Evaluating Transportation Research Journal Quality Using the Author Affiliation Index

Previous research by Gorman and Kanet (2011) reports survey responses on transportation-related research journal quality. In addition to ranking research journal quality, respondents in that survey also provided their opinions regarding the quality of research institutions around the world. We evaluate the consistency of these two responses with the Author Affiliation Index (AAI), which evaluates journal quality by measuring the percentage of authors coming from top research institutions. We find that the AAI produces a journal ranking that is highly correlated with our opinion survey; that is, the best-rated research institutions publish more frequently in the bestrated journals. Based on these observations, we suggest the AAI is a low-cost alternative to opinion surveys and other means of journal quality evaluation