Helping doctoral students crack the publication code: An evaluation and content analysis of the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology

Abstract

Getting published in an academic journal is no easy feat, especially for doctoral students and English as a second language speakers, seeking to publish in English. Considering the relatively low acceptance rate for educational technology journals, this article seeks to provide guidance by following the framework of rigour, impact, and prestige (West & Rich, 2012) to evaluate the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology (AJET), as well as applying computer-assisted content analysis techniques in new and unique ways, in order to understand how AJET is furthering scholarship in the field. Findings reveal a strong focus on Asia-Pacific scholarship, with little representation from other continents. However, the editors are seeking to improve this, by providing regular advice in editorials for conducting rigorous research and hints on how to get published. Future research trends are identified, including teacher development, learning environments and cognition, and the role of feedback in student learning. In addition, recommendations to editors and doctoral students are provided.

Revisiting five decades of educational technology research: A content and authorship analysis of the British Journal of Educational Technology

“…Computer‐assisted content analysis has been found to be an appropriate method by which to map out a research domain (Fisk, Cherney, Hornsey, & Smith, ), whilst also reducing time and cost, and limiting human bias (Krippendorff, ). Analyses using this method within the field of educational technology have included that of Computers & Education (Zawacki‐Richter & Latchem, ), the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology (Bond, ; Bond & Buntins, ), the International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education ( Marín et al , ) and Edutec (Marín, Zawacki‐Richter, Pérez Garcías, & Salinas, ). However, computer‐assisted content analysis has also been used in the fields of psychology (eg, Cretchley, Rooney, & Gallois, ), business studies (eg, Liesch, Håkanson, McGaughey, Middleton, & Cretchley, ) and communication studies (eg, Lin & Lee, ).…”

An analysis of the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology 2013-2017

“…The continued high frequency of the keywords "foreign countries" within articles echoes the analysis by Hadlock et al (2014), and shows a sustained focus on publishing international research. There was, however, a slight drop in the percentage of articles, indicating that there has potentially been less international representation in AJET in the past 4 years, which will be explored in a forthcoming article (Bond, 2018), as it is beyond the scope of this paper.…”

“…Therefore, the results of this analysis should be viewed as one measure of AJET's quality. In order to triangulate this data, and to give a more rounded understanding of AJET's structure and editorial influence, the framework of rigour, impact and prestige (West & Rich, 2012) is used in a forthcoming article (Bond, 2018).…”

“…Interestingly, the h-index (Table 14), which considers both the quality and quantity of articles (Hirsch, 2005), places AJET above journals with a higher 5-year impact factor, such as Language Learning & Technology (2016 h-index = 29). This indicates that it is necessary to consult more than one citation metric when considering journal quality (West & Rich, 2012), which is further explored in an upcoming article (Bond, 2018). …”

“…This article has also only focused on two journal metrics, for comparative purposes, however this should not be considered as the only measure of a journal's quality (West & Rich, 2012), and therefore other measures will be further explored in a forthcoming article (Bond, 2018).…”