Which Structural Engineering Journal ?

Last week Thomson Reuters published 2014 journal citation report. So, I think it is interesting to compare structural engineering journals rankings.

Which Structural Engineering Journal ? this is a very important question specially for early career researchers. Usually for reviewers who evaluate project proposals publication list is important. Based on my own experience they check two parameters: JIF Quartile and Impact Factor.

What is JIF Quartile? Quartiles comes from descriptive statistics. The quartiles of a ranked set of data values are the three points that divide the data set into four equal groups. Q1 is defined as the middle number between the smallest number and the median of the data set. The second quartile Q2 is the median of the data. Q3 is the middle value between the median and the highest value of the data set. So, every year JIF Quatile “will be determined for each journal in each of its subject categories according to which quartile of the IF distribution the journal occupies for that subject category. To summarise: Q1 denotes the top 25% of the impact factor distribution, Q2 for middle-high position (between top 50% and top 25%), Q3 middle-low position (top 75% to top 50%), and Q4 the lowest position (bottom 25% of the impact factor distribution).”

Obviously in evaluations, the best mark is for journal that are in Q1 and then the lowest mark is for Q2 journals. They usually don’t count journals that are in Q3 and Q4.

Below table summarises information that published by Thomson Reuters including the JIF Quartile for structural engineering related journals. Thirteen journals are in Q1 and the lowest impact factor is 1.504 (Journal of Structural Engineering (ASCE)). However, the 5 year impact factor should also be counted to have better idea for submitting a paper. Twenty one journals are in Q2 and their impact factor is between 0.94-1.42. Eighteen journals are in Q3 with impact factor between 0.5-0.92. Finally, twenty journals are in Q4 with impact factor between 0.1-0.5.

It is always better to consider last year impact factor and for researchers in structural engineering filed the recommendation is to submit their papers to journals with impact factor above 1.0. Impact factor above 1.0 in Civil/Structural Engineering related journal means they are in Q1 or Q2.

Recently, Elsevier published the acceptance rate for journals which researchers should take it into account.

Take a look at below table and find the impact factor 2014, JIF Quartile and 5 year impact factor for structural engineering journals.