Estimating the financial value of scientific journals and APCs using visibility factors: A new methodological approach

Abstract

Not all scientific journals that offer open access publication charge the same Article Processing Charges (APC), even within the same publishing group. The hypothesis is that this variation is related to the journal's prestige and impact indicators, which reflect the value the journal provides to authors. This study examines the relationship between these indicators and proposes a method to estimate the APC that should correspond to each journal. Additionally, based on the estimated APC and the articles published over the past five years, a method is proposed to determine the value of a journal. Using these values, the relationship between the estimated APC and the published APC is analyzed, along with the distributions of estimated APCs and journal values. The average and cumulative values are also studied by publisher and by the most developed countries. Finally, a significant correlation is observed between the cumulative estimated journal values and the scientific output of countries.