Category Archives: oa.paywalled

Digitization and the Market for Physical Works: Evidence from the Google Books Project – American Economic Association

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Abstract:  The free digital distribution of creative works could cannibalize demand for physical versions, but it could also boost physical sales by enabling consumers to discover the original work. We study the impact of the Google Books digitization project on the market for physical books. We find that digitization significantly boosts the demand for physical versions and provide evidence for the discovery channel. Moreover, digitization allows independent publishers to introduce new editions for existing books, further increasing sales. Our results highlight the potential of free digital distribution to strengthen the demand for and supply of physical products.

 

Data sharing in neuroimaging: experiences from the BIDS project | Nature Reviews Neuroscience

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Abstract:  Data sharing is an essential component of open science practice. The Brain Imaging Data Structure project has pioneered a way to organize neuroimaging and behavioural data that enables easy sharing and reuse. We present experiences from the BIDS project and highlight how standards can promote open science.

 

“I Am in a Privileged Situation”: Examining the Factors Promoting Inequity in Open Access Publishing – Ayeni – 2023 – Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology – Wiley Online Library

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Despite increasing advocacy for open access (OA), the uptake of OA in some disciplines has remained low. Existing studies have linked the low uptake in OA publishing in the humanities and social sciences (HSS) to disciplinary norm, limited funding to pay for article processing charges (APCs), and researchers’ preferences. However, there is a growing concern about inequity in OA scholarly communication, as it has remained inaccessible and unaffordable to many researchers. This study therefore investigated inequity in OA publishing in Canada. Using semi-structured interviews, qualitative data was collected from 20 professors from the HSS disciplines of research-intensive universities in Canada. Data was analyzed with NVivo software following the reflexive thematic analysis approach. Findings revealed three main causes of inequity in OA publishing among the participants. These are the cost of APCs, unequal privileges, and gender disparities. Hence, there is a need for concerted efforts by funding agencies, stakeholders, higher education institutions, and researchers to promote equity in OA scholarly communication. Some recommendations for improving equity in OA publishing are provided in this paper.

Evaluation of Transparency and Openness Guidelines in Physical Therapy Journals | Physical Therapy | Oxford Academic

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Abstract:  Objective The goals of this study were to evaluate the extent that physical therapy journals support open science research practices by adhering to the Transparency and Openness Promotion guidelines and to assess the relationship between journal scores and their respective journal impact factor. Methods Scimago, mapping studies, the National Library of Medicine, and journal author guidelines were searched to identify physical therapy journals for inclusion. Journals were graded on 10 standards (29 available total points) related to transparency with data, code, research materials, study design and analysis, preregistration of studies and statistical analyses, replication, and open science badges. The relationship between journal transparency and openness scores and their journal impact factor was determined. Results Thirty-five journals’ author guidelines were assigned transparency and openness factor scores. The median score (interquartile range) across journals was 3.00 out of 29 (3.00) points (for all journals the scores ranged from 0–8). The 2 standards with the highest degree of implementation were design and analysis transparency (reporting guidelines) and study preregistration. No journals reported on code transparency, materials transparency, replication, and open science badges. Transparency and openness promotion factor scores were a significant predictor of journal impact factor scores. Conclusion There is low implementation of the transparency and openness promotion standards by physical therapy journals. Transparency and openness promotion factor scores demonstrated predictive abilities for journal impact factor scores. Policies from journals must improve to make open science practices the standard in research. Journals are in an influential position to guide practices that can improve the rigor of publication which, ultimately, enhances the evidence-based information used by physical therapists. Impact Transparent, open, and reproducible research will move the profession forward by improving the quality of research and increasing the confidence in results for implementation in clinical care.

Access and impact barriers to academic publications: a global study of thesis and dissertation embargo policies | Emerald Insight

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Abstract:  Purpose

Many Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) allow students or their advisors to restrict access to theses/dissertations (TDs) by applying embargoes. This study aims to identify why Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) allow embargoes.

Design/methodology/approach

One hundred HEIs were randomly selected, representing seven geographic regions. The authors imported policies/guidelines for embargoing TDs into MAXQDA software and coded the qualitative data.

