Re: ALPSP Research study on academic journal authors

From: Jim Till <till_at_UHNRES.UTORONTO.CA>
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2001 15:25:09 -0500

On Tue, 30 Jan 2001, Jim Till wrote:

> On Tue, 30 Jan 2001, Sally Morris wrote:
>
> > I have been asked whether the acceptance/rejection figures varied
> > significantly by subject area, so I have delved deeper into the figures to
> > analyse this. The provisional results are interesting (bear in mind,
> > though, that the samples for some subjects are very small)
> >
> > By and large, the arts and humanities journals (if I may call them that)
> > appear to be far fussier than those in the sciences, with a marked skew
> > towards a low percentage of acceptances. I attach a table for those who can
> > read it.

Oops! Initially, I didn't notice that Sally had attached a XLS file
containing a more detailed set of data!

A revised version of the table that I posted earlier today is:

For categories involving more than 10 journals:

Percent
acceptance....E&M...LS...M&C...M&VS...SS&E...Total

under 10.......0.....0....0.....1......1.......2
10-25..........0.....1....0....14.....10......25
25-50..........0....14....3....21......7......45
50-75..........6.....9....1....11......3......30
over 75........0.....5....0.....6......0......11

Total..........6....29....4....53.....21.....113


Again, I combined some of the acceptance rate categories, in order to
obtain multiple 2x2 tables (0-50% acceptance vs 50-100% acceptance), and
applied Fisher's Exact Test. I did two more comparisons:

M&VS (Medical and Veterinary Science) vs LS (Life Science): No
statistically-significant difference between acceptance rates (P=0.16).

M&VS (Medical and Veterinary Science) vs SS&E (Social Science and
Education): No statistically-significant difference between acceptance
rates (P=0.15).

So, the conclusions in my earlier message (and in Sally's) aren't
affected:

> Even when one takes into account that I did more than one comparison, it
> appears that, on the basis of these figures, SS&E journals do have a lower
> acceptance rate, and E&M journals a higher acceptance rate, than LS
> journals. So, these data do seem to be consistent with the results of the
> Zuckerman and Merton study (referred to in previous messages).

Jim Till
University of Toronto
Received on Wed Jan 03 2001 - 19:17:43 GMT