The Journal of Aging & Social Policy, published six times annually and based at UMass Boston since its inception in 1989, continues to see a high impact factor—which measures the average number of citations for articles and reviews published in a journal over two years. According to the Journal Citation Index (JCI), JASP’s impact factor was 5.1 in 2022, placing it 7th of 37 gerontology journals globally.

JASP ranks first of 38 gerontology journals according to Scopus’ CiteScore, which looks at citations across a broader range of article types over a four-year period. Scimago Journal Rank places Journal of Aging & Social Policy third of 41 gerontology journals.

The journal’s JCI ranking jumped from 2.3 in 2020 to a surprisingly high 7.1 in 2021, notes Edward Alan Miller, PhD, editor in chief of JASP and professor and chair, Department of Gerontology at UMass Boston. “We credited some of that big jump last year, in part, to our focus on COVID content (much of which was made available for downloading at no charge). Scoring a 5.1 impact factor this past year is still pretty amazing, considering that many of the other journals in the field are much more well established with a more general focus than JASP’s emphasis on policy .”

The number of submissions to JASP continues to mushroom, Miller says. “Population aging affects every sector of the economy, so the relevance of our content is increasing as awareness builds for the need to support current and future older adults through the development, implementation, and assessment public policy.” The demographic jump in aging adults is a global phenomenon, and the journal’s submissions are increasingly global. “We’re getting more submissions from Africa, where they are dealing with the implications of an aging population from a policy perspective as they work to build more infrastructure to support older adults.” Chinese researchers send in the second highest percentage of submissions next to U.S. researchers, Miller says, along with articles from many low- and middle-income countries.

The UMass Boston Department of Gerontology also produces Research on Aging, a peer-reviewed scientific journal edited by Jeffrey Burr, PhD, professor of gerontology. Published eight times a year, the interdisciplinary journal reflects the expanding role of research in the field of social gerontology.

Read August 2022 story, “Journal of Aging & Social Policy sees steep jump in impact ranking”