With more than 218,000 ASHA members, we know that no one’s 2021 was the same. Whether 2021 marked a new beginning, a return to “normal,” or simply a continuation of 2020, we hope you’ll stay tuned to the ASHA journals in 2022!
Thank You, And Welcome!
Whether you shared our articles on or offline or simply read articles from your favorite journal whenever you found the time, we thank you for turning to the ASHA journals. Don’t forget: Stay up to date with the journals via social media by following @ASHAJournals and @SIGPerspectives.
We’d also like to thank the more than 1,000 authors who chose to publish their research in the ASHA journals this year. We thank you for sharing your expertise with ASHA members around the world.
Last year, or any year, wouldn’t have been possible without hundreds of Editorial Board Members, ad hoc reviewers, editors, and our editors-in-chief (EICs). We greatly appreciate your dedication and diligence.
Finally, we’d like to specifically thank the hundreds of individuals on our editorial boards, whether they’re finishing a term, continuing their service, or just getting started. View the full list of our editorial boards. Below, you can learn more about our incoming EICs and celebrate the accomplishments and contributions of our outgoing EICs. Continuing and outgoing EICs also made an impact by selecting the award-winning articles for the 2021 ASHA Journals Awards.
By the Numbers
Across our five ASHA journals, we published more than 900 articles—an increase for the fourth year in a row. In 2021, we saw continued research into timely and important issues, including diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), telepractice, and of course, COVID-19.
Once again, more than 2 million people read articles in the ASHA journals. In fact, readership was up almost 14% over last year’s record numbers! With an exciting variety of special issues, forums, and articles already scheduled for 2022, we plan to keep our momentum going.
Authors (and their CVs!) will be happy to see the 5-year Impact Factor increase for four ASHA journals in 2021. AJSLP and LSHSS had the biggest increases, rising to 2.694 and 3.000, respectively. Most notably, these figures represent a jump of a whole number for LSHSS.
We’ve also increased access to supplementary figures, images, and more by publishing a record number of freely available and fully citable materials in the ASHA journals research repository on Figshare. More than 200 articles had associated Figshare files in 2021, and the 650 new Figshare files published this year represent an 87% increase over 2020.
Finally, the ASHA Journals continued their impressive presence on social media, with @ASHAJournals reaching 15,000 followers on Twitter! Between the @ASHAJournals and @SIGPerspectives accounts, our following grew by almost 20% in 2021, and our impressions grew by 40%.
Furthering our Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)
The ASHA Journals Program continues to take seriously its commitment to increasing DEI in communication sciences and disorders (CSD). Last year, we published DEI-themed forums in Perspectives and also in AJSLP, and the second part of the AJSLP forum is being published later this year.
With so many articles on the topic, it was only appropriate to make DEI the focus of our latest Special Collection. Here, curated articles and timely ASHA resources meet on one handy page.
Additional Developments
We made some big changes to AJSLP in 2021, with a larger editorial board and an expanded number of regular issues (six). With three special issues in 2021, we published a record nine issues of AJSLP in 2021, composed of 179 articles.
Speaking of special issues (and forums), we published 19 in 2021, including one from each ASHA journal. In addition to the forums on DEI (mentioned above), we tackled the latest topics in audiology and speech-language pathology and audiology such as rehabilitative audiology, autism, and motor speech. Be sure to stay tuned to the Context blog in 2022 for more coverage of every special issue and forum in the ASHA journals.
The Year Ahead
Unfortunately, none of us can predict what lies ahead. What we do know is that the ASHA journals thrive because of our contributors and our readers, and we’ll continue to strive to make the journals the best resource possible for evidence-based practice in CSD.
We hope you take opportunities during the year not only to learn more with the ASHA journals but also to find rest and respite where you can. With an impressive editorial board, dedicated contributors, hard-working staff, and loyal readers, we are looking forward to what 2022 has in store—and we hope you are, as well!
