This case study will highlight the complex landscape of scholarly publishing and copyright in an open access world.

Purpose The purpose of this study was to assess the extent to which academic promotion and tenure (APT) criteria and guidelines in schools of nursing recognize predatory publishing. This assessment included an analysis of APT documents looking specifically for guidance about predatory publications by faculty in schools of nursing. Design This study used a cross-sectional, descriptive design and was conducted in 2020. Methods A mixed methods approach was used to collect data from two sources. Data were extracted from APT documents for 92 research-intensive universities found online and specifically focused on documents for universities and for schools of nursing in the United States. Interviews were conducted with a subsample of academic administrators (n = 10) from selected schools. Findings The majority (57%; n = 50) of APT documents reviewed addressed quality of the journals in which faculty publish. However, very nonspecific terms, such as "high quality" or "peer reviewed" were used. None of the documents reviewed (n = 88) included any reference to predatory journals. Deans who were interviewed validated the analysis of the APT documents. While most deans reported faculty were aware of predatory journals and the risks of publishing in them, formal guidelines for consequences for publishing in predatory journals were not developed or available. Conclusion This study examined how schools of nursing in research-intensive universities address the issue of predatory journals. APT criteria do not provide guidance to faculty and promotion and tenure committees about issues related to predatory publications as low-quality publication outlets. Recommendations for APT committees, mentors, and faculty are provided. Clinical relevance Clinicians rely on researchers, many of whom are faculty, to publish rigorous studies that produce evidence they can translate into practice. One measure of the quality of a study's findings is where the paper is published and reflects the level of peer review it has been through. Faculty who publish in predatory journals may not have had their work reviewed by experts; evidence produced may or may not be adequate for translation to guide nursing practice.

The aim of this study was to make a quantitative assessment of the impact that predatory publishing has on a single author over a year, analyzing the number of invitations, the subject areas of the inviting journals and their characteristics. An analysis of all invitations to publication, received during 12 months, was carried out in order to analyze their number, the area of specialization, the presence in reputable databases, publication criteria and presence in the Beall's list. A total of 864 invitations had been received at the end of the 12 months, all with open access policies. Ninety-nine were from journals not on Beall's list. Eight were indexed on reputable databases. The thematic areas were distributed as follows: 370 dental, 346 medical, 122 unspecified subject, 26 non-medical. Predatory publishing is spreading in dentistry. Poor-quality articles and, at the same time, loss of potentially valuable research could seriously pollute the scientific evidence that founds dental clinical practice.

In December of 2019, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) updated its recommendations. As occurs regularly with the ICMJE recommendations, this document was edited and tweaked, and thus fortified and verified. At least one new fortifying positive element was introduced, namely that peer reviewers who relied on the assistance of others during peer review need to declare this to editors. This fortifies publishing integrity, via transparency, in the peer review process in biomedical science. However, a new clause was introduced: "Authors should avoid citing articles in predatory or pseudo-journals." This is controversial because the precise nature of "predatory" publishing venues, either journals or publishers, is unclear and several parameters used by existing blacklists are unreliable and thus debatable. It is concerning that these edited recommendations were simultaneously published in 13 medical journals.

Researchers in developing countries are more likely to publish in predatory journals (Xia et al., 2015). This study investigates the understanding that research scientists in Ghana, a developing country, have about predatory journals and their publishing practices. Using a mixed methods approach, research scientists within one cluster of research organizations in Ghana were asked about their awareness of the characteristics of predatory journals, based on their own experience as a researcher. Their publications were also examined. The results indicate that most of the research scientists in this study are aware of predatory journals and are often solicited by them, but are less aware of tools they can use to determine the quality of a particular publication. In addition, 12% of the articles published that make up 24% of the unique journals in which these researchers published could be considered “predatory”. The findings of this research are significant because they indicate that research scientists may have more awareness of predatory journals than is expected, but that they may lack the training or tools necessary for deciding whether or not a journal is legitimate.

Loosely defined, predatory publishing is the practice of unscrupulous publishers who exploit writers and use aggressive and dubious practices for financial gain. Libraries are starting to employ me...

In this paper, case story methodology is used to construct the narrative of a publisher of scholarly journals. Real-world examples are compiled within a single fictionalized narrative to enable ide...

