Abstract
This study investigates the prevalence and characteristics of papers published in popular predatory journals by South African academics in economic and management sciences. Our aim is to raise awareness and to deepen understanding of the predatory publishing phenomenon. We collected 728 recent (2013 to mid-2016) articles with South African authors in five popular in the field journals classified as ‘potential, possible, or probable predatory’ according to Beall’s list. Our data shows that publishing in these predatory journals is widespread across authors and universities. However, the data also shows that most of the authors only published once in these journals, suggesting that they perhaps mistakenly perceived the journals as being legitimate research outlets. We found evidence of low-quality publishing by the journals in our data, consistent with deficient peer review and copy editing processes. Thus, low-quality publishing was evident from spelling and grammar mistakes in the titles of articles, publishing the same paper twice in the same journal, so-called ‘salami slicing’, and the publishing of an article already published in another journal.
Highlights
The aim of this study is to report on the prevalence, during recent years, of publications in popular predatory journals by South African academics in economic and management sciences
Our results show that publication in predatory journals is widespread amongst South African economic and management sciences academics: we found 728 articles published in only five predatory journals over the three and a half years covered by our study
It was thought that the South African case would add to knowledge about the predatory publishing phenomenon
Summary
The aim of this study is to report on the prevalence, during recent years, of publications in popular predatory journals by South African academics in economic and management sciences. We wish to raise awareness of predatory publishing in this local context and deepen understanding of the phenomenon. Our data shows that the problem of publications in predatory journals is serious. The data suggests that most of the authors may have been misled by the journals. In a twist of irony, that emphasises how aggressively predatory publishers are pursuing South African authors, an initial version of our paper was hijacked by a predatory journal.. A further contribution of our study is to provide detailed evidence of low-quality publishing by the five journals we covered In a twist of irony, that emphasises how aggressively predatory publishers are pursuing South African authors, an initial version of our paper was hijacked by a predatory journal. A further contribution of our study is to provide detailed evidence of low-quality publishing by the five journals we covered
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