A Fine Balance: How Authors Strategize Around Journal Submission

Publishing in peer-reviewed journals is essential for medical education researchers. Competition remains fierce for top journals, and authors are advised to consider impact factor (IF), audience, and alignment of focus. However, little is known about how authors balance these factors when making submission decisions. The authors aimed to explore decision making around journal choice.

Using constructivist grounded theory, the authors conducted and analyzed 27 semistructured phone interviews (August-November 2016) with medical education researchers. Participants were recruited from a larger study, and all had presented abstracts at medical education meetings in 2005 or 2006.

When deciding where to submit an article, participants weighed a journal's IF and prestige against other factors, such as a journal's vision and mission, finding the right audience, study-specific factors including perceived quality of the work, and the peer review process. The opportunity cost of aiming high and risking rejection was influenced by career stage and external pressures. Despite much higher IFs, clinical journals were viewed as less desirable for establishing legitimacy in the medical education field and were often targeted for less novel or rigorous work. Participants expressed dissatisfaction with peer review in general, citing overly critical and poorly informed reviewers.

Authors strategize around a particular article's submission by attempting to balance many interrelated factors. Their perceptions that high-IF clinical journals are viewed as less prestigious in this field can lead to publication strategies running counter to advice given to junior faculty. This has implications for mentorship and institutional leadership.