Identifying Writing Factors Influencing the Acceptance of Research Papers in English-Language Journals
محورهای موضوعی : Journal of Studies in Learning and Teaching English
Shahrzad Chahardahcherik
1
,
Mohammad Bavali
2
,
Leila Akbarpour
3
1 - Department of Foreign Languages, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran
2 - Department of Foreign Languages, Shiraz branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran
3 - Department of English Language, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran
کلید واژه: acceptance, rejection, validation, academic reviewers, editorial practice, revision, nonnative-English-speaker scientific writing,
چکیده مقاله :
The pressure on non-native Ph.D. scholars to publish their research in English journals has recently been enhanced. Existing academic literature highlights several factors influencing research paper acceptance within various specialized fields. This study aimed to understand the participants' past experiences in publishing in English journals in terms of revision requirements and outright rejection of papers through a quantitative-descriptive survey-based design. The study offered valuable insights that helped develop resources and support tailored to their training requirements. To elicit the students’ perceptions, 300 Iranian doctoral students from several subfields of the engineering discipline responded to the validated version of a questionnaire developed by Moreno (2011). Descriptive statistics including frequency and valid percentage as well as qualitative interpretations were employed for data analysis. The construct validity of the adapted questionnaire was assessed by confirmatory factor analysis with Amos 25. The results revealed that the outright rejection by journal editors had to do with not following the writing conventions expected by the journal and the supposed flaws in certain areas of the research such as design, method, and statistical tests. The students were required to revise the formal features of their writing as expected by the journal and alter the design and methods used before the final acceptance of papers. The most difficult sections of the paper were the Introduction, Correspondence with reviewers, Theoretical framework, and Methods. Most Iranian researchers confirmed their feeling of being disadvantaged in the publishing process.
The pressure on non-native Ph.D. scholars to publish their research in English journals has recently been enhanced. Existing academic literature highlights several factors influencing research paper acceptance within various specialized fields. This study aimed to understand the participants' past experiences in publishing in English journals in terms of revision requirements and outright rejection of papers through a quantitative-descriptive survey-based design. The study offered valuable insights that helped develop resources and support tailored to their training requirements. To elicit the students’ perceptions, 300 Iranian doctoral students from several subfields of the engineering discipline responded to the validated version of a questionnaire developed by Moreno (2011). Descriptive statistics including frequency and valid percentage as well as qualitative interpretations were employed for data analysis. The construct validity of the adapted questionnaire was assessed by confirmatory factor analysis with Amos 25. The results revealed that the outright rejection by journal editors had to do with not following the writing conventions expected by the journal and the supposed flaws in certain areas of the research such as design, method, and statistical tests. The students were required to revise the formal features of their writing as expected by the journal and alter the design and methods used before the final acceptance of papers. The most difficult sections of the paper were the Introduction, Correspondence with reviewers, Theoretical framework, and Methods. Most Iranian researchers confirmed their feeling of being disadvantaged in the publishing process.
Abdi, J., & Azizi, M. (2020). Language-related revisions in published articles written by non- native PhD students in applied linguistics discipline. International Journal of Practical and Pedagogical Issues in English Education, 5.
Ågerfalk, P. J. (2014). Insufficient theoretical contribution: A conclusive rationale for rejection? European Journal of Information Systems, 23(6), 593. DOI: 10.1057/ejis.2014.35
Akhondzadeh, S. (2013). Iranian science shows the world’s fastest growth: Ranks 17th in science production in 2012. Avicenna Journal of Medical Biotechnology, 5(3), 139.
Ammon, U. (2012). Linguistic inequality and its effects on participation in scientific discourse and on global knowledge accumulation: With a closer look at the problems of the second-rank language communities. Applied Linguistics Review, 3(2). DOI: 10.1515/applirev-2012-0016
Barrett, P. (2007). Structural equation modelling: Adjudging model fit. Personality and Individual Differences, 42(5), 815-824. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2006.09.018
Belcher, D. (2007). Seeking acceptance in an English-only research world. Journal of Second Language Writing, 16, 1-22.
Bentler, P. M. (1990). Comparative fit indexes in structural models. Psychological Bulletin, 107(2), 238-246. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.107.2.238
Bhatia, V. K. (2006). Discursive practices in disciplinary and professional contexts. Linguistics and the Human Sciences, 2 (1), 5-28.
