Category Archives: oa.unfamiliarity

A survey of medical researchers indicates poor awareness of research data management processes and a role for data librarians – Milewska – – Health Information & Libraries Journal – Wiley Online Library

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Abstract:  Background

The European Parliament’s directive on open data indicates the direction to follow for all public institutions in Europe. The portal Polish Platform of Medical Research (PPM) required more information about researcher attitudes and training requirements for strategic planning.

Objectives

The aim was to assess (1) the status of knowledge about research data management among medical researchers in Poland, and (2) their attitudes towards data sharing. This knowledge may help to inform a training program and adapt PPM to the requirements of researchers.

Methods

The authors circulated an online survey and received responses from 603 researchers representing medical sciences and related disciplines. The survey was conducted in 2019 at seven Polish medical universities and at the Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine. Analysis used descriptive statistics.

Results

Data sharing was not widespread (55.7% only shared with their research team, 9.8% had shared data on an open access basis). Many cited possible benefits of research data sharing but were concerned about drawbacks (e.g. fraud, plagiarism).

Discussion

Polish medical scientists, like many researchers, are not aware of the processes required for safe data preparation for sharing. Academic libraries should develop roles for data librarians to help train researchers.

Conclusion

Fears about the dangers of data sharing need to be overcome before researchers are willing to share their own research data.

Guest Post – APC Waiver Policies; A Job Half-done? – The Scholarly Kitchen

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“Most, if not all, open access publishers offer to waive publication charges (of whatever flavor) for researchers in lower and middle-income countries (LMICs) without access to funds to pay them. After all, no-one wants to see open access actually increasing barriers and reducing diversity and inclusion in direct opposition to one of its fundamental objectives. However, as an echo of the “build it and they will come” mentality, waiver policies may end up failing to achieve their intended outcome if they are poorly constructed and communicated to their intended beneficiaries. A recent study by INASP revealed that fully 60% of respondents to an AuthorAID survey had paid Article Processing Charges (APCs) from their own pockets, despite the widespread availability of waivers. This could be due to internal organizational bureaucracy but more likely to the lack of awareness and understanding of APC waivers and how to claim them.

A White Paper published jointly by STM and Elsevier’s International Center for the Study of Research in September 2020 on how to achieve an equitable transition to open access included a specific recommendation to make publisher policies on APC waivers more consistent and more transparent. The authors commented, “Even though this business model may turn out to be an interim step on the road to universal open access, it is likely to persist for several years to come and may unwittingly end up preventing much important research from reaching its intended audience.”…”

Owens | Scholarly Communication Outside the R1: Measuring Faculty and Graduate Student Knowledge and Interest at a Doctoral/Professional University | Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication

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Abstract:  INTRODUCTION This study explores the baseline knowledge and interest of faculty and graduate students at a Carnegie-classified Doctoral/Professional University regarding different components of scholarly communication. METHODS A survey was developed to inquire about such topics as scholarly research, scholarly publishing, access to research, copyright, measuring impact, promoting research, and open-educational resources. Responses more significantly represented the humanities and social sciences versus the natural and applied sciences. RESULTS & DISCUSSION Results showed some hesitancy in embracing the open access (OA) publishing model, especially the use of article processing charges (APCs). Faculty largely collect original data and believe public access to original data is important, but this varies by college and includes almost one-fourth of faculty who do not feel that sharing data is important. The areas in which respondents expressed the highest level of knowledge correlate directly with the areas in which respondents expressed the most interest in professional development. Preferences in professional development modality were split between virtual and in-person sessions. With virtual sessions specifically, graduate students prefer synchronous sessions while faculty prefer pre-recorded sessions. CONCLUSION Respondents were generally aware of the library’s current scholarly communications services, but additional promotion and marketing is still needed, especially for colleges with the lowest areas of engagement.

 

EIFL agreements result in increased OA publishing | EIFL

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“The EIFL Licensing Programme has been negotiating open access agreements with publishers since 2016. These include waived and discounted Article Processing Charges (APCs), as well as free and discounted read & publish terms, and aim to increase the amount of open access publishing output. We currently have 11 agreements with publishers, six of which were signed in 2020. 

Many publishers have APC waiver and discount schemes for authors from developing and transition economy countries. However, publishers’ eligibility criteria can change unexpectedly; hybrid journals are usually excluded, and many researchers are not aware of these schemes as they are not always well publicized….”

Press release: New Research4Life User Review sheds light on users’ needs and challenges

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“Research4Life programs make a significant positive difference to research experiences in low- and middle-income countries – but only when users know they are available and how to use them.

This is a key finding of an independent Research4Life user experience review conducted during 2020 using a combination of interviews, surveys and focus groups by INASP across a range of countries and institution types: the findings will guide Research4Life’s future work in reducing the knowledge gap between researchers in industrialized nations and those in low- and middle-income countries….”

