Perceptions regarding open science appraised by editors of scholarly publications published in Spain

Authors : Remedios Melero, Juan-José Boté-Vericad, Alexandre López-Borrull

Pillars of open science are often included within the editorial policies of scholarly journals, including policies on open access publication, availability of underlying research data, preprints and open peer review.

The aim of this paper is to examine and analyse perceptions and editorial practices related to open access, preprints, open research data and open peer review, from the perspective of editors of scientific journals published in Spain, to gain an insight into editorial policies related to open science.

Results and data were obtained by a combined method of online interviews and an online questionnaire. The online survey was sent to editors from journals indexed in the Dulcinea directory, which at the time of the study included 1875 academic journals. A total of 420 responses (22.4%) were obtained.

The results indicated that 92% of the journals were open access journals, 2% of the journals conducted open peer review, 15% of the journals had instructions to allow archiving preprints, and out of 375 responses, only 59 journals (16%) reported having a policy on underlying research data.

Based on these results, there is a trend in favour of open access, but the perceived barriers to open peer review outweighed the advantages. There is also some reluctance to allow preprints to be made available.

This concern might be because editors want authors and readers to read and cite the contents published in their journals, rather than their preprint versions.

URL : Perceptions regarding open science appraised by editors of scholarly publications published in Spain

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.1511

Objectifs et stratégies de publication d’un bulletin de liaison : Le Médiéviste et l’Ordinateur (1979-1989)

Auteur/Author : Edgar Lejeune

En 1979, un petit groupe de spécialistes d’histoire médiévale utilisateurs des ordinateurs lance une publication d’un genre nouveau : le bulletin de liaison Le Médiéviste et l’Ordinateur.

Leur objectif est alors de « créer un réseau » permettant d’échanger des informations sur les nouvelles pratiques de recherche assistée par ordinateur qui se développent dans leur discipline depuis la fin des années 1960.

Cet article propose une analyse des stratégies de publication mises en place par les membres du comité de rédaction du Médiéviste et l’Ordinateur, dans le but d’observer comment une « culture commune » peut se construire en humanités numériques sur la base d’un périodique.

Pour ce faire, nous regarderons dans un premier temps, à partir des archives du comité de rédaction du bulletin conservées à l’Institut de recherche et d’histoire des textes (IRHT), comment cette publication est organisée, depuis le choix des auteurs jusqu’à la distribution des exemplaires.

Nous analyserons ensuite comment, dans les pages du bulletin, les éditeurs mettent en place des stratégies de communication permettant de rendre accessibles des contenus « techniques » à l’ensemble du lectorat visé.

URL : Objectifs et stratégies de publication d’un bulletin de liaison : Le Médiéviste et l’Ordinateur (1979-1989)

DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/revuehn.3087

La fonction de l’éditeur-auteur dans les éditions critiques numériques

Autrice/Author : Joana Casenave

Cet article propose une étude des caractères d’auctorialité propres à l’édition critique et de l’évolution que cette auctorialité connaît dans l’édition critique numérique. Le développement des éditions numériques induit en effet la mise en place d’un corps auctorial collectif, dont nous analysons ici les modes de fonctionnement.

L’évolution de la fonction auctoriale amène également un profond renouvellement de la mise en discours de l’information, dans sa forme comme dans le choix et la hiérarchisation des contenus proposés.

Dans le même temps, cela modifie le processus de reconnaissance de l’autorité de l’édition ainsi que les modes d’évaluation scientifique. Cet article propose ainsi une étude exploratoire de ces évolutions que connaît l’édition critique dans le champ numérique.

URL : La fonction de l’éditeur-auteur dans les éditions critiques numériques

DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/revuehn.3241

Faculty Perceptions of Open Access Publishing: Investigating Faculty Publishing Habits to Evaluate Library Collection Alignment

Authors : Elisabeth Shook, Amy Vecchione

Introduction

This investigation, originally conceived as a method for informing Albertsons Library on creative solutions to the collections budget shortfall, sought to determine an institution’s faculty perceptions of publishing and/or using open access (OA) materials, as well as to identify future mechanisms that would shift perceptions of OA publishing to a more favorable light, thereby fostering adoption of OA materials in faculty research and teaching.

Methods

The study used an anonymous electronic survey of 468 faculty members, with a response rate of nearly 34%.

Results and Discussion

Respondents indicated a mixed set of adoption, with equal distribution in willingness to engage with OA journals and publications. Quality of OA publications, combined with concerns for tenure and promotion, holds faculty back from utilizing OA journals and publications in their own research and in the classroom.

