Étiquette : open access

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Geographical and disciplinary coverage of open access journals: OpenAlex, Scopus, and WoS

Authors : Abdelghani Maddi, Marion Maisonobe, Chérifa Boukacem-Zeghmouri

This study aims to compare the geographical and disciplinary coverage of OA journals in three databases: OpenAlex, Scopus and the Web of Science (WoS). We used the Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources (ROAD), provided by the ISSN International Centre, as a reference to identify OA active journals (as of May 2024). Among the 62,701 active OA journals listed in ROAD, the WoS indexes 6,157 journals, Scopus indexes 7,351, while OpenAlex indexes 34,217.

A striking observation is the presence of 24,976 OA journals exclusively in OpenAlex, whereas only 182 journals are exclusively present in the WoS and 373 in Scopus. The geographical analysis focuses on two levels: continents and countries. As for disciplinary comparison, we use the ten disciplinary levels of the ROAD database. Moreover, our findings reveal a similarity in OA journal coverage between the WoS and Scopus. However, while OpenAlex offers better inclusivity and indexing, it is not without biases.

The WoS and Scopus predictably favor journals from Europe, North America and Oceania. Although OpenAlex presents a much more balanced indexing, certain regions and countries remain relatively underrepresented. Typically, Africa is proportionally as under-represented in OpenAlex as it is in Scopus, and some emerging countries are proportionally less represented in OpenAlex than in the WoS and Scopus.

These results underscore a marked similarity in OA journal indexing between WoS and Scopus, while OpenAlex aligns more closely with the distribution observed in the ROAD database, although it also exhibits some representational biases.

URL : Geographical and disciplinary coverage of open access journals: OpenAlex, Scopus, and WoS

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0320347

 

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Does open access foster interdisciplinary citations? Decomposing open access citation advantage

Authors : Kai Nishikawa, Akiyoshi Murakami

The existence of an open access (OA) citation advantage—that is, whether OA increases citations—has been a topic of interest for many years. Although numerous studies have focused on whether OA increases citations, expectations for OA go beyond that. One such expectation is the promotion of knowledge transfer across various fields.

This study aimed to clarify what effects OA, particularly gold OA, has on knowledge transfer across fields. Specifically, we measure the effect of OA on interdisciplinary and within-discipline citation counts by decomposing an existing OA citation advantage metric.

OA increased both interdisciplinary and within-discipline citations in many fields studied, and only interdisciplinary citations in chemistry, computer science, and clinical medicine. In these three fields, clinical medicine showed a tendency toward interdisciplinary citations, independent of journal or paper.

These findings suggest that OA fosters knowledge transfer across disciplines.

URL : Does open access foster interdisciplinary citations? Decomposing open access citation advantage

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-025-05297-z

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The time for action is now: Equity and sustainability for diamond publishing in Aotearoa New Zealand

Authors : Luqman Hayes, Craig Murdoch

Diamond open access journals make a significant contribution to scholarship globally while enduring a precarious existence due to a lack of funding. The purpose of this study was to identify the necessary characteristics of a shared service that would deliver improved sustainability for diamond journals in Aotearoa New Zealand.

We conducted semi-structured interviews with several of the editors of journals hosted by Tuwhera, Auckland University of Technology’s diamond hosting service. We sought to understand their experiences, both positive and negative, via thematic analysis of the interview transcripts. These themes indicate that our diamond journal editors face significant burdens due to lack of funding, which threaten the unique contribution they make as journals of and from Aotearoa.

We conclude that a shared open infrastructure is the most appropriate way to ensure the sustainability of diamond journals in Aotearoa, but that it must be accompanied by shared services that address the administrative and journal production load currently experienced by editors.

We propose that such an endeavor should be funded by shifting a small percentage of existing library subscription expenditure from profit-making publishers to diamond journals.

URL : The time for action is now: Equity and sustainability for diamond publishing in Aotearoa New Zealand

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18311

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From Fees to Free: Comparing APC-Based and Diamond Open Access Journals in Engineering

Authors : Luís Eduardo Pilatti, Luiz Alberto Pilatti, Gustavo Dambiski Gomes de Carvalho, Luis Mauricio Martins de Resende

This study analyzes the impact of different Open Access (OA) publication models in engineering, comparing journals that charge Article Processing Charges (APCs) with those operating under the Diamond OA model.

A total of 757 engineering OA journals, comprising 504 APC-based and 253 Diamond OA journals, were examined using bibliometric data from 2020 to 2023. The analysis focused on four key metrics: CiteScore, total citations, number of published articles, and the percentage of cited articles. The results indicate that APC-based journals dominate the upper quartiles (Q1 and Q2) regarding absolute citation counts, primarily driven by high-volume mega-journals such as IEEE Access.

