Journal quality: The problem of size.

Abstract

practices. That is, overall, 95% of employers would prefer to hire graduates of APA-approved programs, and this percentage is even higher for academic than for applied positions (95% and 87%, respectively). The percentages for actual hiring and preferred hiring for applied positions are identical (both 87%).At the present time little is known about who advertises jobs in the Monitor and who does not. It is possible that the positions advertised may be systematically biased toward a preference for graduates from APA-approved programs, thus accounting for our results. We suggest that future research focus on the APA-approved/ non-APA-approved variable as it relates to other means of obtaining employment (e.g., word of mouth, local newspaper advertisement, or specialinterest-group publications) from the perspective of both employers and job applicants.This research was completed while both authors were predoctoral interns at Malcolm Bliss Mental Health Center. The authors would like to express their appreciation to an anonymous reviewer for comments on a previous draft of this comment.

Evaluation of Social Work Journal Quality: Citation versus Reputation Approaches

“…Critics accuse such studies of lacking a theoretical foundation, of being biased toward larger journals, and of shifting attention away from more important issues (Korobkin, 1999;Meacham, 1984;Storandt, 1985). Nonetheless, "there seems to be an informal consensus on the order of journals to which submissions should be made so that the most demanding get them first and the least last" (Zuckerman, 1970, p. 249).…”

Meacham contra Meacham.

“…Meacham (October 1984) has clearly succumbed to the infectious wave of attempts sweeping through the pages of the American Psychologist in the past decade to evaluate the discipline of psychology through quantification, despite Looft’s (1971) arguments in the same journal against “the psychology of more,” against “equating value with countable things” (p. 564). This recent but increasingly prevalent quantification and ranking of psychologists (Endler, Rushton, & Roediger, 1978; Gibson, 1972; Wright, 1970), departments (Cox & Catt, 1977; Endler, et al, 1978), and journals (Koulack & Keselman, 1975; Rushton & Roediger, 1978) has led merely to further transformations of the numbers and subsequent disagreements as to appropriate methods for quantification (Buss & McDermott, 1976; Levin & Kratochwill, 1976; Perlman, 1980; Porter, 1978; Schaeffer & Sulyma, 1979).…”

“…At least two of the five texts sampled by Hogan and Hedgepeth (August 1983), whose letter was the basis for Meacham’s (1984) comment, include no chapters at all on adult development and aging. Hogan and Hedgepeth themselves acknowledged that the Journal of Gerontology was not cited in two of the texts.…”

Journal quality: Problems with definitions.

“…Meacham (October 1984) recommended that journal size be considered in determining estimates of journal quality for such purposes as “guiding decisions about tenure and promotion” (p. 1200). Such decisions are important and not to be taken lightly.…”