On 25 August 2016, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued OMICS Group Inc., iMedPub LLC, Conference Series LLC, and Srinubabu Gedela, all affiliated with open access mega-publisher OMICS International, for deception in their solicitation of journal articles and advertising of conferences. The ongoing lawsuit seeks to stop OMICS’s deceptive practices and disgorge US $50.5 million in ill-gotten gains. OMICS has in turn claimed over $2.1 billion for harm caused by the lawsuit to its business and employees. This article describes the main arguments, counter-arguments, and court decisions in the 5920 pages of pleadings, exhibits, and orders that have been filed through 14 October 2018. The article then evaluates the case to formulate key take-aways for publishers, editors, academics, and universities. Depending on its ultimate outcome, the case against OMICS may be a turning point in the practices of questionable open access online publishers, making this interim case assessment pertinent to all concerned about the future of academic publishing.

A thriving black-market economy of scam scholarly publishing, typically referred to as ‘predatory publishing,’ threatens the quality of scientific literature globally. The scammers publish research with minimal or no peer review and are motivated by article processing charges and not the advancement of scholarship. Authors involved in this scam are either duped or willingly taking advantage of the low rejection rates and quick publication process. Geographic analysis of the origin of predatory journal articles indicates that they predominantly come from developing countries. Consequently, most universities in developing countries operate blacklists of deceptive journals to deter faculty from submitting to predatory publishers. The present article discusses blacklisting and, conversely, whitelisting of legitimate journals as options of deterrence. Specifically, the article provides a critical evaluation of the two approaches by explaining how they work and comparing their pros and cons to inform a decision about which is the better deterrent.

SUMMARYOpen access publishing has a dark side, the predatory publishers and journals that exist for revenue rather than scholarly activity. This article helps researchers to: (1) identify some of the commonly used tactics and characteristics of predatory publishing; and (2) avoid falling prey to them. In summary, authors should choose the journal for submission themselves and never respond to unsolicited emails. It is also important to check blacklists such as ‘Stop Predatory Journals’ and whitelists such the Directory of Open Access Journals.LEARNING OBJECTIVESAfter reading this article, readers should be able to do the following: •be aware of the dangers of predatory journals and publishers•use blacklists of predatory journals and publishers’ whitelists of legitimate open access journals•be aware of warning signs that might suggest a predatory journal or publisher.DECLARATION OF INTERESTS.K. is on the editorial board of BJPsych International. He also receives five to ten spam emails a day from predatory journals and publishers.

Predatory publishing is a major threat to contemporary publishing, as it offers 'to unaware scientist's', a quick open-access publication against fees without peer-review procedures.. Lack of peer-review leads to unethical practices, as plagiarism, publication of unscientific falsified data, and even unsafe clinical practices. As these journals threaten the credibility of academic publishing, significant work has been done from many scientific teams, in the last years, in establishing discriminating criteria between predatory and legitimate publishing. In the present review, we include mechanisms used by predatory editors to convince eager researchers to submit to their journals. We also provide useful links giving information about potential predatory journals and publishers, as well as scholarly writing. Joining the efforts of different scientific disciplines which compiled "green" lists with journals in their field, we conducted a "green" list with genuine orthopaedic research journals based on the directory of open-access journals (DOAJ) and Thomson Reuters journal citation reports. Ninety-six legitimate orthopaedic journals were identified based on the Thomson Reuters journal citation reports. One hundred thirty hits were found on the DOAJ site using the keywords "orthopaedics, orthopedics, sports medicine, musculoskeletal, trauma, traumatology, osteoarthritis, osteoporosis, cartilage, bone, hand, shoulder, knee, hip, foot, wound." Twenty-one journals on the DOAJ site occurred overlapping with keywords. Researchers and clinicians in the field of orthopaedics are advised to use all available tools in order to recognize predatory practices and avoid publishing in predatory journals.

