A journal, conference, or book publisher asks experts in the field to conduct a preliminary assessment of the scientific publishability of manuscripts submitted for publication. The process evaluates, among other things, the comprehensiveness of the material, mastery of the theoretical framework, and the reliability and accuracy of the research implementation.
The reviewers (referees) are independent in relation to the manuscript being evaluated.
The review can be conducted either anonymously or openly.
Checking or using the scholarly nature (scholarly journals, academic journals) or peer review status of international journals as a search filter:
You can verify whether a Finnish journal is scholarly or peer-reviewed by searching for the journal name in the JUFO portal.
All journals included in Journal.fi are Finnish scholarly publications.
In LUC-Finna, you can limit your search to these journals by selecting Journal.fi as the collection.
When evaluating books and edited volumes, pay attention to the author’s background and the publisher.
University presses are generally considered more reputable publishers of scholarly literature than commercial publishers. Reliable publishers are listed in the JUFO portal.
A scholarly book always includes a reference list.
Doctoral dissertations are reviewed during the preliminary examination and the public defense, so they can be used as sources. The component publications of dissertations (article-based or compilation dissertations) are published in peer-reviewed journals.
The JUFO portal is a service you can use to check whether a journal is scholarly (peer-reviewed) or whether a book publisher is reliable.
Julkaisufoorumi (JUFO) is a Finnish classification system that supports the quality assessment of scholarly publishing. The classification includes journals, book series, conferences, and book publishers.
You can search the Julkaisufoorumi database without logging in. However, note that not all journals and book publishers are included in the JUFO portal.
Only scholarly, peer-reviewed publications can receive JUFO Level 1, 2, or 3.
JUFO Portal:
Type the journal name in the search box. If the journal is classified as Level 1, 2, or 3, it is scholarly.
accounting review → The Accounting Reviewavain → Kirjallisuudentutkimuksen aikakauslehti Avain / AVAIN - Kirjallisuudentutkimuksen aikakauslehtimedia ja viestintä | media viestintä → Media & viestintä / Media ja viestintäYou cannot search using abbreviations, e.g.:
european journal of human genetics → European Journal of Human Genetics (EJHG)
Finnish Journals in Specific Disciplines
Level 0 includes various types of publication channels: professional magazines, questionable open access journals, university publication series, and unclassified publications.
The JUFO classification does not cover all possible scholarly publications, so if a journal is not found, it does not necessarily indicate poor quality—nor does Level 0 automatically mean low quality.
JUFO Portal:
Type the publisher’s name in the search box.
If the publisher is classified as Level 1, 2, or 3, it is considered reliable.
Additionally, check that the book meets the criteria for a scholarly publication, since a book publisher does not have to publish exclusively scholarly books to be included in the classification.
Since a publisher’s name may appear in different forms in a book, search using the beginning of the name or a proper name if it includes a person’s name, for example:
peter lang → Peter Lang International Academic Publishing Group, Peter Lang Publishing, Peter Lang
Finnish scholarly book series are classified in JUFO.
Books published by a Finnish publisher receive their level primarily based on the series, for example:
A few foreign book series are also included, for example:
If the book is not published in a series or the series is not listed in JUFO, the publisher’s classification is used.
The publisher must specialize in scholarly publishing, and for scholarly books, at least Level 1 criteria must be met (with some exceptions).