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Library "Do-It-Yourself" (DIY)

I need to know if a journal is significant in my field

In every discipline there are journals that scholars consider highly influential. Journals are judged by various metrics, including some that assess the "impact" of published articles. These metrics usually look at the number of cited references made to papers published in a given journal.

Citation metrics have received some criticism because they are not a clear measure of quality. (For more details, see the Declaration on Research Assessment and the European Association of Science Editors Statement on Inappropriate Use of Impact Factors.) 

 

Journal Citation Reports 
FAU Libraries does not subscribe to Journal Citation Reports. You may find a journal's impact factor listed on its website. If you do a Google search for the journal, it may appear on its landing page, or it may be included a link to About, Journal Home, Overview, or similar areas of the journal. 

 

Eigenfactor

Eigenfactor looks at the impact of journals that cite each article. On their website, you can search for a specific journal, search by discipline (choose an ISI Category), or search by year. For more information on how they calculate the impact of journals, see their FAQs.

 

Q:   How can I find Journal Impact Factors for individual journals?

For major publishers, Journal Impact Factors can usually be found on the journal's homepage or publisher's site, if they are indexed in JCR (see example).

 

See the impact factor on a journal's landing page.

 

Alternatively, if you type in "[organization] journal impact factors" to Google with [organization] a learned society or publishing house, you should get their list. Often, this information can be found in the section "About the Journal." 

The Journal Impact Factors are copyright protected by Thomson Reuters. You may also want to consult the following for other measures of impact: 

Q: Is there an impact factor that calculates author productivity and impact?

Yes, an index that aims to calculate author productivity and impact is h-index. 
For more information, see our Scholarly Communications Program LibGuide.

For further information, see the Faculty LibGuide.