Open access journal content found in commercial full-text aggregation databases and journal citation reports

Abstract

Purpose: The aim of this paper is to conduct a study regarding the indexing of open access journals in three large, commercially available full-text aggregation databases and using Journal Citation Reports Metrics File to further explore the journals that were being indexed. Design/methodology/approach: Using publicly available database title lists produced by the full-text aggregation database publishers, titles and title metadata were analyzed and compared to data from the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) and Journal Citation Reports (JCR) metrics file in order to investigate the availability of open access (OA) scholarly journals. Subject Category Impact Factor Ranking Quartiles and Percentiles (SCIFRQs and SCIFRPs) were used as part of this investigation as indicators of the research significance of these OA journals. Findings: Results showed that very small percentages of open access journals were indexed in each of the full-text aggregators studied. A total of 7.9 percent of titles included in journal citation reports were OA journals. This study also reports the averaged SCIFRPs of OA journals for all subject areas with more than five journals included in JCR. The average SCIFRP for OA journals included in JCR was 34.49 percent and the averaged SCIFRP for all OA journals indexed by full-text aggregation databases being studied is 41.2 percent. This study points to large differences in the rate of indexing OA journals by different databases. Originality/value: Unlike past studies into the indexing of OA journals, this is not limited to selected subject areas and shows indications of the research prominence of OA journals with JCR derived data. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.