Findings

Among the 100 studied HEIs, 43 HEIs (43%) have policies/guidelines on the web for embargoing TDs, most of which are from North America. For the majority of HEIs, embargoes are a voluntary option for students/advisors. Content analysis of the 32 embargo policies showed that embargo reasons (18 key reasons) can be categorized into six broad themes (commercialization, publication, ethical issues, funding contracts/agreements, security and safety, and miscellaneous).

Research limitations/implications

In this study, only those policies are reviewed that are available, discoverable and accessible on HEIs’ websites.

Practical implications

Highlighting the detrimental effect of not managing stipulations towards embargoes clearly, the findings could be useful for national/institutional policymakers and administrators of research departments, academic libraries, institutional repositories and graduate offices.

Originality/value

This is the first study to investigate rationales for TDs embargo practices. It creates awareness of how embargoes are managed and reflected in policy. Ultimately, it recommends further interrogation on how embargoes influence the principle of openness to scholarship.

On Enhancing Clinical Trial Data Sharing | Oncology | JAMA Oncology | JAMA Network

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“Hopkins et al1 should be commended for providing important statistics on sharing of individual-participant data (IPD) from clinical trials by pharmaceutical sponsors, using databases designed specifically for this purpose (clinicalstudydatarequest.com,2 Vivli,3 and Yale University Open Data Access4), as well as direct requests to companies that do not use such databases….

They were granted access to the data requested for 70 of them (77%). This is undoubtedly quite an achievement compared with the situation only a decade ago, when clinical trial data were considered legal property of the sponsoring companies, and as such could not be shared with anyone beyond regulatory agencies.

However, as the authors of this study1 acknowledge, the 70 trials they obtained data from represented only a small fraction of all trials conducted in the same time period. Focusing on the small subset of 203 trials mentioned in the product labels of the approved anticancer medicines, only 91 were considered eligible for data sharing. One wonders what makes a trial ineligible for data sharing, a situation that concerns more than half of the trials….”

Now you have to pay! A deeper look at publishing practices of predatory journals – Freiermuth – Learned Publishing – Wiley Online Library

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Abstract:  In this study, by using Beall’s (Scholarly open-access, 2014; Beall’s list of predatory journals and publishers, 2018) predatory journal lists as well as direct e-mail solicitations from journals, we intentionally submitted a poorly written manuscript to 58 open-access journals using counterfeit names and affiliations. Although, there have been several studies examining the practices of questionable journals, there is a lack of research investigating the interactive processes in detail. Our analysis, then, was to provide a more comprehensive view of the underlying reasoning for the acceptance or rejection of a manuscript. Of the 31 journals acknowledging receipt of our manuscript, 21 accepted it either unexpurgated or asked only for cosmetic revisions. Regarding ‘positive responses’, we point to five common flaws associated with such journals, namely that (1) they lack any interest in the researchers who are submitting manuscripts; (2) they do not judge academic writing in accordance with expected conventions; (3) they appear to be indifferent to scholarship including research design, plagiarism issues, and citation quality; (4) their review process is opaque and overly hasty, and (5) the tone they use in correspondence e-mail messages is highly inappropriate. Based upon the investigation, it is clear that such journals’ primary aim is in securing the article processing fee. Our findings paint a more comprehensive picture of questionable journal practices with the hope of disseminating such information to the broader scholarly community.

 

Open-Source 3D Morphing Software for Facial Plastic Surgery and Facial Landmark Detection Research and Open Access Face Data Set Based on Deep Learning (Artificial Intelligence) Generated Synthetic 3D Models | Facial Plastic Surgery & Aesthetic Medicine

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“Abstract:  Background: The scarcity of 3D facial models presents a significant hurdle for researchers and educators. Gathering such data demands substantial resources.

Objective: To introduce an open-source 3D morphing software to generate 3D facial data sets for research and to provide a large sample data set that is based on synthetically generated 3D models.

Methods: Software is developed to morph 3D facial models in bulk by altering landmark locations. Twenty synthetic 3D facial models are generated utilizing deep learning tools and 28 landmarks located on each. The measurements of synthetic models are confirmed to be realistic by comparing them with facial statistics. Several facial deformities and types are simulated at various magnitudes on 3D models to generate a large data set.

Results: An open-source software and an open-access data set of 980 3D facial models, each with 28 landmark locations, are provided. Since the data set is based on synthetically generated 3D models, no institutional review board approval is required.