Conclusion

The data collected through the course of this perceptions survey provide important insight into the perceptions of faculty at this point in time, laying the groundwork for future surveys to evaluate growth in engagement with OA publishing.

Though the data provided do not immediately alleviate collections budget constraints at Albertsons Library, the survey contributed to a more holistic understanding of faculty publishing behavior in OA journals.

URL : Faculty Perceptions of Open Access Publishing: Investigating Faculty Publishing Habits to Evaluate Library Collection Alignment

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.13216

Open access and predatory publishing: a survey of the publishing practices of academic pharmacists and nurses in the United States

Authors : Bridget C. Conlogue, Neyda V. Gilman, Louisa M. Holmes

Objective: Academics are under great pressure to publish their research, the rewards for which are well known (tenure, promotion, grant funding, professional prestige). As open access publishing gains acceptance as a publishing option, researchers may choose a “predatory publisher.” The purpose of this study is to investigate the motivations and rationale of pharmacy and nursing academics in the United States to publish in open access journals that may be considered “predatory.”

Methods: A 26-item questionnaire was programmed in Qualtrics and distributed electronically to approximately 4,500 academic pharmacists and nurses, 347 of whom completed questionnaires (~8%). Pairwise correlations were performed followed by a logistic regression to evaluate statistical associations between participant characteristics and whether participants had ever paid an article processing fee (APF).

Results: Participants who had published more articles, were more familiar with predatory publishing, and who were more concerned about research metrics and tenure were more likely to have published in open access journals. Moderate to high institutional research intensity has an impact on the likelihood of publishing open access. The majority of participants who acknowledged they had published in a predatory journal took no action after realizing the journal was predatory and reported no negative impact on their career for having done so.

Conclusion: The results of this study provide data and insight into publication decisions made by pharmacy and nursing academics. Gaining a better understanding of who publishes in predatory journals and why can help address the problems associated with predatory publishing at the root.

URL : Open access and predatory publishing: a survey of the publishing practices of academic pharmacists and nurses in the United States

DOI : https://doi.org/10.5195/jmla.2022.1377

Knowledge Production: Analysing Gender- and Country-Dependent Factors in Research Topics through Term Communities

Authors : Parminder Bakshi-Hamm, Andreas Hamm

Scholarly publications are among the most tangible forms of knowledge production. Therefore, it is important to analyse them, amongst other features, for gender or country differences and the incumbent inequalities.

While there are many quantitative studies of publication activities and success in terms of publication numbers and citation counts, a more content-related understanding of differences in the choice of research topics is rare.

The present paper suggests an innovative method of using term communities in co-occurrence networks for detecting and evaluating the gender- and country-specific distribution of topics in research publications. The method is demonstrated with a pilot study based on approximately a quarter million of publication abstracts in seven diverse research areas.

In this example, the method validly reconstructs all obvious topic preferences, for instance, country-dependent language-related preferences. It also produces new insight into country-specific research focuses. It emerges that in all seven subject areas studied, topic preferences are significantly different depending on whether all authors are women, all authors are men, or there are female and male co-authors, with a tendency of male authors towards theoretical core topics, of female authors towards peripheral applied topics, and of mixed-author teams towards modern interdisciplinary topics.

URL : Knowledge Production: Analysing Gender- and Country-Dependent Factors in Research Topics through Term Communities

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3390/publications10040045

Overlay journals: A study of the current landscape

Authors : Antti Mikael Rousi, Mikael Laakso

Overlay journals are characterised by their articles being published on open access repositories, often already starting in their initial preprint form as a prerequisite for submission to the journal prior to initiating the peer-review process.

In this study we aimed to identify currently active overlay journals and examine their characteristics. We utilised an explorative web search and contacted key service providers for additional information. The final sample consisted of 34 overlay journals.

While the results show that new overlay journals have been actively established within recent years, the current presence of overlay journals remains diminutive compared to the overall number of open access journals. Most overlay journals publish articles in natural sciences, mathematics or computer sciences, and are commonly published by groups of academics rather than formal organisations.

They may also rank highly within the traditional journal citation metrics. None of the investigated journals required fees from authors, which is likely related to the cost-effective aspects of the overlay publishing model.

Both the growth in adoption of open access preprint repositories and researchers’ willingness to publish in overlay journals will determine the model’s wider impact on scholarly publishing.

URL : Overlay journals: A study of the current landscape

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1177/09610006221125208