Logically, and by most common standards, academics would be pleased to be cited, considering it a form of recognition of their intellect. In return, especially those with high citation counts, such as Clarivate Analytics' Highly Cited Researchers, can benefit through peer recognition, rewards, funding, securing a better position, or expanding a collaborative network. Despite known and untold benefits, one issue has not been discussed: the right to refuse to be cited or the right to refuse a citation. Academics might not want to be cited by papers published in truly predatory journals, papers with false authors, or sting papers with falsified elements that employ underhanded ethical tactics. Currently, academics generally have the freedom to select where they publish their findings and choose studies they cite, so it is highly probable that requests to remove citations or refuse citations might never become formal publishing policy. Nonetheless, this academic discussion is worth having as valid and invalid literature increasingly gets mixed through citations, and as the grey zone between predatory/non-predatory and scholarly/unscholarly becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish.

Knowledge production is an important factor in establishing the geopolitical position of countries. In the recent heated discussion on predatory publishing, the geopolitical dimension of this topic is often ignored or treated superficially. In this paper, we introduce the term “mislocated centres of scholarly communication” to help better understand the emergence of predatory journals, and journals that bear similarities to them, in geopolitical peripheries. Mislocated centers of scholarly communication are perceived in the peripheries as legitimized by the center but are in fact invisible or illegitimate in the center. Thus, we argue the importance of viewing these mislocated centers as the result of unequal power relations in academia. To support our argument, we summarize the research on the topic of predatory publishing and demonstrate that predatory journals are a geopolitical problem because the geopolitical peripheries of science are much more often harmed by them than the center. Unlike predatory journals, mislocated centers of scholarly communication are not necessarily fraudulent but rather they are geopolitical roles imposed on some journals by a dynamic between center and peripheries. Our approach could help to criticize this system without discriminating against peripheral scholars or journals.

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This article explores the application of corpus linguistics methods in dealing with an underexplored area concerning predatory publishing, with a focus on lexical bundles and formulaicity. Using a comparative approach, the study employs two corpora of more than 1,6 million words, consisting of 220 research articles drawn from two comparable journals in the field of political science, one predatory and one top-ranking. The results show that writers publishing in the top-ranking journal use a more limited range of lexical bundles with a higher frequency, giving further evidence for the highly formulaic nature of the genre. The two groups of writers also display different preferences for lexical bundles with particular functions and/or forms. While the top-ranking journal articles feature more disciplinary-specific bundles with noticeable variation across the main sections of the research article, the predatory journal articles highlight in particular a set of common-core lexical bundles typical of general academic language use. Our findings also demonstrate the potential of lexical bundles in revealing the amount of scientific information research articles contain as well as the level of scientific literacy of the authors.

Background: Predatory publishing poses a fundamental threat to the development of nursing knowledge. Previous research has suggested that authors of papers published in predatory journals are mainly inexperienced researchers from low- and middle-income countries. Less attention has been paid to contributors from high-income countries. Aim: To describe the prevalence and characteristics of Swedish authors publishing in predatory nursing journals. Design: Quantitative descriptive case study. Participants and research context: Descriptive statistics were used to analyse the academic positions and academic affiliations of the authors of 39 papers published in predatory nursing journals during 2018 and 2019. Predatory nursing journals with Swedish contributors were identified by searching public listings of papers and applying a set of criteria. Journal site archives were used to identify additional papers with Swedish authors. Ethical considerations: This study was conducted in accordance with national regulations and ethical principles of research. Results: Almost two-thirds of Swedish authors publishing in predatory nursing journals hold senior academic positions. A small group of higher education institutions account for a majority of academic affiliations. Findings suggest that higher education institutions and experienced nursing researchers from Sweden make substantial contributions to predatory nursing journals, but that predatory publication habits might be concentrated in a limited number of academics and research milieus. A year-to-year comparison indicates that the prevalence of publishing in predatory journals might be diminishing. Discussion: Swedish nurse researchers help legitimize predatory journals, thus jeopardizing the trustworthiness of academic nursing knowledge. Substandard papers in predatory journals may pass as legitimate and be used to further academic careers. Experienced researchers are misleading junior colleagues, as joint publications might become embarrassments and liabilities. Conclusion: While the academic nursing community needs to address the problem of predatory publishing, there is some hope that educational efforts might have an effect on combating predatory publishing in nursing.

