VHB-Jourqual

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VHB-Jourqual is a magazine ranking of the Association of University Teachers for Business Administration (VHB), the umbrella organization of German university professors in the field of business administration .

VHB-Jourqual

The ranking is based on the evaluation of economically relevant journals by the members of the VHB. The first version of the ranking was developed in 2003 by marketing scientists Thorsten Hennig-Thurau , Gianfranco Walsh and Ulf Schrader; the ranking is currently available in version 2.1, which combines data from 2008 and 2011 and is managed by Henrik Sattler in addition to Hennig-Thurau . The ranking makes a comparative assessment of international and German-language business journals with regard to their scientific quality. It is intended to provide scientists with an orientation for assessing the scientific quality of journal articles. a. Used to evaluate the scientific research performance of professors, junior professors, post-doctoral candidates and doctoral students in the field of business administration. Exemplary applications are university appointment procedures, professor salaries, cumulative habilitations and cumulative doctorates.

The ranking aims to take into account those journals that are relevant for German-speaking scientists in the field of business administration; this includes both international (and especially English-language) and German-language magazines. It is seen as one of the driving forces behind the internationality and research orientation of German business administration. The third edition of the ranking was published in February 2015 after several years of preparation.

method

In the first version of the ranking in 2003, 651 people (= 59% of the VHB members) rated 1,695 journals using a non-anonymized and individualized online questionnaire. The question was asked about the scientific level of the articles and the scientific requirements of the review process. The second version from 2008 is based on the no longer anonymous judgments of 1,011 scientists who rated 1,633 different journals. The ranking was expanded to include an additional 173 journals as part of an update survey in autumn 2010, in which 848 association members took part. This survey was also not anonymized in order to prevent possible strategic behavior by the respondents. In December 2014 and January 2015, 1,101 scientists took part in the JOURQUAL3 survey, giving a total of 64,113 ratings from 934 journals; these journals had previously been selected in a multi-stage process with the participation of the association members and committee chairmen.

In the first two issues, the rating of a journal was determined as the weighted mean value of the perceived quality of the articles in a journal and the quality of the review process of the journal ( VHB Jourqual index value ); both values ​​were queried on a 10-point scale. The weighting took into account not only the number of people who have experience with the review process of a journal, but also the expertise of the evaluators, measured by the number of journals in which an evaluator has published and the number of his publications in top journals and in international journals . In JOURQUAL3, the separation of article and review quality was abandoned and only an overall judgment was made that reflects the perception of the “scientific quality” of a journal in the German-speaking scientific community. The scientific quality is now defined as the extent "to which the journal in question advances business administration as a scientific discipline" and is intended to integrate the various information and experiences of scientists with a journal. The rating now corresponds to the median of a 5-point scale, ranging from A + (= "Outstanding, world-leading scientific journal in the field of business administration or its sub-disciplines") to D (= "Scientific journal in the field of business administration or its sub-disciplines") ") enough.

In order to be included in the magazine ranking, a magazine had to receive at least 10 ratings from VHB members for the first two editions of JOURQUAL; 385 journals met this requirement in the first version and 742 journals in the second version, 655 of which were classified as business journals. In version 2.1 the ranking included 839 journals. Journals that did not essentially represent business studies journals were included as “business studies relevant” if at least 5 people had additional experience with the review process. Only those journals were included in the third edition of the ranking that were rated by at least 25 respondents; this applied to 651 journals.

The test-retest reliability of the ranking was checked in the first version using a sample of 40 evaluators. The convergence validity with other journal rankings resulted in rank correlations between 0.29 and 0.81. The results of the second version show correlations of 0.89 with the first version and 0.57 with the Social Citation Impact Factor .

criticism

Like other scientific rankings, the VHB-Jourqual is also exposed to criticism: Common points of criticism are, for example, that such rankings are set up and dominated by a white, male majority and that the social impact of the publications is not recorded. In connection with this, critics argue that journal rankings are inherent in conservatism, discrimination and the hostility to innovation, which hinders the internationalization as well as the qualitative and critical realignment of research. This would also apply to the award of research funds, for example by the DFG, if reviewers refer to the VHB-JOURQUAL in order to assess the alleged competence of the applicant and thus underestimate applicants who have previously been based on internationally recognized rankings and conduct critical and interdisciplinary research that would have been eligible for selection according to other rankings. The same bias is argued for the replacement of professorships.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ U. Schrader, T. Hennig-Thurau: VHB-JOURQUAL2. Planning status and results of the preliminary survey. Presentation at the VHB annual conference in Paderborn on June 2, 2007.
  2. ↑ Christian Homburg: Internationality, practical relevance, cutting-edge research: German universities facing conflicting goals? In: Technische Universität Bergakademie Freiberg (Hrsg.): Future of German Universities: Standpoints and Perspectives. Wiesbaden, Gabler 2008, pp. 31-60.
  3. ↑ http://www.bwl2011.de/index.php?id=57 73rd Annual Scientific Meeting of the Association of University Lecturers for Business Administration
  4. ↑ Changes to VHB-JOURQUAL2.
  5. ↑ a b T. Hennig-Thurau, G. Walsh, U. Schrader: VHB-JOURQUAL: A ranking of economically relevant journals based on expert judgments. In: Journal for Business Research. 56th vol., H. 9, 2004, pp. 520-545.
  6. ↑ a b c d U. Schrader, T. Hennig-Thurau: VHB-JOURQUAL2: Method, Results, and Implications of the German Academic Association for Business Research's Journal Ranking. (PDF; 1.5 MB). In: BuR - Business Research Journal. Vol. 2, No. 2 2009, pp. 180-204. ( business-research.org ( Memento from March 27, 2014 in the Internet Archive ))
  7. ↑ http://vhbonline.org/service/jourqual/ Website of the Association of University Lecturers for Business Administration eV on JOURQUAL.
  8. ^ MA Özbilgin: From Journal Rankings to Making Sense of the World. In: Academy of Management Learning and Education. Volume 8, No. 1, 2009, pp. 1-9.
  9. ↑ NJ Adler, AW Harzing: When Knowledge Wins: Transcending the Sense of nonsense and of Academic rankings. In: Academy of Management Learning and Education. Volume 8, No. 1, 2009, pp. 72-95.
  10. ^ J. Mingers, H. Willmott: Taylorizing Business School Research: On the 'One Best Way'. In: Performative Effects of Journal Ranking Lists, Human Relations. Volume 66, No. 8, 2013, pp. 1051-1073.

literature

  • NJ Adler, AW Harzing: When Knowledge Wins: Transcending the Sense of and Nonsense of Academic Rankings. In: Academy of Management Learning and Education. Volume 8, No. 1, 2009, pp. 72-95.
  • H. Dyckhoff, C. Schmitz: Research performance measurement using SSCI and SCI-X? International visibility and perception of German business administration from 1990 to 2004. In: Die Betriebswirtschaft. 67th vol., H. 6, 2007, pp. 640-664.
  • M. Fiedler, I. Welpe, A. Picot: Terra Incognita - Research Services and Qualification Paths for Young German-Speaking University Professors in Business Administration. In: Business Administration. 66th vol., H. 4, 2006, pp. 464-486.
  • M. Seiter, M. Stirzel: Measurement of research performance . State-of-the-art. In: Science Management. 11th vol., H. 3, 2005, pp. 25-29.

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