Matching authors and readers of scientific papers

Summary-A novel service is proposed to help authors of scientific papers to select journals to which to submit their manuscripts. The aim of the service is to optimize the common interests of authors, readers/users, and science, by providing the authors with a tool for reaching those readers who can most benefit from the news of their accomplishments. The five basic factors which intervene in the choice of a journal are analyzed: relevance, acceptance rate, circulation, prestige and publication lag. With the help of a mathematical model, we show how these five variables can be used in a plausible decision procedure leading to the selection of journals suitable for the publication of given papers. WHEN a scientist submits an article for publication, the choice of a suitable journal is often guided by self-interest. It helps the scientist's career if the results of his work are published in a journal representative of his discipline. It helps most if the journal is the most prestigious in the subject area, with the largest circulation, and with the shortest publication lag. If an author chooses wisely where to publish, this may also serve the interests of the potential readers of his papers. Their concern is to gain valuable information with the minimum possible delay. There is, therefore, a convergence of interests on the part of authors and readers that the proper audience for the reporting of scientific investigations be reached. The healthy growth of the scientific enterpriseand also of enterprises based on the utilization of knowledge-is dependent on the matching of these complementary interests. Some scientists find it difficult to select wisely the journals to which to submit their papers. Scientists who are just starting their careers, who do not have experienced colleagues to advise them, and who do not yet belong to any "invisible college", may experience difficulties. So may scientists who have just switched from one specialty to another, or people who work in interdisciplinary fields or in fields without a welldeveloped "paradigm". Almost any scientist, even the most experienced, has probably felt, at one time or another, that he had submitted some of his papers to the wrong journal or addressed it to the wrong audience. A good service to advise an author on how to reach the readers who can benefit most from news of his accomplishments would be helpful to him, to his potential readers, and to science. To justify such service, one should be able to show that it would fill a real, important and sizeable need, and that it would do as well or better than the advice offered by experienced professional colleagues. Some scientific foundation is required to design such a service with assurance that it will be helpful. Prior work on the sociology of publishing/I-3], on the psychology of authorship/4-5], and on the patterns of communication in a scientific community [6-12] provides the starting point of this study. The "Bradford law" [13-14] states