Archives des mots-clés : scientific communication

The impact of COVID-19 on the debate on open science: An analysis of expert opinion

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Auteurs/Authors : Melanie Benson Marshall,  Stephen Pinfield, Pamela Abbott, Andrew Cox, Juan Pablo Alperin,  Natascha Chtena, Isabelle Dorsch, Alice Fleerackers, Monique Oliveira,
Isabella Peters

This study is an analysis of the international debate on open science that took place during the pandemic. It addresses the question, how did the COVID-19 pandemic impact the debate on open science?

The study takes the form of a qualitative analysis of a large corpus of key articles, editorials, blogs and thought pieces about the impact of COVID on open science, published during the pandemic in English, German, Portuguese, and Spanish.

The findings show that many authors believed that it was clear that the experience of the pandemic had illustrated or strengthened the case for open science, with language such as a “stress test”, “catalyst”, “revolution” or “tipping point” frequently used. It was commonly believed that open science had played a positive role in the response to the pandemic, creating a clear ‘line of sight’ between open science and societal benefits.

Whilst the arguments about open science deployed in the debate were not substantially new, the focuses of debate changed in some key respects. There was much less attention given to business models for open access and critical perspectives on open science, but open data sharing, preprinting, information quality and misinformation became most prominent in debates. There were also moves to reframe open science conceptually, particularly in connecting science with society and addressing broader questions of equity.

The impact of COVID-19 on the debate on open science: An analysis of expert opinion

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/xy874

Determinants of manuscript submissions to fully open access journals: elasticity to article processing charges

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Author : Sumiko Asai

Article processing charges that authors and research institutions pay to make articles open access are increasing. If manuscript submission is price elastic, then rising charges will cause a significant reduction in submissions, leading to decreased revenues under constant acceptance rates.

Therefore, the elasticity of manuscript submission to article processing charge is one of the determinants of publishers’ charges. However, several studies that investigated the determinants of article processing charges did not consider this elasticity.

This study investigated the determinants of submissions, including the elasticity to article processing charge, by formulating the number of manuscript submissions to fully open access journals published by Hindawi and Elsevier in 2022. Moreover, this study formulated manuscript submissions using both list prices and charges paid to Elsevier that OpenAPC collected to compare the results.

The estimation results reveal that the two publishers increase their revenues by raising the article processing charges due to the inelasticity. Moreover, these conclusions do not depend on the data set used, although the number of observations sourced from OpenAPC is small.

URL : Determinants of manuscript submissions to fully open access journals: elasticity to article processing charges

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-024-04934-3

New academic journals: an international overview of indexing and access models

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Authors : Rosangela Rodrigues, Cristóbal Urbano, Patrícia Neubert, José Miguel Rodríguez-Gairín, Marta Somoza-Fernández

Introduction

An international analysis of academic journals newly created in the period from 2011 to 2020 according to type of publisher, place of publication, their relationship with open access, and their indexing in databases.

Studies of the issues of concentration of journal publisher ownership, uses of metrics, and access to titles reveal a changing landscape that is nevertheless still dominated by large commercial oligopolies. One notable trend is the creation of new titles in various configurations.

Method

To assess the global scenario, we analyse titles created from 2011 to 2020, focusing on indexing and access models. The methodology is multidimensional, predominantly bibliometric and quantitative. The data were collected from Crossref and other databases and processed with the resources of the Information Matrix for the Analysis of Journals.

Results

The findings confirm the expansion of the periodical publishing market, of which the academic journal market represents a small fraction (7.29%). Of thdatabases may be considered academic based on indexing in some database, most are open access, indicated by their presence in the Directory of Open Access Journals (55.21%).

The analysis of publisher type confirmed the predominance of commercial publishers (44.57%), followed by universities (30.08%). The largest proportion of the titles are in the health field, compatible with the existing distribution of fields, followed by journals in the multidisciplinary and education fields.

Conclusion

In the expansion of the publishing market, academic journals represent a small fraction of the total. The main sources of new titles in open access with no processing charges for authors are universities in countries that are not home to large commercial publishers (Indonesia, Brazil, and Spain), all with government subsidies.

