The researcher and publisher in the evaluation of scientific journals

Abstract

Evaluation of scientific journals in Spain and abroad is at the peak of attention. There are several journal evaluation systems but there are few relations among them. They cover quality indicators interesting for editors, researchers and evaluators but, how are these groups really affected? On the one hand, researchers from other areas are obliged to know some concepts and terms from Bibliometrics or Information Science. That makes it possible to develop a certain "users training" as well as releasing one of the aspects of Documentation. On the other hand, some researchers engaged with scientific journals as editors or members of the editorial or advisory board express their critical opinion related to some systems or indicators and from their discussions we obtain ideas to improve the evaluation systems. Finally, editors visit these information systems to see how they have been evaluated but are not sure to which system to pay attention. A general conclusion could be obtained: research about journal quality has impact: a social impact.