Awareness of predatory journals and open access publishing among orthopaedic and trauma surgeons – results from an online survey in Germany | BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders | Full Text

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Abstract:  Background

Along with emerging open access journals (OAJ) predatory journals increasingly appear. As they harm accurate and good scientific research, we aimed to examine the awareness of predatory journals and open access publishing among orthopaedic and trauma surgeons.

Methods

In an online survey between August and December 2019 the knowledge on predatory journals and OAJ was tested with a hyperlink made available to the participants via the German Society for Orthopaedics and Trauma Surgery (DGOU) email distributor.

Results

Three hundred fifty orthopaedic and trauma surgeons participated, of which 291 complete responses (231 males (79.4%), 54 females (18.6%) and 5?N/A (2.0%)) were obtained. 39.9% were aware of predatory journals. However, 21.0% knew about the “Directory of Open Access Journals” (DOAJ) as a register for non-predatory open access journals. The level of profession (e.g. clinic director, consultant) (p =?0.018) influenced the awareness of predatory journals. Interestingly, participants aware of predatory journals had more often been listed as corresponding authors (p <?0.001) and were well published as first or last author (p <?0.001). Awareness of OAJ was masked when journal selection options did not to provide any information on the editorial board, the peer review process or the publication costs.

Conclusion

The impending hazard of predatory journals is unknown to many orthopaedic and trauma surgeons. Early stage clinical researchers must be trained to differentiate between predatory and scientifically accurate journals.

Open access information resources and university libraries: Analysis of perceived awareness, challenges, and opportunities – ScienceDirect

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Abstract:  This study assesses the perceived level of Open Access (OA) awareness, challenges, and opportunities in context of university libraries of Pakistan. The differences between public and private sector university libraries in terms of their awareness, challenges and opportunities were also analyzed in this study. Survey research design, based on a structured questionnaire, was employed to meet the objectives of the study. The population of the study was libraries of Higher Education Commission of Pakistan (HEC) recognized universities located in Punjab and Islamabad (Pakistan). The findings revealed that majority of university libraries were fully aware of HEC-National Digital Library (NDL) OA resources, OA journals, and Pakistan Research Repository, whereas, somewhat aware of Budapest OA Initiative, and Diamond OA Model. Lack of additional resources (staff, time, efforts), unreliability of OA information resources, and inadequate tools and infrastructure were identified as top challenges. However, free access, increase in library value, and fulfilling users need with shrinking budget were top three identified opportunities. The study did not find any significant statistically difference between public and private university libraries in terms of their level of awareness, perceived challenges and opportunities. This study is administered in institutional context and fills the literature gap.

 

An analysis of the factors affecting open access to research output in institutional repositories in selected universities in East Africa | JLSC

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Kakai, M., 2021. An analysis of the factors affecting open access to research output in institutional repositories in selected universities in East Africa. Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication, 9(1), p.eP2276. DOI: http://doi.org/10.7710/2162-3309.2276

Abstract: Institutional repositories (IRs) present universities with an opportunity to provide global open access (OA) to their scholarship, however, this avenue was underutilised in two of the three universities in this study. This study aimed at proposing interventions to improve access to research output in IRs in universities in East Africa, and it adds to the depth of knowledge on IRs by pointing out the factors that limit OA in IRs, some of which include lack of government and funder support for OA and mediated content collection workflows that hardly involved seeking author permission to self-archive. METHODS A mixed methods approach, following a concurrent strategy was used to investigate the low level of OA in IRs. Data was collected from three purposively selected IRs in universities in East Africa, using self-administered questionnaires from 183 researchers and face-to-face interviews from six librarians. results The findings revealed that content was collected on a voluntary basis, with most of the research output deposited in the IR without the authors’ knowledge. The respondents in this study were, however, supportive of the activities of the IR, and would participate in providing research output in the IR as OA if required to do so. CONCLUSION The low level of OA in IRs in universities in East Africa could be increased by improving the IR workflow, collection development, and marketing processes. Self-archiving could be improved by increasing the researchers’ awareness and knowledge of OA and importance of IRs, while addressing their concerns about copyright infringement.

Full article: Open Access and Promotion and Tenure Evaluation Plans at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire

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Abstract:  Department and program evaluation plans at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire were examined to see if these documents provide evidence that could be used to justify supporting the publication of peer-reviewed open access articles toward tenure and promotion. In an earlier study, the authors reveal that faculty members at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire are more unaware of open access publishing than their counterparts at larger universities. These findings dovetail with other studies that show that faculty members are reluctant to publish in open access journals because of concerns about the quality of those journals. The existing body of scholarship suggests that tenure-line faculty fear publishing in open access journals because it could adversely impact their chances of promotion and tenure. The authors of this current study sought to determine if department and program evaluation plans could influence negative perceptions faculty have of open access journals. The implications of this study for librarians, scholarly communication professionals, tenure-line faculty, departments, and programs are addressed.

