Occupational therapy and the journal citation reports: 10-year performance trajectories.

The purpose of this study was to document performance of occupational therapy journals on the metrics of the Journal Citation Reports (JCR), the annually appearing index used as a yardstick to assess the quality of scholarly publications. Outcomes for the field's two indexed journals, the American Journal of Occupational Therapy and OTJR: Occupation, Participation and Health, were assessed over a 10-year period (1996-2005) to determine their overall standing and patterns of change on each of the JCR's five metrics. The mean category ranking for the two journals was generally above the 50th percentile. However, they performed least adequately and evidenced a downward trend over time on the most widely used metric (the journal impact factor). Possible reasons underlying this latter result are explored, pressing implications of the overall findings for practice and research are discussed, and strategic steps toward ethically safeguarding the profession's viability are offered.