3.1 Introduction

Contributing to scholarly communication is a requirement for many members of the medical and academic fields. This expectation now extends to many professionals who have little experience with the scholarly publishing process. As Rowan Murray predicted in the text Writing for Academic Journals, “the pressure on academics to publish in journals increases year by year. In addition, as more institutions are granted university status, and new disciplines join higher education, there is an urgent need for support in this area” (Murray, 2005). An informationist's involvement often begins at the literature search. Owing to the nature of our profession, we are often best suited to help a researcher take the analysis that goes into a research project, and help them present this to peers and advance their careers. Therefore, it is important for informationists to be well versed in the ins-and-outs of publishing, as the lifecycle of a researcher's literature search might end in publication.

3.2 Pre-pre-publishing: Getting started

Before the pre-publishing process can begin, there are several questions the informationist should ask the researcher. Nailing down the following will determine which direction the researcher should take, or whether or not they should pursue publication at all.

3.3 Pre-publishing: Choosing the right journal

A major part of assisting a researcher in getting their work published is determining where to do so. As, ethically, a researcher can only submit an article to one journal at a given time, it is important to choose one that is appropriate. Remind the researcher that simultaneous submission is considered unethical. If an article is rejected by a journal, they can, and should, revise and resubmit it elsewhere, but they must receive a rejection notification first. Bhandarkar (2013) outlines a list of dos and don'ts for authors to avoid misconduct:

1. 1. Never submit the same manuscript to more than one journal simultaneously.
2. 2. If a manuscript that is under peer review of one journal is to be submitted to another journal:
   1. a. Inform the coauthors and get their written consent.
   2. b. Write to the Editor of the first journal, asking that the paper be withdrawn.
   3. c. Get a formal communication from the Editor of the first journal that the article has been withdrawn from peer review process.
   4. d. If such a communication is not received, do not submit the manuscript to another journal.
   5. e. Preserve this communication and submit it to the second journal at the time of submission (Bhandarkar, 2013).

Here are a few steps to help them vet the many options, ideally coming up with a list of three target journals. Remind the researchers that these criteria should be looked at collectively in order to get a complete picture.

1. 1. Search to see where similar papers have been published. What some authors fail to realize is that they have already developed a list of potential journals by the time they have finished the manuscript—their bibliography. Chances are there will be several articles published in the same journals, providing a good place to start investigating.
2. 2. Do you read it/trust it? Do your colleagues? A researcher wants their article to make the most impact possible, so the more widely read/known the journal, the better. If the author or their colleagues have never heard of a journal, there is a chance it might be producing less-than-quality content. Firsthand experience with a particular journal is invaluable, so it helps to have the researcher talk to other authors who have published in a particular journal. Trustworthiness can also be evaluated through author/editor credentials. Have the researcher check out the editorial board. A journal’s editors should ideally be known, international experts in the field. Having an international board helps to reduce bias, and can help to recognize the best research from all over the world.
3. 3. Who is the publisher/sponsor? Is it a society journal? A recognizable publisher name or society is a good indicator that a journal is trustworthy. Since there is money to be made in publishing, many predatory journals have cropped up, scamming authors with high publishing fees. These are strictly for-profit operations, wherein published papers do not undergo any peer review or quality control, despite being advertised as such.
4. 4. Longevity—How many volumes has the journal published? Longer running journals can typically be considered more trustworthy than journals with shorter runs. If a journal has been around for a while, it is usually for good reason.
5. 5. Impact factor of journals in the field. Many researchers will look at the impact factor and make a decision based on this metric alone. This is ill-advised and the informationist should let the author know that impact factor should only be one part of the whole when deciding where to publish. Impact factors were designed with the idea of managing library journal collections, as they were deemed helpful in “determining the optimum makeup of both special and general collections”(Garfield, 1972). As Pirmez et al. point out, “things can get more complicated when this metric is deployed to measure and define what is beyond its natural limits” (Pirmez et al., 2016).
6. 6. Where is the journal indexed? Have the author take a look at visibility/reach. In which databases is it available—MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, etc.? Explain that if an author wants their article to get the best possible exposure for maximum readership, then a widely indexed journal is an important factor.
7. 7. Is the journal open access? If a journal is open access, it means that the content is freely accessible for readers, without subscription costs or paywalls. Often times, funding bodies will have open access requirements that accompany their grants. It is important for the researcher to know their open access obligations before choosing a journal.
   Remind the author that just because an open access journal means there are no fees for the reader, this does not mean that there are no fees for them. Often times, publishing in an open access journal will be contingent upon APCs or Article Processing Costs/Charges. These can be anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars, and vary from journal to journal. Sometimes these fees are covered by research grants. Some institutions will also have APC reimbursement funds, so it is important for informationist to be familiar with the options available at their institution.
8. 8. What is the journal’s acceptance rate? Time to publication. This will help authors get an idea of what they are in for once they have submitted an article for publication. First time authors are often unaware of how long the process can take, even just to get a rejection letter.

Other than information provided on the journal’s homepage, there are several tools an informationist can point authors to in order to answer these questions. Table 3.3 can be used as a guide.

3.5 Case study: Republishing

One early morning a discouraged psychiatrist, in a last ditch effort, visited the library asking to speak to a librarian. He explained that he and his colleague had submitted a literature review to a journal and the reviewers determined extensive edits would be required if the manuscript was to be accepted for publication. The authors were required to make these substantive edits within 2 weeks. A consultation was immediately arranged with a Scholarly Communications Informationist. The lead author shared the reviewer’s ratings and comments and met with the informationist to discuss the next steps. The reviewer’s major criticisms were that the methods were inadequate in describing the literature review and the results were not clearly presented and lacking references.

During the first consultation, the informationist also learned that

• ● a bibliographic management tool had not been used
• ● the search terms and databases were recorded but not reported
• ● the citations and in-text formatting did not conform to the instruction to authors
• ● the authors had not considered backup journals to publish their work
• ● the authors had not took full advantage of submitting keywords to describe their paper—submitting just four when the journal allowed up to ten
• ● the authors did not know where the journal was indexed

In this particular case, the client was very motivated to get a publication. As a result, the author shared the submitted manuscript for the informationist to review. The informationist was able to quickly set up an additional consultation to guide the author on database searching, search strategy documentation, and the use of bibliographic management tools, specifically EndNote. Including the databases selected and the search strategies greatly improved the clarity of the research methods. In addition, the authors added a table describing all the studies that were relevant to their overall findings. The expanded search, which included controlled vocabulary and text words, increased the number of citations included in the literature review. By using EndNote the authors were able to quickly import database results and ensure their citations and in-text formatting correctly conformed to the journal's specifications.

To ensure discoverability of the paper, the informationist tracked where the journal was indexed and supplemented the authors’ list of keywords with controlled vocabulary from select indexing databases. The databases chosen were those that the authors routinely searched themselves and that their targeted audience most likely to use.

Using the manuscript's bibliography, PubsHub, JANE, Journal Citation Reports and Ulrich’s Web, the informationist provided a report of three backup journals for manuscript submission. The report included journal descriptions and scope, impact factor, indexing information, acceptance rate and time to publication, and links to instructions for authors.

The author’s resubmitted manuscript was accepted and additional training sessions were offered to the psychiatry faculty. Sessions included EndNote, preparing to publish and database searching.