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Data journals: incentivizing data access and documentation within the scholarly communication system

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Authors : William H. Walters

Data journals provide strong incentives for data creators to verify, document and disseminate their data. They also bring data access and documentation into the mainstream of scholarly communication, rewarding data creators through existing mechanisms of peer-reviewed publication and citation tracking.

These same advantages are not generally associated with data repositories, or with conventional journals’ data-sharing mandates. This article describes the unique advantages of data journals. It also examines the data journal landscape, presenting the characteristics of 13 data journals in the fields of biology, environmental science, chemistry, medicine and health sciences.

These journals vary considerably in size, scope, publisher characteristics, length of data reports, data hosting policies, time from submission to first decision, article processing charges, bibliographic index coverage and citation impact. They are similar, however, in their peer review criteria, their open access license terms and the characteristics of their editorial boards.

URL : Data journals: incentivizing data access and documentation within the scholarly communication system

DOI : http://doi.org/10.1629/uksg.510

How often do leading biomedical journals use statistical experts to evaluate statistical methods? The results of a survey

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Authors : Tom E. Hardwicke, Steven N. Goodman

Scientific claims in biomedical research are typically derived from statistical analyses. However, misuse or misunderstanding of statistical procedures and results permeate the biomedical literature, affecting the validity of those claims.

One approach journals have taken to address this issue is to enlist expert statistical reviewers. How many journals do this, how statistical review is incorporated, and how its value is perceived by editors is of interest.

Here we report an expanded version of a survey conducted more than 20 years ago by Goodman and colleagues (1998) with the intention of characterizing contemporary statistical review policies at leading biomedical journals.

We received eligible responses from 107 of 364 (28%) journals surveyed, across 57 fields, mostly from editors in chief. 34% (36/107) rarely or never use specialized statistical review, 34% (36/107) used it for 10–50% of their articles and 23% used it for all articles.

These numbers have changed little since 1998 in spite of dramatically increased concern about research validity. The vast majority of editors regarded statistical review as having substantial incremental value beyond regular peer review and expressed comparatively little concern about the potential increase in reviewing time, cost, and difficulty identifying suitable statistical reviewers. Improved statistical education of researchers and different ways of employing statistical expertise are needed. Several proposals are discussed.

URL : How often do leading biomedical journals use statistical experts to evaluate statistical methods? The results of a survey

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0239598

Open access at the national level: A comprehensive analysis of publications by Finnish researchers

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Authors : Janne Pölönen, Mikael Laakso, Raf Guns, Emanuel Kulczycki, Gunnar Sivertsen

Open access (OA) has mostly been studied by relying on publication data from selective international databases, notably Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus.

The aim of our study is to show that it is possible to achieve a national estimate of the number and share of OA based on institutional publication data providing a comprehensive coverage of the peer-reviewed outputs across fields, publication types, and languages.

Our data consists of 48,177 journal, conference, and book publications from 14 Finnish universities in 2016–2017, including information about OA status, as self-reported by researchers and validated by data-collection personnel through their Current Research Information System (CRIS).

We investigate the WoS, Scopus, and DOI coverage, as well as the share of OA outputs between different fields, publication types, languages, OA mechanisms (gold, hybrid, and green), and OA information sources (DOAJ, Bielefeld list, and Sherpa/Romeo).

We also estimate the role of the largest international commercial publishers compared to the not-for-profit Finnish national publishers of journals and books.

We conclude that institutional data, integrated at national and international level, provides one of the building blocks of a large-scale data infrastructure needed for comprehensive assessment and monitoring of OA across countries, for example at the European level.

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00084

Who Does What? – Research Data Management at ETH Zurich

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Authors: Matthias Töwe, Caterina Barillari

We present the approach to Research Data Management (RDM) support for researchers taken at ETH Zurich. Overall requirements are governed by institutional guidelines for Research Integrity, funders’ regulations, and legal obligations. The ETH approach is based on the distinction of three phases along the research data life-cycle: 1. Data Management Planning; 2. Active RDM; 3. Data Publication and Preservation. Two ETH units, namely the Scientific IT Services and the ETH Library, provide support for different aspects of these phases, building on their respective competencies. They jointly offer trainings, consulting, information, and materials for the first phase.

