An Evaluation of the Neuroscience Journals in a Large Urban Public University

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to evaluate neuroscience scholarly journals in academic libraries and to identify the most important journals for academic study, teaching, and research. A Web-based survey of faculty members of the City University of New York participating in different neuroscience programs was carried out. As a result of this study, the list of 116 professional journals which academic neuroscience faculty used regularly for clinical/research information, teaching, and current awareness was compiled. The strength of this listing is that all journals are grouped in three separate use categories: for research, for teaching, and for current awareness. In addition, the ranked list of 43 most influential periodicals was generated. These results are of interest to collection development librarians, to better understand their users’ needs. Furthermore, this project might be of interest to academic faculty and scholars teaching and/or researching in the different areas of neuroscience.