EN

Investigating SSH Research and Publication Practices in Disciplinary and Institutional Contexts. A Survey-Based Comparative Approach in Two Universities

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : Florian Baye, Juan Gorraiz, Christian Gumpenberger, Arantxa Itúrbiden, Isabel Iribarren-Maestro, Steve Reding

In this paper, we comparatively analyze, present and discuss the results from a survey on increasing the visibility of research achievements in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) that was carried out at the University of Vienna (Austria) and the University of Navarra (Spain) in 2016 and 2017.

Covering four major topics—searching and finding literature, publishing, the visibility of research, and the assessment of research outputs—we ask the following questions: are there disciplinary differences to be identified, and how do they present themselves in the two institutional contexts?

Discussing the results, we showcase how disciplinary and institutional traditions and contexts are important factors that influence research and publication practices in the SSH.

Our results indicate that the practices of searching and finding literature as well as publication practices and behavior are shaped by disciplinary traditions and epistemic cultures.

On the contrary, assessment and valuation of research outputs are influenced by institutional and national contexts in which SSH research is organized and carried out.

URL : Investigating SSH Research and Publication Practices in Disciplinary and Institutional Contexts. A Survey-Based Comparative Approach in Two Universities

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3389/frma.2019.00001

FR

Construction(s) et contradictions des données de recherche en SHS

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Auteurs/Authors : Marie-Laure Malingre, Morgane Mignon, Cécile Pierre, Alexandre Serres

La structuration et le partage des données s’imposent depuis cinq ans au monde de la recherche, à travers des injonctions politiques (de Horizon 2020 au Plan national pour la science ouverte).

L’analyse de l’enquête menée en 2017 auprès des chercheurs de l’université Rennes 2 sur leurs pratiques, représentations et attentes en matière de données conduit à interroger le terme lui-même. Variable et complexe, contrairement à ce que suggère le mot « donnée », la notion ne va pas de soi.

L’article s’efforcera de montrer qu’elle fait l’objet d’une triple construction, épistémologique, intellectuelle et politique, dans les discours des chercheurs et des acteurs institutionnels, en tension avec les pratiques constatées sur le terrain.

DOI : https://www.openscience.fr/Construction-s-et-contradictions-des-donnees-de-recherche-en-SHS#

EN

Building an International Consensus on Multi-Disciplinary Metadata Standards: A CODATA Case History in Nanotechnology

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : John Rumble, John Broome, Simon Hodson

Science today is rapidly becoming both multi-disciplinary and data-driven. These two trends pose new challenges to the capture, management, sharing, and dissemination of research data. Multi-disciplinary science means diverse data generation communities and equally diverse user groups.

Data-driven means that sharing data among different communities is more important than ever because of the growth of modeling and knowledge discovery.

Nanotechnology is a prime example, involving chemistry, physics, materials science, toxicology, environmental science, and many other disciplines. During the past few years, CODATA has created an international, multi-disciplinary Working Group that has developed a number of critically important metadata standards to facilitate sharing nanomaterials data.

In this paper, we discuss the challenges faced in starting and executing this work, as well as the approaches taken to make progress on producing internationally accepted metadata standards.

Many of these approaches are directly applicable to other multi-disciplinary subjects.

URL : Building an International Consensus on Multi-Disciplinary Metadata Standards: A CODATA Case History in Nanotechnology

DOI : http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2019-012

EN

Instagram and the science museum: a missed opportunity for public engagement

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : Paige Brown Jarreau, Nicole Smith Dahmen, Ember Jones

Science museums are missing an opportunity to promote informal education, scientific literacy, public engagement and public visibility of scientists outside of museum walls via Instagram.

With an analysis of 1,073 Instagram posts, we show that museums are using Instagram as a promotional broadcasting tool, with a focus on end results of collections and curation work over communication of museum-led discovery and science as a process.

We suggest that science museums create more Instagram posts that offer educational information and visibility of exhibit creation and museum researchers’ work behind the scenes.