Bitchener, J., & Basturkmen, H. (2006). Perceptions of the difficulties of postgraduate L2 thesis students writing the discussion section. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 5 (1), 4-18.
Byrne, D. (2000). Common reasons for rejecting manuscripts at medical journals: A survey of editors and peer reviewers. Science Editor, 23 (2).
Canagarajah, A. S. (1996). Nondiscursive requirements in academic publishing, material resources of periphery scholars, and the politics of knowledge production. Written Communication, 13(4), 435-72.
Dong, Y. R., (1998). Non-native graduate students’ thesis/dissertation writing in science: Self-reports by students and their advisors from two U.S. institutions. English for Specific Purposes, 17(4), 369–390.
El-Omar, E.M. (2014), How to publish a scientific manuscript in a high-impact journal.
Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aidm.2014.07.004
Ferguson, G., Perez-Llantada, C., & Plo, R. (2011). English as an international language of scientific publication: a study of attitudes. World Englishes, 30 (1), 41-59.
Flowerdew, J. (1999). Writing for scholarly publication in English: The case of Hong Kong. Journal of Second Language Writing, 8(2), 123–145.
Gea-Valor, M., Rey-Rocha, J., Moreno, A. I. (2014). Publishing research in the international context: An analysis of Spanish scholars’ academic writing needs in the social sciences. English for Specific Purposes, 36, 47-59.
Gholami, J., Zeinolabedini, M. (2017). Peer-to-peer prescriptions in medical sciences: Iranian field specialists’ attitudes toward convenience editing. English for Specific Purposes, 45, 86-97.
Gosden, H. (1996). Verbal reports of Japanese novices' research writing practices in English. Journal of Second Language Writing, 5(2), 109-128.
Griffiths, P., & Ian, N. (2016). Why was my paper rejected? Editors’ reflections on common issues that influence decisions to reject papers submitted for publication in academic nursing journals. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 5 (7), A1- A4 doi:10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2016.03.01.
Habibie, P. (2016). Writing for scholarly publication in a Canadian higher education context: A case study. In C. Badenhorst & C. Guerin (Eds.), Research literacies and writing pedagogies for masters and doctoral students (pp. 51–67). Leiden, NL: Brill.
Hanauer, D., & Englander, K. (2011). Quantifying the burden of writing research articles in a second language: Data from Mexican scientists’ written communication. SAGE, 28(4), 403-416. DOI: 10.1177/0741088311420056.
Hyland, K. (2009). English for professional academic purposes: Writing for scholarly publication. In D. D. Belcher (Ed.), English for specific purposes in theory and practice (pp. 83–105). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Hyland, K. (2016). Academic publishing and the myth of linguistic injustice. Journal of Second
Language Writing, 31, 58-69.
Kibret, B. (2015). Why are manuscripts unacceptable for publication? An analysis of Ethiopian Journal of Education (EJE) rejections. Educational Research and Reviews, 12(2), 83-93, DOI: 10.5897/ERR2013.1620.
Kline R. B. (2015). Principles and practice of structural equation modeling. New York, NY:
Guilford.
Krejcie, R.V., & Morgan, D.W., (1970). Determining sample size for research activities. Educational and Psychological Measurement.
Kourilova, M. (1996). Interactive function of language in peer reviews of medical papers written by NN users of English. UNESCO-ALSED LSP Newsletter, 19, 4-21.
Kwan, B. S. C. (2010). An investigation of instruction in research publishing in doctoral programs: The Hong Kong case. Higher Education, 59, 55-68.
Lane, T., & Tang, J. (2016). Publishing challenges faced by authors with English as a second language. European Science Editing, 42 (2).
Lillis, T., & Curry, M. J. (2006). Professional academic writing by multilingual scholars: Interactions with literacy brokers in the production of English-medium texts. Written communication, 23(1), 3-35. https://doi.org/10.1177/0741088305283754.
Lillis, T., & Curry, M. J. (2014). Academic writing in a global context: The politics and practices of publishing in English. London: Routledge. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1473-4192.2009.00233.x
López-Navarro, I., Moreno, A. I., Quintanilla, M. A., & Rey-Rocha, J. (2015). Why do I publish research articles in English instead of my own language? Differences in Spanish researchers’ motivations across scientific domains. Scientometrics, 103 (3), 939-976. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-015-1570-1.
