Journal of Media Ethics

Journal of Media Ethics is published by Taylor & Francis and is in Zone 4 of Philosophy in the CAS Journal Ranking (2025 upgraded edition). By OpenAlex counts of its recent articles, its largest topics are Media Studies and Communication, Public Relations and Crisis Communication and Social Media and Politics, together about 37.8% of its articles. Its main subfields are Communication. (generated from OpenAlex topic counts and CAS ranking data)

Aims and scopeJournal metrics Editorial board The Journal of Media Ethics publishes empirical studies and theoretical-philosophical essays on all matters pertaining to media ethics. The goal of the journal is to provide a forum for rigorous and theoretically informed analyses of issues relevant to the ethical conduct of media actors, whether at micro (e.g., individual, psychological, interpersonal), meso (e.g., organizational, communal), or macro (e.g., institutional, societal, international) levels. The journal takes an expansive view of “media,” incorporating not just the traditional media professions of journalism, advertising, and public relations, and so on, but any personal or professional context involving mediated communication that raises ethical questions. These contexts include, for example, social media platforms, artificial intelligence, mobile media, popular culture and entertainment media, documentary filmmaking, corporate communications, political campaigns, propaganda, health communication, virtual reality, and partisan media. The journal takes a similarly pluralistic approach to epistemology and methodology, maintaining that no single discipline, tradition, ethical perspective, or paradigm has a monopoly on well-conceived and illuminating work. What We Publish The Journal of Media Ethics publishes a variety of types of original research, reflecting its commitment to both humanistic and social scientific modes of inquiry. All submissions are expected to have a strong foundation in ethics theories and concepts and must offer a clear theoretical contribution that advances knowledge in media ethics. Published work generally falls into one of the below categories:
· Theoretical-philosophical research (i.e., “theoretical essays” that advance a theory-driven normative or philosophical argument).
· Quantitative empirical research (e.g., surveys, experiments, content analyses) that makes a theoretical contribution.
· Qualitative empirical research (e.g., observations/ethnographies, in-depth interviews, focus groups, textual analyses) that makes a theoretical contribution.
· Historical research that makes a theoretical contribution.
· Mixed- or multi-method empirical research (i.e., research that integrates two or more of the methods listed above) that makes a theoretical contribution. Research makes a theoretical contribution when it advances, refines, or challenges existing theory by developing new concepts, distinctions, relationships, or explan

From the journal's Aims & Scope

Research area (LetPub): Multiple

Editor-in-chief Ryan J. ThomasPublisher website

CAS Journal Ranking

JCR / CiteScore quartiles on the journal's website

• JCR Q2 · best quartile · 2025
• CiteScore Q1 · 2025

Publisher-reported: JCR figures are Clarivate's and CiteScore figures Scopus's to confirm; both are a different system from the CAS zones.Publisher website

Database indexing

SSCIScopusLetPub

International journal early-warning lists: not listed in any editionLetPub

Indexing the journal's website claims

Web of ScienceCurrent ContentsPublisher website

Other: ProQuest, OCLC, EBSCOhost, E-psyche, Social Sciences Index, OCLC Sociological Abstracts (Online), ProQuest online research databases

As the journal's website lists them, not checked against each database; for Web of Science editions the records above apply.

Editions, and major and minor categories, are shown separately and never merged into one zone; check which edition your institution uses before you submit or report.

Impact

Impact factor

1.44LetPub · 2026-09-13

Impact factor (publisher) 2025

1.5Publisher website · 2026-09-30

5-year impact factor (publisher) 2025

1.9Publisher website · 2026-09-30

CiteScore 2026-06

1.9LetPub · 2026-09-13

CiteScore (publisher) 2025

1.9Publisher website · 2026-09-30

SJR 2026-06

0.48LetPub · 2026-09-13

SJR (publisher) 2025

0.48Publisher website · 2026-09-30

SNIP 2026-06

0.79LetPub · 2026-09-13

SNIP (publisher) 2025

0.79Publisher website · 2026-09-30

h-index

23OpenAlex · 2026-10-01

i10-index

69OpenAlex · 2026-10-01

2-year mean citedness

1.51OpenAlex · 2026-10-01

Self-citation rate

13.3%LetPub · 2026-09-13

Share of gold OA articles

9.86%LetPub · 2026-09-13

Volume

Articles per year

35LetPub · 2026-09-13

Downloads per year (publisher)

72,000Publisher website · 2026-09-30

Sources count differently and were observed at different times, so each source's own value is kept; "publisher" marks figures from the journal's website.

Other sources

Acceptance rate (publisher)

14%Publisher website · 2026-09-30

Submission to first decision

13 daysPublisher website · 2026-09-30

First decision after review

66 daysPublisher website · 2026-09-30

Acceptance to publication

20 daysPublisher website · 2026-09-30

Community reports come from authors' own submissions (confidence 0.5) and are not a promise from the journal; for publisher figures, the journal's own definitions apply.

A hybrid journal charges the APC only when the author chooses open access; publishing under the subscription model is usually free.

The journal's website is authoritative for fees; sources were observed at different times and each keeps its own value, without averaging.

Excerpts are quoted from the journal's website; "model summary" lines are written by Workers AI and checked against the text. The journal's website is authoritative.

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

ISSN

2373-6992

Electronic ISSN

2373-700X

Latest issue on the website

Volume 41, Issue 3 (2026)

Official links

• Journal homepage ↗LetPub
• Submission system ↗Publisher website
• Special issues ↗Publisher website