Predatory journals in applied linguistics: The who, the what, and the why

Predatory journals are a cause for concern in academia, and authors who publish in predatory journals are stigmatised. Yet, 20% of all research articles are still published in predatory journals. There has been little research, with most conducted in biomedicine, into this issue. This paper investigates why researchers choose to publish in predatory journals in applied linguistics through a bibliometric analysis of 200 articles and a survey of 15 authors. The bibliometric analysis shows that, although research topics are similar for articles in predatory and high-level journals, authors of articles in predatory journals are more likely to be located in the academic periphery in Asia and Africa. The survey showed that authors were not aware that their chosen journal was predatory, and several journals did not charge fees. Authors chose journals because of unsolicited requests for articles, recommendations from colleagues and fast turnaround times, but regretted their choice on learning the journal was predatory. The findings show that the black-and-white division of journals into predatory and non-predatory needs to be replaced by a more nuanced perspective, and that the dominant perception of predatory journals derived from the academic core needs to be adapted for contexts in the academic periphery.