There are many reasons why one would look for top journals in a specific subject area or research topic. Many researchers select the top journals to publish in to boost their publication portfolio. It is also useful to know what are the emerging research topics and discussions in the top journals in your research area.

Librarians have often received enquiries on how to locate top journals for a particular subject or research area. Here we will show how you can find top journals for a specific subject category, using Language and Linguistics as an example. You can apply the same steps for your own research area.

• Incites Journal Citation Reports (JCR)

• Scopus Journal Metrics

Information on research trends can help researchers and research administration to decide the direction of future research within an institution. Information such as which countries are doing most work in a research area, institutions that publish the most publications in a research area and also, growing and declining topics within a research area – can provide greater insights to help a researcher better plan his or her research. For the research administrator, information on research trends can be useful when planning for mid-term research strategies.

SciVal, a research analytical tool, has a module to let you study the research trends by analyzing the developments of a research area in terms of publication information, contributing institutions, funders, authors and countries. In addition, SciVal provides analysis on key phrases by identifying important concepts from publications within a research area. You can see which of these key phrases are growing or declining in research output over the last few years.

SciVal uses data from Scopus, a citation database that covers approx. 23,000 peer-reviewed scholarly publications in multi-disciplines.

Here is an example to show how to identify research trends in language & linguistics. The steps can be adapted to other subject areas.
 

Access SciVal and go to the “Trends” module. Under “Topics and Research Areas”, you may either select an existing Research Area suggested by SciVal, or define a new Research Area. After this, you will be able to explore the hot topics (key phrases). Switch to other tabs to see who are the key contributors, e.g. top authors, in that area.

There are many places where you can share your works, either through an institutional repository like PIRA (PolyU Institutional Research Archive), or a scholarly social media platform such as ResearchGate. Here are a few tips for you before you share your works online.
 

1. Choose the right version of manuscript to share

Publishers usually make distinctions between three primary versions of a manuscript: the Pre-Print, the Post-Print and the Published version. Pre-Print is the original manuscript the authors submitted to the journal. Post-Print, or "final accepted manuscript", is the version that has gone through the peer review, accepted by the journal, but not yet copy-edited. Published version is the final formatted version that can be seen on publisher's site. Most publishers DO NOT allow sharing the published version online. As an author, you will benefit from sharing the appropriate version of your work. You do not need to worry about the citations – they are always attributed to the published version of your work.

2. Upload full-text in PIRA, instead of a commercial site

PIRA (PolyU Institutional Research Archive) is the institutional repository of PolyU. Upload your works into PIRA makes your research works permanently archived. Your publications will also become more visible and discoverable through Google and Google Scholar since everyone can view your work without subscription paywall. The PIRA team will help you check and ensure that the appropriate version of the work is made available online at the right time in accordance to the publishers’ policy for self-archiving. PIRA accepts the deposit of Post-Print (or final accepted manuscript).

 

3. Send manuscript as soon as it is accepted - before you forget!

If you wish to share your works in PIRA, make sure to send over the manuscript as soon as the paper gets accepted. This is because many people will not be able to locate this version after the final published version is online.

Visit our guide to learn more about PIRA and how to deposit your works in PIRA. Contact us if you have any enquiries.