Figure 1.
Ranking of journals based solely on maximizing citations over different periods of time, T (i.e., maximizing C in eq. 1 over all possible submission strategies; probability of getting scooped, s = 0.001, time for revisions after each submission, tR = 30 days).
The time over which to accrue citations, T, changes the optimal submission ranking considerably.
Figure 2.
Ranking of journals, under a citation maximization framework, for different values of scooping probability, s (T = 10 years, tR = 30 days).
Figure 3.
3,200,000 different submission strategies (each grey dot) are evaluated in terms of expected number of citations (over 5 years) and number of submissions needed before acceptance (s = 0.002, tR = 30 days).
Highlighted are the top journals for citation-maximizing strategies that minimize resubmissions (efficiency frontier). Ecology Letters dominates the high expected number of citations area, while PLOS ONE is the clear optimal choice at intermediate citations.
Figure 4.
Expected number of citations (over 5 years) and time spent in review for 3,200,000 different submission strategies (s = 0.002, tR = 30 days).
Highlighted are the top journals for citation-maximizing strategies that minimize time spent in review.