The predatory nature of a journal is in constant debate because it depends on multiple factors, which keep evolving. The classification of a journal as being predatory, or not, is no longer exclusively associated with its open access status, by inclusion or exclusion on perceived reputable academic indexes and/or on whitelists or blacklists. Inclusion in the latter may itself be determined by a host of criteria, may be riddled with type I errors (e.g., erroneous inclusion of a truly predatory journal in a whitelist) and/or type II errors (e.g., erroneous exclusion of a truly valid scholarly journal in a whitelist). While extreme cases of predatory publishing behavior may be clear cut, with true predatory journals displaying ample predatory properties, journals in non-binary grey zones of predatory criteria are difficult to classify. They may have some legitimate properties, but also some illegitimate ones. In such cases, it might be too extreme to refer to such entities as “predatory”. Simply referring to them as “potentially predatory” or “borderline predatory” also does little justice to discern a predatory entity from an unscholarly, low-quality, unprofessional, or exploitative one. Faced with the limitations caused by this gradient of predatory dimensionality, this paper introduces a novel credit-like rating system, based in part on well-known financial credit ratings companies used to assess investment risk and creditworthiness, to assess journal or publisher quality. Cognizant of the weaknesses and criticisms of these rating systems, we suggest their use as a new way to view the scholarly nature of a journal or publisher. When used as a tool to supplement, replace, or reinforce current sets of criteria used for whitelists and blacklists, this system may provide a fresh perspective to gain a better understanding of predatory publishing behavior. Our tool does not propose to offer a definitive solution to this problem.

The fraudulent behaviour of predatory journals/conferences through E-mail solicitations and author's perspective in unknowingly becoming victims of predatory publishing scheme, by being unaware of the fact that the journals in which they are involved are possibly predatory are highlighted here.

INTRODUCTION This study reflects a mid-size university library’s first attempt to assess faculty research output to shape future scholarly communications efforts. METHODOLOGY The assessment combined a qualitative analysis of the university’s reappointment, promotion, and tenure (RPT) documents with a quantitative analysis of faculty publications recorded in Digital Measures from 2015-2019. The RPT documents were coded to determine which indicators of scholarly value were emphasized, then compared with data on where and how faculty were publishing. RESULTS Within RPT documents, peer review was frequently emphasized, but open access and predatory publishing were not mentioned. The majority of publications occurred in hybrid journals, and publishing was concentrated among only a handful of publishers, with 11 publishers responsible for 62% of faculty’s research output. OA journal publications have risen slightly in recent years but still accounted for only 20.7% of UCCS publications. However, predatory publishing was very low, accounting for less than 5% of UCCS publications. DISCUSSION More education is needed on the importance of open access and how to assess the quality of a journal. RPT criteria consistently mentioned certain indicators of scholarly quality, but these indicators were often vague and preferential to traditional publishing models. Both open access and predatory publishing remain low, and additional education may help faculty feel more confident in exploring alternative publishing models. CONCLUSION Assessing the research output of faculty and how scholarship is being evaluated within each college can help libraries to tailor their efforts to promote open access publishing. However, the lack of OA support in the RPT criteria suggests a larger cultural shift is needed to make faculty not only aware of OA, but also encouraged and supported in publishing OA.

The open access (OA) publishing, where a reader- pays economy has been replaced by an author-pays model, began at the end of the 20th century. This movement arose as an attempt to avoid excessive costs and copyright transfer agreements inherent to the subscription model.

This article systematically reviews recent empirical research on the factors shaping academics' knowledge about, and motivations to publish work in, so‐called ‘predatory’ journals. Growing scholarly evidence suggests that the concept of ‘predatory’ publishing’ – used to describe deceptive journals exploiting vulnerable researchers – is inadequate for understanding the complex range of institutional and contextual factors that shape the publication decisions of individual academics. This review identifies relevant empirical studies on academics who have published in ‘predatory’ journals, and carries out a detailed comparison of 16 papers that meet the inclusion criteria. While most start from Beall's framing of ‘predatory’ publishing, their empirical findings move the debate beyond normative assumptions about academic vulnerability. They offer particular insights into the academic pressures on scholars at the periphery of a global research economy. This systematic review shows the value of a holistic approach to studying individual publishing decisions within specific institutional, economic and political contexts. Rather than assume that scholars publishing in ‘questionable’ journals are naïve, gullible or lacking in understanding, fine‐grained empirical research provides a more nuanced conceptualization of the pressures and incentives shaping their decisions. The review suggests areas for further research, especially in emerging research systems in the global South.