Archives des auteurs : Hans Dillaerts

Gold Open Access Publishing in Mega-Journals: Developing Countries Pay the Price of Western Premium Academic Output

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Authors : Jacintha Ellers, Thomas W. Crowther, Jeffrey A. Harvey

Open access publishing (OAP) makes research output freely available, and several national governments have now made OAP mandatory for all publicly funded research. Gold OAP is a common form of OAP where the author pays an article processing charge (APC) to make the article freely available to readers.

However, gold OAP is a cause for concern because it drives a redistribution of valuable research money to support open access papers in ‘mega-journals’ with more permissive acceptance criteria. We present a data-driven evaluation of the financial ramifications of gold OAP and provide evidence that gold OAP in mega-journals is biased toward Western industrialized countries.

From 2011 to 2015, the period of our data collection, countries with developing economies had a disproportionately greater share of articles published in the lower-tier mega-journals and thus paid article APCs that cross-subsidize publications in the top-tier journals of the same publisher.

Conversely, scientists from Western developed countries had a disproportionately greater share of articles published in those same top-tier journals. The global inequity of the cross-subsidizing APC model was demonstrated across five different mega-journals, showing that the issue is a common problem.

We need to develop stringent and fair criteria that address the global financial implications of OAP, as publication fees should reflect the real cost of publishing and be transparent for authors.

URL : https://research.vu.nl/en/publications/gold-open-access-publishing-in-mega-journals-developing-countries

Médiation numérique des savoirs. Des enjeux aux dispositifs

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Auteurs/Authors : Lionel Dujol, Silvère Mercier

Dans un monde connecté, la question à soulever est moins celle de l’accès à l’information que celle des parcours et des choix menant à telle ou telle information. À ce titre, les médiations numériques des savoirs n’ont jamais été aussi nombreuses.

Mots-valises pour certains, médiation et numérique peuvent prendre un sens précis à condition de les considérer comme les clés d’une démarche au service du partage et de développement des savoirs et des savoir-faire. Mais comment traduire cet objectif en dispositifs concrets? Comment développer une stratégie de médiation dans le cadre d’une politique publique?

Nous verrons pourquoi et comment le centre de gravité de l’activité d’une bibliothèque peut se déplacer de la constitution de collections vers des activités de curation et de médiations numériques des contenus. Ce livre est l’aboutissement de plus de dix ans de pratiques et de réflexions menées par les auteurs à travers leur pratique professionnelle, leurs blogues et l’animation de formations continues pour les bibliothécaires.

À la fois réflexion sur les enjeux et manuel pratique, il s’adresse à tous ceux, professionnels de l’information, étudiants ou curieux qui souhaitent mieux comprendre et contribuer à la circulation des idées à l’ère numérique.

URL : http://mediation-numerique-des-savoirs.org/

Prestigious Science Journals Struggle to Reach Even Average Reliability

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Author : Björn Brembs

In which journal a scientist publishes is considered one of the most crucial factors determining their career. The underlying common assumption is that only the best scientists manage to publish in a highly selective tier of the most prestigious journals.

However, data from several lines of evidence suggest that the methodological quality of scientific experiments does not increase with increasing rank of the journal. On the contrary, an accumulating body of evidence suggests the inverse: methodological quality and, consequently, reliability of published research works in several fields may be decreasing with increasing journal rank.

The data supporting these conclusions circumvent confounding factors such as increased readership and scrutiny for these journals, focusing instead on quantifiable indicators of methodological soundness in the published literature, relying on, in part, semi-automated data extraction from often thousands of publications at a time.

With the accumulating evidence over the last decade grew the realization that the very existence of scholarly journals, due to their inherent hierarchy, constitutes one of the major threats to publicly funded science: hiring, promoting and funding scientists who publish unreliable science eventually erodes public trust in science.

URL : Prestigious Science Journals Struggle to Reach Even Average Reliability

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00037

Moving up the ladder: heterogeneity influencing academic careers through research orientation, gender, and mentors

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Authors : Ward Ooms, Claudia Werker, Christian Hopp

We look into the question whether heterogeneity stemming from research orientation, gender, or disciplinary and cultural differences with their PhD supervisors helps or hampers academics’ careers.

Based on a sample of 248 academics at two leading European universities of technology, we combine multinomial logit models and sequential logit models to understand career advancement. Our results show that heterogeneity stemming from research orientation is helpful. Academics who bridge between the quest for fundamental understanding and socio-economic relevance attain career success.

