Structural Factors and the Quality of Publication in Social Work Journals

Abstract

The publication standards and review practices of social work journals have been the subject of sporadic attention in the past quarter century. Existing studies have examined at least five aspects of journal publication including the (1) scholarly records of editorial board members (Lindsey, 1976; Pardeck, 1992; Pardeck & Meinert, 1999; Thyer & Polk, 1997); (2) quality and reliability of manuscript reviews (Epstein, 1990, 2004; Kirk & Franke, 1997); (3) assessment of confirmational response bias to determine if reviewers and editors are more likely to accept studies reporting positive outcomes than negative ones (Epstein, 1990, 2004); (4) impact of journals on the field (Lindsey & Kirk, 1992); and, (5) decision making and editorial practices used by journals (Thyer & Myers, 2003). Results from the aforementioned studies reveal modest scholarly records among many journal editorial board members, considerable levels of variation in the quality and reliability of manuscript reviews, mixed findings pertaining to the presence of conformational response bias, low impact scores for many journals, and perceived inefficiencies in review practices. In addition, these studies have been the subject of frequent and lively debate in the social work literature. Pardeck's (1992) findings, for example, yielded seven different responses from leading journal editors in a 1992 issue of Research on Social Work Practice. Calls for reform in scholarly journals have been made recently by active editors and board members of prominent social work publications. In 2005 alone the editors-in-chief of Social Work (Marsh, 2005) and the Journal of Social Work Education (Valentine, 2005) identified strategies to improve the efficiency and the transparency of their respective journal's manuscript review practices. The attention currently directed to the discussion of social work journal publications affords a unique opportunity to improve the professions core dissemination outlets. This issue of Social Work Research aims to further the current discussion of quality in social work journals by printing a statement attributed to a group of scholars attending the 2005 conference of the Society for Social Work and Research. The authors of this statement participated in a conference roundtable discussion of social work journal publication practices and quality. The resultant identifies key concerns and offers recommendations to improve the efficiency and quality of publications in social work. Among the group's major concerns are issues associated with the limited impact of social work journals, the poor quality of manuscript reviews, the slow pace of review and publication, and lack of leadership in journal publication. IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF JOURNAL PUBLICATION The problems and pursuant recommendations found in the Miami Statement should be seriously considered by the profession. Encouragingly, some of the recommendations outlined in the statement are being addressed by leading social work journals. Jeanne Marsh (2005), editor-in-chief of Social Work, recently identified specific strategies to improve journal publication that include increasing the number of article submissions from diverse fields and methods, using available evidence to improve the impact of journals, using technology to decrease the length of the manuscript review process, recruiting skilled reviewers, and reducing or eliminating academic fraud. She and colleagues at NASW Press have applied several of these strategies to successfully reduce a manuscript backlog and to decrease the length of time between an article's acceptance and publication in Social Work. Recommendations found in the and in Marsh (2005) provide proactive steps that, if implemented, hold great promise for improving the quality of social work journals. However, I believe that solutions to problems in journal publication also must attend to structural factors that contribute to the underlying causes of publication deficiencies. …