URL : New academic journals: an international overview of indexing and access models

Original URL : https://informationr.net/infres/article/view/466

DOI : https://doi.org/10.47989/ir284466

How can revivals of scientific publications be explained using bibliometric methods? A case study discovering booster papers for the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper

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Authors : Robin Haunschild, Werner Marx, Jürgen Weis

The unusual citation profile of the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper has been analyzed. The number of citing papers per year exhibits a maximum of 123 citations in the mid-1980s and increases to more than 200 citations about two decades later.

The publication set of the citing papers was analyzed in terms of co-authorships and research topics. The USA and (more recently) the People’s Republic of China appear prominently among the countries of the citing authors. A keyword analysis of the citing papers revealed research dealing with topological insulators as one of the major newly evolving research topics. An analysis of the co-cited papers has been performed via reference publication year spectroscopy (RPYS).

The most-frequently co-cited papers (the peak papers of the RPYS spectrogram) were identified and discussed. As a result, we found two primary booster papers and three secondary booster papers that renewed the interest in the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper.

URL : How can revivals of scientific publications be explained using bibliometric methods? A case study discovering booster papers for the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-023-04906-z

Going Open Access: The Attitudes and Actions of Scientific Journal Editors in China

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Authors : Wenqi Fu, Jie Xu, Qing Fang, Jingjia Ding, Hanqing Ma

This study aims to investigate the attitudes and actions of scientific journal editors in China towards open access. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 17 Chinese editors from various scientific journals during September and October of 2022.

The results indicate that the editors generally possess knowledge of open access and have implemented an appropriate open access model for their respective journals. However, the Chinese-language journal editors expressed a lack of motivation to adopt open access, unless there is a reform in the mechanism of academic publishing or a policy is imposed.

On the other hand, the English-language journal editors acknowledged that they have no other choice but to adopt open access. This study helps us learn about Chinese editors’ understanding and attitudes towards open access, the current status of open access in China’s scientific journals, and the mechanisms of academic publishing in China.

URL : Going Open Access: The Attitudes and Actions of Scientific Journal Editors in China

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3390/publications12010001

Emerging roles and responsibilities of libraries in support of reproducible research

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Authors : Birgit Schmidt, Andrea Chiarelli, Lucia Loffreda, Jeroen Sondervan

Ensuring the reproducibility of research is a multi-stakeholder effort that comes with challenges and opportunities for individual researchers and research communities, librarians, publishers, funders and service providers. These emerge at various steps of the research process, and, in particular, at the publication stage.

Previous work by Knowledge Exchange highlighted that, while there is growing awareness among researchers, reproducible publication practices have been slow to change. Importantly, research reproducibility has not yet reached institutional agendas: this work seeks to highlight the rationale for libraries to initiate and/or step up their engagement with this topic, which we argue is well aligned with their core values and strategic priorities.

We draw on secondary analysis of data gathered by Knowledge Exchange, focusing on the literature identified as well as interviews held with librarians. We extend this through further investigation of the literature and by integrating the findings of discussions held at the 2022 LIBER conference, to provide an updated picture of how libraries engage with research reproducibility.

Libraries have a significant role in promoting responsible research practices, including transparency and reproducibility, by leveraging their connections to academic communities and collaborating with stakeholders like research funders and publishers. Our recommendations for libraries include: i) partnering with researchers to promote a research culture that values transparency and reproducibility, ii) enhancing existing research infrastructure and support; and iii) investing in raising awareness and developing skills and capacities related to these principles.

URL : Emerging roles and responsibilities of libraries in support of reproducible research

DOI : https://doi.org/10.53377/lq.14947

Applying Librarian- Created Evaluation Tools to Determine Quality and Credibility of Open Access Library Science Journals

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Authors : Maggie Albro, Jessica L. Serrao, Christopher D. Vidas, Jenessa M. McElfresh, K. Megan Sheffield, Megan Palmer

This article explores the application of journal quality and credibility evaluation tools to library science publications. The researchers investigate quality and credibility attributes of forty-eight peer-reviewed library science journals with open access components using two evaluative tools developed and published by librarians.

The results identify common positive and negative attributes of library science journals, compare the results of the two evaluation tools, and discuss their ease of use and limitations. Overall, the results show that while library science journals do not fall prey to the same concerning characteristics that librarians use to caution other researchers, there are several areas in which publishers can improve the quality and credibility of their journals.

URL : https://preprint.press.jhu.edu/portal/sites/default/files/06_24.1albro.pdf