Maniati, M., & Jalilifar, A. (2018). Strategies for publishing in English journals: A study of the perceptions of Iranian scholars. Whiley, 31 (4). https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.1186/
Martín, P., Rey-Rocha, J., Burgess, S., & Moreno, A. I. (2014). Publishing research in English-language journals: Attitudes, strategies and difficulties of multilingual scholars of medicine. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 16, 57-67
Martinez, R. (2017). “Especially in the last years…”: Evidence of ELF and non-native English forms in international journals. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 33, 40-52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jeap.2018.01.007
Matsuda, P. K., & Tardy, C. M. (2007). Voice in academic writing: The rhetorical construction of author identity in blind manuscript review. English for Specific Purposes, 26(2), 0-249. doi:10.1016/j.esp.2006.10.001
Moreno, A.I. (2011). Introduction to the Spanish team for the Intercultural studies of academic discourse (ENEIDA) project and research group. URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10612/1824
Moreno, A. I., Burgess, S., Sachdev, I., López-Navarro, I., & Rey-Rocha, J. (2011). The ENEIDA questionnaire: publication experiences in scientific journals in English and Spanish. Universidad de León, ENEIDA’s website. http://eneida.unileon.es/eneidaquestionnaire.php.
Moreno, A. I., Rey-Rocha, J., Burgess, S., López-Navarro, I., & Sachdev, I. (2012). Spanish researchers’ perceived difficulty writing research articles for the English- medium journals: The Impact of proficiency in English versus publication experience. Ibérica, 5 (24), 157-184.
Moreno, A.I. (2021). Selling research in RA discussion sections through English and Spanish: An intercultural rhetoric approach. English for Specific Purposes, 63, 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esp.2021.02.002
Moreno, A. I. (2022). To be, or not to be, self-critical? Writing discussion and/or closing sections in English and Spanish social science research articles. ESP Today, 102, 221–244. https://doi.org/10.18485/esptoday.2022.10.2.2
Mungra, P. & Webber, P. (2010). Peer review process in medical research publications: Language and content comments. English for Specific Purposes, 29, 43-53.
Mur Dueñas, P. (2012). Research published internationally in English: An ethnographic account of a team of finance Spanish scholars’ struggles. Ibérica, 24, 139-155.
Paltridge, B., & Starfield, S. (2016). Getting published in academic journals: Navigating the publication process. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Pennycook, A. (1994). The cultural politics of English as an international language. New York: Longman.
Pérez-Llantada, Carmen, Ramón Plo, and Gibson R. Ferguson. (2010). You don’t say what you know, only what you can’: The perceptions and practices of senior Spanish academics regarding research dissemination in English. English for Specific Purposes, 30 (1), 18-30.
Riazi, M., & Bahrami, A. (2009). Iranian scholars and scientific publication in English: Attitudes, problems, and strategies, TEFL, 3 (11-12), 33-59.
Rugg, G., & Petre, M. (2004). The unwritten rules of Ph.D. research. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Salager-Meyer, F. (2014). Writing and publishing in peripheral scholarly journals: How to enhance the global influence of multilingual scholars? Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 13, 78-82.
Shashok, K., & Handjani, F. (2010). Enhancing the quality of research publication: Author aid in the Eastern Mediterranean. Journal of Tehran University Heart Center, 5(4).
Sitompul, S., & Anditasari, A. W. (2022). Challenges in writing academic research: An Exploration of master’s students’ experiences. Getsempena English Education Journal, 9 (2), 136-148.
St John, M. J. (1987). Writing processes of Spanish scientists publishing in English. English for Specific Purposes, 6, 113-120.
Tardy, C. M. (2004). The role of English in scientific communication: Lingua franca or Tyrannosaurusrex? Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 3, 247-269.
Tharirian, M. H., & Sadri, E. (2013). Peer reviewers’ comments on research articles submitted by Iranian researchers. The Journal of Teaching Language Skills, 5(3), 107-123.
Thomas, G. (2013). How to do your research project. SAGE Publication Limited.
Thomson Reuters. (2012). Global publishing: Changes in submission trends and the impact on scholarly publishers
Ware, M., & Mabe, M. (2014). The STM report: An overview of scientific and scholarly publishing. Oxford: International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers.
Wellington, J. (2003). Getting published: A guide for lecturers and researchers. London: Taylor and Francis.
Westfall, P. H. (2014). Kurtosis as peakedness. The American Statistician, 68(3), 191-195.