Yet heterogeneity stemming from gender hinders careers: female academics face problems securing
tenured positions and full professorships. Mentor–mentee heterogeneity only helps in early career transitions, but hampers advancement later on.

Our insights offer suggestions to policymakers, university managers, and academics, because they help to identify promising academics, the right support for sitting staff members, measures correcting for gender imbalances, and can inform strategic choices regarding research orientation and PhD supervisors.

URL : Moving up the ladder: heterogeneity influencing academic careers through research orientation, gender, and mentors

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2018.1434617

Authorial and institutional stratification in open access publishing: the case of global health research

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Authors : Kyle Siler, Stefanie Haustein, Elise Smith, Vincent Larivière, Juan Pablo Alperin

Using a database of recent articles published in the field of Global Health research, we examine institutional sources of stratification in publishing access outcomes. Traditionally, the focus on inequality in scientific publishing has focused on prestige hierarchies in established print journals.

This project examines stratification in contemporary publishing with a particular focus on subscription vs. various Open Access (OA) publishing options.

Findings show that authors working at lower-ranked universities are more likely to publish in closed/paywalled outlets, and less likely to choose outlets that involve some sort of Article Processing Charge (APCs; gold or hybrid OA).

We also analyze institutional differences and stratification in the APC costs paid in various journals. Authors affiliated with higher-ranked institutions, as well as hospitals and non-profit organizations pay relatively higher APCs for gold and hybrid OA publications.

Results suggest that authors affiliated with high-ranked universities and well-funded institutions tend to have more resources to choose pay options with publishing. Our research suggests new professional hierarchies developing in contemporary publishing, where various OA publishing options are becoming increasingly prominent.

Just as there is stratification in institutional representation between different types of publishing access, there is also inequality within access types.

URL : Authorial and institutional stratification in open access publishing: the case of global health research

DOI : https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.4269

Open access, data capitalism and academic publishing

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Author : Michael Hagner

Open Access (OA) is widely considered a breakthrough in the history of academic publishing, rendering the knowledge produced by the worldwide scientific community accessible to all. In numerous countries, national governments, funding institutions and research organisations have undertaken enormous efforts to establish OA as the new publishing standard.

The benefits and new perspectives, however, cause various challenges. This essay addresses several issues, including that OA is deeply embedded in the logic and practices of data capitalism.

Given that OA has proven an attractive business model for commercial publishers, the key predictions of OA-advocates, namely that OA would liberate both scientists and tax payers from the chains of global publishing companies, have not become true. In its conclusion, the paper discusses the opportunities and pitfalls of non-commercial publishing.

URL : Open access, data capitalism and academic publishing

DOI : https://doi.org/10.4414/smw.2018.14600

Data sharing and reanalysis of randomized controlled trials in leading biomedical journals with a full data sharing policy: survey of studies published in The BMJ and PLOS Medicine

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Authors : Florian Naudet, Charlotte Sakarovitch, Perrine Janiaud, Ioana Cristea, Daniele Fanelli, David Moher, John P A Ioannidis

Objectives

To explore the effectiveness of data sharing by randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in journals with a full data sharing policy and to describe potential difficulties encountered in the process of performing reanalyses of the primary outcomes.

Design

Survey of published RCTs.

Setting

PubMed/Medline.

Eligibility criteria

RCTs that had been submitted and published by The BMJ and PLOS Medicine subsequent to the adoption of data sharing policies by these journals.

Main outcome measure

The primary outcome was data availability, defined as the eventual receipt of complete data with clear labelling. Primary outcomes were reanalyzed to assess to what extent studies were reproduced. Difficulties encountered were described.

Results

37 RCTs (21 from The BMJ and 16 from PLOS Medicine) published between 2013 and 2016 met the eligibility criteria. 17/37 (46%, 95% confidence interval 30% to 62%) satisfied the definition of data availability and 14 of the 17 (82%, 59% to 94%) were fully reproduced on all their primary outcomes. Of the remaining RCTs, errors were identified in two but reached similar conclusions and one paper did not provide enough information in the Methods section to reproduce the analyses. Difficulties identified included problems in contacting corresponding authors and lack of resources on their behalf in preparing the datasets. In addition, there was a range of different data sharing practices across study groups.

Conclusions

Data availability was not optimal in two journals with a strong policy for data sharing. When investigators shared data, most reanalyses largely reproduced the original results. Data sharing practices need to become more widespread and streamlined to allow meaningful reanalyses and reuse of data.