Evaluating the results of scientific research: The role and capabilities of journals of private universities

Abstract

At present, Russia is undergoing a transformation of approaches to the evaluation of both scientific activity in general and scientific journals. Over the past year, there have been significant changes in the role and importance of Russian journals in promoting national scientific knowledge, and, consequently, in approaches to their evaluation: the classification of journals included in the list of peer-reviewed scientific journals in which the main scientific results of dissertations for the degree of candidate of science, for the degree of doctor of science have to be published, (hereinafter referred to as the Higher Attestation Commission – HAC list), the development of an information resource – the “White List”. What approaches to the evaluation of scientific activity exist now in Russia and in the world? Is it necessary to seriously change something in the approaches to the evaluation of scientific activity that are being formed today, or is it sufficient just to change the sources of information, leaving the previously used principles as the basis? Can journals affiliated with private universities now be an effective tool for promoting scientific results? Within the study it was analyzed how different modern systems for evaluating scientific activity, the basis of which are journals – Science Index, the list of the Higher Attestation Commission, the “whitelist” of scientific journals – correlate with each other. Also scientific journals including those affiliated with private universities, were evaluated by comparing different groups of journals (journals with the calculated Science Index; journals of the first, second, third categories of the HAC list, Russian journals included in the Web of Science Core Collection, Scopus and Russian Science Citation Index, etc.) based on scientometric indicators. An insignificant interconnection between the considered systems for evaluating scientific activity currently functioning in Russia, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the indicated groups of journals, including those affiliated with private universities, their position in these systems for evaluating scientific publications, is revealed.