Conclusion: The 3D morphing software and the large 3D data set are expected to benefit researchers and educators in the field of facial surgery and facial landmark detection.

AI in medical imaging grand challenges: translation from competition to research benefit and patient care

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Abstract:  Artificial intelligence (AI), in one form or another, has been a part of medical imaging for decades. The recent evolution of AI into approaches such as deep learning has dramatically accelerated the application of AI across a wide range of radiologic settings. Despite the promises of AI, developers and users of AI technology must be fully aware of its potential biases and pitfalls, and this knowledge must be incorporated throughout the AI system development pipeline that involves training, validation, and testing. Grand challenges offer an opportunity to advance the development of AI methods for targeted applications and provide a mechanism for both directing and facilitating the development of AI systems. In the process, a grand challenge centralizes (with the challenge organizers) the burden of providing a valid benchmark test set to assess performance and generalizability of participants’ models and the collection and curation of image metadata, clinical/demographic information, and the required reference standard. The most relevant grand challenges are those designed to maximize the open-science nature of the competition, with code and trained models deposited for future public access. The ultimate goal of AI grand challenges is to foster the translation of AI systems from competition to research benefit and patient care. Rather than reference the many medical imaging grand challenges that have been organized by groups such as MICCAI, RSNA, AAPM, and grand-challenge.org, this review assesses of the role of grand challenges in promoting AI technologies for research advancement and for eventual clinical implementation, including their promises and limitations.

Wikipedia can measure dissemination of science | Times Higher Education (THE)

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“Article edit history is an untapped resource in charting the evolution of scientific knowledge over time, researchers say….

Wikipedia could prove an invaluable source in charting the output of scientific knowledge as it diffuses into the public discourse, argue the authors of new research.

Rona Aviram and Omer Benjakob, whose findings were published on 13 September in the journal Plos One, combed over thousands of iterations of articles in the online encyclopaedia related to the gene-editing technology CRISPR, which served as a case study into how scientific findings influence Wikipedia entries….”

Who tweets scientific publications? A large?scale study of tweeting audiences in all areas of research – Zhang – Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology – Wiley Online Library

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Abstract:  The purpose of this study is to investigate the validity of tweets about scientific publications as an indicator of societal impact by measuring the degree to which the publications are tweeted beyond academia. We introduce methods that allow for using a much larger and broader data set than in previous validation studies. It covers all areas of research and includes almost 40 million tweets by 2.5 million unique tweeters mentioning almost 4 million scientific publications. We find that, although half of the tweeters are external to academia, most of the tweets are from within academia, and most of the external tweets are responses to original tweets within academia. Only half of the tweeted publications are tweeted outside of academia. We conclude that, in general, the tweeting of scientific publications is not a valid indicator of the societal impact of research. However, publications that continue being tweeted after a few days represent recent scientific achievements that catch attention in society. These publications occur more often in the health sciences and in the social sciences and humanities.

 

Pictures at an exhibition: How to share your imaging data – Hartley – Journal of Microscopy – Wiley Online Library

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Abstract:  Open access to data underpinning published results is a key pillar of scientific reproducibility. Making data available at scale also provides opportunities for data reuse, encouraging the development of new analysis approaches. In this poster article, accompanying a recorded talk, we will explain the benefits of publicly archiving your image data alongside your published manuscripts, as well as highlight what resources are available to do this. This will include the BioImage Archive, EMBL-EBI’s new resource for biological image data, https://www.ebi.ac.uk/bioimage-archive/. We will look at how image data submission works, how to prepare in advance for archiving your data, and upcoming developments.

 

Article Processing Charges in Gold Open Access Journals: An Empirical Study: Journal of Electronic Resources in Medical Libraries: Vol 0, No 0

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Abstract:  This study focuses on analyzing the trends in article processing charges (APCs) levied by open access journals. To gather the required data, a CSV file was generated from the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). The APC values were assessed and converted into standardized currencies, including INR and USD. Among the 17,379 journals included in the DOAJ, only 5,122 journals were found to charge APCs. Through the examination of the collected data, it was discovered that the highest APC amount recorded was INR 518,334.95 (equivalent to USD 6680.46), while the lowest APC observed was INR 1.04 (equivalent to USD 0.013).