URL : Instagram and the science museum: a missed opportunityfor public engagement

Alternative location : https://jcom.sissa.it/archive/18/02/JCOM_1802_2019_A06

EN

Use of the Journal Impact Factor in academic review, promotion, and tenure evaluations

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : Erin C. McKiernan​, Lesley A. Schimanski, Carol Muñoz Nieves, Lisa Matthias, Meredith T. Niles, Juan Pablo Alperin

The Journal Impact Factor (JIF) was originally designed to aid libraries in deciding which journals to index and purchase for their collections. Over the past few decades, however, it has become a relied upon metric used to evaluate research articles based on journal rank. Surveyed faculty often report feeling pressure to publish in journals with high JIFs and mention reliance on the JIF as one problem with current academic evaluation systems.

While faculty reports are useful, information is lacking on how often and in what ways the JIF is currently used for review, promotion, and tenure (RPT). We therefore collected and analyzed RPT documents from a representative sample of 129 universities from the United States and Canada and 381 of their academic units.

We found that 40% of doctoral, research-intensive (R-type) institutions and 18% of master’s, or comprehensive (M-type) institutions explicitly mentioned the JIF, or closely related terms, in their RPT documents.

Undergraduate, or baccalaureate (B-type) institutions did not mention it at all. A detailed reading of these documents suggests that institutions may also be using a variety of terms to indirectly refer to the JIF.

Our qualitative analysis shows that 87% of the institutions that mentioned the JIF supported the metric’s use in at least one of their RPT documents, while 13% of institutions expressed caution about the JIF’s use in evaluations.

None of the RPT documents we analyzed heavily criticized the JIF or prohibited its use in evaluations. Of the institutions that mentioned the JIF, 63% associated it with quality, 40% with impact, importance, or significance, and 20% with prestige, reputation, or status.

In sum, our results show that the use of the JIF is encouraged in RPT evaluations, especially at research-intensive universities, and indicates there is work to be done to improve evaluation processes to avoid the potential misuse of metrics like the JIF.

URL : Use of the Journal Impact Factor in academic review, promotion, and tenure evaluations

DOI : https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.27638v2

EN

Evolving and Enduring Patterns Surrounding Student Usage and Perceptions of Academic Library Reference Services

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : Jodi Jameson, Gerald Natal, John Napp

This descriptive study analyzes results from an 18-item survey which assessed students’ usage and perceptions of library reference services at a comprehensive public metropolitan university.

Among 235 surveys completed between November 2016 and January 2017, the majority of respondents represented the “Generation Z” population of college students, 18 to 24 years of age. Quantitative and qualitative findings revealed patterns of reference service usage, perceptions of librarians, and barriers and facilitators to seeking help from a librarian.

These findings can inform decision-making to improve marketing and outreach to students regarding general reference services, reference models, and liaison roles.

URL : Evolving and Enduring Patterns Surrounding Student Usage and Perceptions of Academic Library Reference Services

Alternative location : https://crl.acrl.org/index.php/crl/article/view/17116

EN

If Research Libraries and Funders Finance Open Access: Moving Beyond Subscriptions and APCs

Posted on by Hans Dillaerts

Authors : John Willinsky, Matthew Rusk

Following the examples of SCOAP3, in which libraries fund open access, and eLife, in which funding agencies have begun to directly fund open access scholarly publishing, this study presents an analysis of how creatively combining these two models might provide a means to move toward universal open access (without APCs).

This study calculates the publishing costs for the funders that sponsor the research and for the libraries that cover unsponsored articles for two nonprofit biomedical publishers, eLife and PLOS, and the nonprofit journal aggregator BioOne.

These entities represent a mix of publishing revenue models, including funder sponsorship, article processing charges (APC), and subscription fees. Using PubMed filtering and manual-sampling strategies, as well as publicly available publisher revenue data, the study found that, in 2015, 86 percent of the articles in eLife and PLOS acknowledge funder support, as do 76 percent of the articles in the largely subscription journals of BioOne.

Such findings can inform libraries and funding agencies, as well as publishers, in their consideration of a direct-payment open access model, as the study (a) demonstrates the cost breakdown for funder and library support for open access among this sample of X articles; (b) posits how publishing data-management organizations such as Crossref and ORCID can facilitate such a model of funder and library per-article open access payments; and (c) proposes ways in which such a model offers a more efficient, equitable, and scalable approach to open access across the disciplines than the prevailing APC model, which originated with biomedical publishing.

URL : If Research Libraries and Funders Finance Open Access: Moving Beyond Subscriptions and APCs

Alternative location : https://crl.acrl.org/index.php/crl/article/view/16992