However, Diamond OA journals exhibit a higher proportion of cited articles (88.8% compared to 83.4% in APC-based journals) within the top 10% category. Despite their benefits in providing cost-free dissemination, Diamond OA journals account for only 8.4% of the 3012 active engineering journals indexed in Scopus, highlighting sustainability and visibility challenges.

The findings suggest that, while APC-based journals achieve higher absolute citation counts, editorial reputation and visibility strategies significantly influence citation performance.

This study contributes to the ongoing discussion on the financial sustainability and equity of OA publishing in engineering.

URL : From Fees to Free: Comparing APC-Based and Diamond Open Access Journals in Engineering

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3390/publications13020016

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The Open Book Environment (OBE) Dashboard: A Tool for Increasing Publisher Transparency for Authors, Librarians, and the Scholarly Community

Authors : Holly Limbert, Dan DeSanto

Introduction: The Open Book Environment (OBE) Dashboard is introduced as a pioneering tool aimed at fostering transparency and clarity in the realm of open access book publishing. In response to the growing need for accessible information for authors, librarians, and stakeholders, this dashboard aggregates data from a multitude of publishers into a centralized platform.

Description of Program/Service: Employing a comprehensive set of criteria, including pricing for book processing charges (BPCs), licensing options, editorial quality statements, and self-archiving policies, the Dashboard evaluates publisher transparency. Through a color-coded system, it visually represents the degree of openness exhibited by each publisher, empowering authors to make informed decisions about where to publish their work.

Next Steps: Looking ahead, the Dashboard’s dynamic nature allows for continuous updates, facilitating its role as an agent for positive change within the scholarly publishing community. As a versatile resource, the OBE Dashboard holds promise in enhancing efficiency, transparency, and accountability in open access book publishing.

Open Book Environment (OBE) Dashboard: https://bit.ly/OBEdashboard
OBE Additions and Edits Form: https://bit.ly/OBEdashboardform
Zenodo Link: https://zenodo.org/records/13366056

URL : The Open Book Environment (OBE) Dashboard: A Tool for Increasing Publisher Transparency for Authors, Librarians, and the Scholarly Community

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18112

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Open and impactful academic publishing

Authors : Rosaria Ciriminna, Giovanna Li Petri, Giuseppe Angellotti, Rafael Luque, Mario Pagliaro

Introduction

The advantages of self-archiving research articles on institutional repositories or personal academic websites are numerous and relevant for society and individual researchers. Yet, self-archiving has been adopted by a small minority of active scholars.

Methods

Aiming to further inform educational work on open and impactful academic publishing in the digital era, we posed selected questions to Stevan Harnad 30 years after his « subversive proposal » to maximize research impact by self-archiving scholarly articles in university-hosted or disciplinary online repositories to make published articles openly available.

Results and discussion

Self-archiving is even more needed today than it was when Professor Harnad called for it when the World Wide Web was in its infancy; OA academic publishing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for impactful research; self-archiving on a personal academic website is often more effective than in institutional repositories.

URL : Open and impactful academic publishing

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3389/frma.2025.1544965

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Open access, open infrastructures, and their funding: Learning from histories to more effectively enhance diamond OA ecologies for books

Authors  : Kira Hopkins, Kevin Sanders

The decade since the “Bottlenecks in the Open Access System” special issue of JLSC in 2014 has been an expansive one for open access (OA) and OA books in particular. The creation of a scholarly publishing ecosystem that enables works to be freely accessible for readers has been successful in many ways.

However, the underlying politics and economics of OA scholarly publishing often remain opaque or under-interrogated (Lawson et al., 2015). The problems with journal OA funding, specifically regarding inequality of access to publishing, discussed by Bonaccorso et al. (2014) in their contribution to that issue, have also increased and become entrenched as we discuss below.

This entrenchment has been largely via the growth and consolidation of gold OA, “transformative” agreements, and read-and-publish journal deals, which have effectively, and unnecessarily, commodified OA publications. We would argue that this is in direct tension with some of the foundations of contemporary OA.

OA was explicitly described from early principles as not a business model and as aiming to reduce financial barriers from authors, libraries, and other groups (Suber, 2024). We would like to note that, while the main focus of this paper is books, we begin with a discussion of journals. This is because we are focusing on the history, development, and critiques of OA fundings in the intervening ten years following the “Bottlenecks” special issue.

OA journal publishing has been at the forefront of discussions of OA funding, and it has dominated the last decade, and more, of this discussion; it would therefore be remiss of us not to discuss this history, the resulting current landscape of inequity, and the potential ramifications if this were to be transferred to OA books, a more nascent field in general.

URL : Open access, open infrastructures, and their funding: Learning from histories to more effectively enhance diamond OA ecologies for books

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18284