The second phase deals with data which is in current use in active research projects. Scientific IT Services provide their own platform, openBIS, for keeping track of raw, processed and analysed data, in addition to organising samples, materials, and scientific procedures.

ETH Library operates solutions for the third phase within the infrastructure of ETH Zurich’s central IT Services. The Research Collection is the institutional repository for research output including Research Data, Open Access publications, and ETH Zurich’s bibliography.

URL : Who Does What? – Research Data Management at ETH Zurich

DOI : http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-036

Addressing diversity in science communication through citizen social science

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Author : Lissette Lorenz

This article seeks to address the lack of sociocultural diversity in the field of science communication by broadening conceptions of citizen science to include citizen social science.

Developing citizen social science as a concept and set of practices can increase the diversity of publics who engage in science communication endeavors if citizen social science explicitly aims at addressing social justice issues.

First, I situate citizen social science within the histories of citizen science and participatory action research to demonstrate how the three approaches are compatible. Next, I outline the tenets of citizen social science as they are informed by citizen science and participatory action research goals.

I then use these tenets as criteria to evaluate the extent to which my case study, a community-based research project called ‘Rustbelt Theater’, counts as a citizen social science project.

URL : Addressing diversity in science communication through citizen social science

DOI : https://doi.org/10.22323/2.19040204

Disadvantages in preparing and publishing scientific papers caused by the dominance of the English language in science: The case of Colombian researchers in biological sciences

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Author : Valeria Ramírez-Castañeda

The success of a scientist depends on their production of scientific papers and the impact factor of the journal in which they publish. Because most major scientific journals are published in English, success is related to publishing in this language.

Currently, 98% of publications in science are written in English, including researchers from English as a Foreign Language (EFL) countries. Colombia is among the countries with the lowest English proficiency in the world. Thus, understanding the disadvantages that Colombians face in publishing is crucial to reducing global inequality in science.

This paper quantifies the disadvantages that result from the language hegemony in scientific publishing by examining the additional costs that communicating in English creates in the production of articles.

It was identified that more than 90% of the scientific articles published by Colombian researchers are in English, and that publishing in a second language creates additional financial costs to Colombian doctoral students and results in problems with reading comprehension, writing ease and time, and anxiety.

Rejection or revision of their articles because of the English grammar was reported by 43.5% of the doctoral students, and 33% elected not to attend international conferences and meetings due to the mandatory use of English in oral presentations.

Finally, among the translation/editing services reviewed, the cost per article is between one-quarter and one-half of a doctoral monthly salary in Colombia. Of particular note, we identified a positive correlation between English proficiency and higher socioeconomic origin of the researcher.

Overall, this study exhibits the negative consequences of hegemony of English that preserves the global gap in science. Although having a common language is important for science communication, generating multilinguistic alternatives would promote diversity while conserving a communication channel. Such an effort should come from different actors and should not fall solely on EFL researchers.

URL : Disadvantages in preparing and publishing scientific papers caused by the dominance of the English language in science: The case of Colombian researchers in biological sciences

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0238372

Copyright life hacks for librarians

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Authors: Claire Sewell, John Clarke, Amy Theobald

Librarians are continuously looking for new ways to make the training they offer accessible and engaging to both colleagues and users. One area where this is especially important is copyright – a topic many librarians identify as vital to their role, but they often find it hard to attend training.

Cambridge University Libraries has introduced a range of methods to reach out to even the most reluctant copyright learner and improve the overall copyright literacy of its staff. This article showcases these methods in the form of ‘life hacks’ – simple measures which can be implemented with little or no cost and using existing resources.

Methods outlined include making the best use of knowledge already present within your organisation, using visual methods to attract a new audience and creating interactive online resources. Also discussed is the importance of making copyright training accessible, both to users with disabilities and those who may have constraints on their time and technological ability.

The article concludes with a reflection about the challenges faced whilst creating new resources. The techniques outlined in this case study can be adapted for use by a range of libraries no matter the target audience.

URL : Copyright life hacks for librarians

DOI : http://doi.org/10.1629/uksg.519