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Journal Article Acceptance Rates
Introduction
Locating acceptance rates for individual journals or for specific disciplines can be difficult, yet is necessary information for promotion and tenure activities. Journals with lower article acceptance rates are frequently considered to be more prestigious and more “meritorious”.
The Libraries have a number of resources in the collection that may be useful to you. They are arranged alphabetically by broad subject in the Information by Subject section below. Many disciplines do not publish collated acceptance rates. Please see below for tips on finding acceptance rates for journals in these disciplines.
Some journals will include the acceptance rate in the “information for authors” area of the print journal or on the home pages for the journal.
Some societies will also publish acceptance rates for their journals on their home pages. A Google search www.google.com using the name of the journal or the name of the society will usually take you to the home page.
Occasionally, societies or other parties will publish acceptance rates for journals within a particular discipline. Again, a Google search may help find these. Useful keywords are “acceptance rates and biology” (replace biology with the name of the discipline you are interested in).
You can try contacting the editor of the journal to see if s/he will share the acceptance rate.
Journal Citation Reports provides “impact factors” for “core” journals in a number of disciplines. There is a tutorial available.
Accounting/Business/Economics/Finance
Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Accounting, 9th edition, 2004. Call Number: H91 C23. 1 copy located in the Willis Library General Reference Collection.
Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Economics & Finance, 9th edition, 2004. Call Number: H91 C24. 1 copy located in the Willis Library General Reference Collection.
Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Management, 9th edition, 2004. Call Number: HD28.C14. 1 copy located in the Willis Library General Reference Collection.
Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Marketing, 9th edition, 2004. Call Number: HD 28.C23. 1 copy located in the Willis Library General Reference Collection.
Mitenko, G. R., & Diamond, J. M. (1994). "Publication policies and practices of major finance journals: A survey of editors." Financial Practice & Education, 4(2), 88.
Business – Finance SCI-Bites ranks the Top 10 Finance Journals by impact. 2004. http://www.in-cites.com/research/2004/july_19_2004-1.html
From the European Economic Association, this paper provides rankings of academic journals and institutions in Economics. [pdf] http://www.sceco.umontreal.ca/divers/jeea2003.pdf
Communication
Iowa Guide: Scholarly Journals in Mass Communication and Related Fields, 10th edition, 2003. Lists acceptance rates as well as general publishing information. http://fmp2.its.uiowa.edu/iowaguide/indexpage.html
Education
Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Educational Curriculum and Methods. 2002. Call Number: Z286. E3 C322 2002 – 1 copy in Willis first floor Reference and 1 copy at UNT Dallas.
Cabell's Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Educational Psychology and Administration. 2002. Call Number: Z286. E3 C324 2002 – 1 copy in Willis first floor Reference and 1 copy at UNT Dallas.
Instructional Technology
Journals in the field of Instructional Technology hosted by Penn State/Galbraith/Bentley. No date. Includes some acceptance rates as well as publishing and contact information. http://designer.50g.com/journals.htm
Multi-disciplinary
Reference Guide of Professional Journals/Publications (Ohio State University Extension). Lists selected publications with information about publication guidelines, including article acceptance rates. Has sections for Agriculture, Behavioral Science, Community Development, Cognition, Communications, Creativity, Diversity, Evaluation, Extension/Agricultural Education, Family and Consumer Sciences, Food Science, Human Ecology, Human Resources, Leadership, Leisure, Psychology, Reading, Sociology, Violence. http://www-bos.ag.ohio-state.edu/admin/publication.htm (link was not working as of August 1, 2007)
In-Cites by Thompson ISI. Links to some acceptance rates by
discipline, also includes “high impact” universities by discipline, and
“hot papers”. http://www.in-cites.com/research/2004/index.html
Political Science
Getting Published in Political Science Journals. 5th ed. 2001. Call Number: JA86 .M37 2001 1 copy available in the Willis Library General Reference Collection.
SCI-Bites ranks the Top 10 Political Science Journals by Impact Factor. 2003. http://www.in-cites.com/research/2003/june_16_2003-2.html
Psychology and Behavior Science
American Psychology Association journal acceptance rates are listed at http://www.apa.org/journals/statistics.html
Cabell's
Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Educational Psychology and
Administration 2002. Call Number: Z 286 E3 C32 2002-2003 1 copy in
Willis General Reference Collection.
Sociology and Social Work
A Compendium of Journals (published by the Family and Consumer Sciences Research Institute at Iowa State University) and hosted by the Iowa State University Family and Consumer Sciences Research:. Has sections for: Economics/finance, sociology, psychology, child development. (1999). http://ww2.hs.iastate.edu/rge/research/compendiumWEBpage.asp
Society Sites
American Psychological Association (APA). APA journal acceptance rates are listed at http://www.apa.org/journals/statistics.html
Association for the Advancement of Computers in Education's review policy is found at http://www.aace.org/reviewpolicy.htm and includes acceptance rates.
In-Cites by Thompson ISI. Links to some acceptance rates by discipline, also includes “high impact” universities by discipline, and “hot papers”. http://www.in-cites.com/research/2004/index.html
Association for Computing Machinery www.acm.org
* Communications of the ACM (CACM)
o Author Guidelines Acceptance Rate
* Crossroads, The ACM's Student Magazine (The ACM's First Electronic Publication)
o Author Guidelines Acceptance RateMeta-Sources
Acceptance Rates from Haworth Journals: http://www.haworthpress.com/faq/results.asp?category=Journals#11
PubList Directory of Periodicals Note: This provides information on journals such as publisher, journal URL, editor name (usually) but not acceptance rates. Free registration is required. www.publist.com
Serials Directory, available through UNT’s Electronic Resources page, provides journal information including whether the journal is available at UNT and publisher contact information.
Bibliography
Acceptance/Rejection Rates hosted by Auburn University http://www.lib.auburn.edu/socsci/rejecrates.htm
Who Publishes What?: A Guide to Publishing Opportunities in Magazines and Journals created by Nancy McClements from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. http://memorial.library.wisc.edu/whopubs.htm