I am in a publications lead department. I am a first year and I have no publications this year - I had one in my undergraduate year... and I have just had a paper rejected this week..it was for a really good conference. I dont mind as the reviews are really useful. How many publications should you aim to have by the end of your phd?

I think it excellent that you can get something published in a Journal as an undergrad. That has to be pretty rare. Even on my MSc. none of us got anything published. That said joined up writing was an achievement for some of them. I have done the odd thing for the THES and the Guardian, but that's more mature studenty type stuff.

depends...if you wanna be an academic (in the humanities) i'd say three. don't worry about the rejection of your paper. incorporate the comments and submit it to another journal. i've always been keen on publishing. i have a few drafts of papers, but my supervisors always discourages me when i say am gonna publish. i was gonna publish in may then one of my supervisors said i shouldn publish for the sake of publishing. i should wait til i really know my field. trouble is.....i've read lots of journals and i can tell you for sure, that my work is a lot better than a lot of papers I have seen in some journals. am planning on publishing later this year - with or without my supervisor's approval. hopefully 2 to 3 papers and that's it, til am done.

oh, jojo well done! thre papers for humanities before PhD is great!
I guess, in sciences it is much easier to get publications before you finish PhD.
I am social sciences, 2nd year and got a publication in a good journal (from my MPhil), still wonder how I managed. No plans to publish more till the end of the PhD.

thanks Verdy.... did i say i'd published????? that must have been a mistake. lol. am hoping to get three in coz that's what the lecturers in my department said was required to rise above the other competitors for a academic post. they also emphasised on the importance of completing your phd in time. Mia...i find that academics in my field don't really lay a lot of emphasis on the type of journal you publish in. Most journals in my field are usually out on a monthly basis, so editors are often desperate for papers. So...looking at it that way, 3 isn't impossible. A friend of mine recently published a book after publishing 3 papers....and he's a first year!!! he doesn have a life tho - other than books. So i guess for the average person, 2 to 3 would be ok. With one, i wouldn't feel so confident about getting an academic job.

published a book?!?!?!?! Now i feel awful

he hadn't done any part of his thesis by the end of this term. he plans to do it in summer. that should be a bit comforting :).

even having three papers ready to publish is an achievement;))
A book in the first year? Wow, must be a wunderkid...

Mia, scientists would ALWAYS publish jointly with their supervisor, even if the research was 'just' the supervisor's idea and the student did all the work. I want to have three papers published, but so far have none...and I'm in my last year, so I'm hoping for lots of last minute results. I think ONE paper (in the sciences) per PhD is about the average, but there are people in my department who have published 11 papers - so sickening. That's theoretical work though (that makes it sound awful, but I'd admire them a lot more if they had published 11 experimental papers - I'm not even sure that wuold be possible).

thanks verdy...for lifting me up. lol.

My supervisor reckons 2 is the average number. It really varies. A number of people in my group have published quite a few short communications on their results (communications being usually two pages), whilst others have written much more comprehensive papers (quite long) hence they have less publications. Both are acceptable.

I wish I had just a mention on one paper, I wrote a communication for a professor-he said he was going to get some more results and is flaky so hasn't. I'm hoping I will get one for my second project.

Answer to your topic question- none.