Latin American electronic journals: its visibility through databases

Abstract

An assessment of the impact of Latin American electronic journals included in international databases is offered, with the aim of evaluating the performance of these journals in the international literature. The Latin American journals selected are analyzed and preserved in the Latin American Journal Collection (Hemeroteca Latinoamericana) of the General Libraries Directorate of the National University of Mexico (UNAM); are available on line and included in two databases, namely PERIODICA and CLASE, were used for this work. The journal titles were searched in the most important international databases of each discipline with the aim of detect their presence in this databases their coverage and actual status. The obtained data were analyzed and interpreted. A diagnosis on the performance of these journals at an international level was realized. Finally, these journals were searched in the Journal Citation Report, just to know their impact factor. Results showed that the Latin American journals are not included in the most important international databases, and also that the most developed countries have a higher presence in these databases, and that the most outstanding discipline is biomedicine.