 

Chinese PhD Students’ Perceptions of Predatory Journals: A Survey Study | Journal of Scholarly Publishing

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Abstract:  This study investigates the attitudes of Chinese PhD students toward predatory journals. Data were gathered using an online questionnaire to which 332 Chinese PhD students responded. Our main conclusions are 1) in the sciences, technology, and medicine, respondents frequently confused predatory journals with open access journals; 2) in the humanities and social sciences, the respondents identified only Chinese-language (not English-language) journals as predatory and made a number of misidentifications; and 3) most respondents indicated that they would not submit papers to predatory journals, mainly because doing so would hurt their reputation, yet the minority who were willing to do so mentioned easy acceptance and a short wait time for publication as the top reasons for considering it.

 

Ewelina Pabja?czyk-Wlaz?o, Poland: Open Science is a must, which was strongly shown by the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic | Eurodoc

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What are the main challenges for Open Science implementation in your country?

The biggest challenges in Poland are, first of all, the lack of awareness and lack of knowledge about Open Science among researchers. Despite the fact that there are many initiatives, events and courses, either available for free on the internet or as services and resources provided by university libraries, scientists in Poland do not always know what Open Science and related concepts are about. Another problem concerns the lack of systemic support in this regard at the university level or national level policies e.g. during research assessment. If these policies will not include incentives for researchers to practice OS, it will be very difficult to develop this habit and permanently introduce it into the researchers’ daily work. In addition, practicing OS requires specific skills, as well as some kind of administrative work, which, given the current heavy workload of researchers, may become another unwanted duty if universities do not provide support in this area. The discussion on this topic in Poland is still difficult – Open Science has many opponents and, sadly, it often applies to scientists themselves who do not distinguish OS practices from practices of predatory publishing houses….”

Preprints South Asia Survey 2020: A Report

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Abstract:  A survey on conducted to know the status of awareness and attitude particularly towards preprints among the research scholars, scientists and librarians in the South Asian region during the months of April and May 2020 had maximum responses from India (83.71%) and majority of Agricultural Sciences (54%) discipline. Respondents ranked ‘Journal’s Impact Factor’ at the top factor for selecting journals to publish. Seventy five percent had at least 25% of their publications in Open Access and had paid the APCs (65.33%) for publications and the source of funds are personal pooling (30.34%). While 61.72% read preprints, 27.03% have not heard about preprints and 11.26% never read the preprints. However, those read, 64.42% trust the preprints. And why they share preprints is because of ‘belief in open access’ (39.91%), ‘rapid feedback’ (23.53%) and ‘timely sharing results’ (21.72%). With regard to citing preprints, 60.36% never cited any preprints and 79.73% respondent’s preprints were never cited. However, the respondents mentioned that indexing, citing, visibility, consideration in assessment & evaluation will motivate the authors to share preprints.

 

Implementing Open Science policies into library processes – case study of the University of Eastern Finland library

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Abstract:  This is a case study about the creation of open science services in the University of Eastern Finland. The library has overseen the open science services that have been actively implemented from 2010 onwards due to the development of the digitalisation of science and open science policies. A survey was conducted to determine how the UEF’s academic faculty use the services provided as well as their attitudes towards opening their own research findings in this manner. The researchers seem to be most interested in issues that influence their daily work, i.e. data management plans and opening their publications. It seems that the culture of openness is still at the development stage within UEF. The innovators, i.e. active research groups and researchers, are already practicing and encouraging openness, but the majority of the academic staff seems to be either unaware of open science or unwilling to implement it, due to the fact that incentives and career advancements still support the traditional way of conducting research.

 

Determining the factors influencing the level of awareness and usage of open source digital repository software by academic librarians in India | Emerald Insight

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Abstract:  Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the level of awareness and usage of open source digital repository software (DRS). The paper also studies the factors, which influence the level of awareness and usage of different open source DRS by academic librarians in India.

Design/methodology/approach

The study administered an online questionnaire to academic librarians in India to know their level of awareness and usage of open source DRS. The questionnaire aimed to gather the awareness and usage of open source DSR. In total, 374 complete responses were collected from academic librarians in India and the collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Moreover, Fishers’ exact test was used to identify whether factors i.e. qualification and participation in workshop/seminar influence the level of awareness and usage of open source DRS.

Findings

The results of the study reveal that the level of awareness and usage of open source DRS, namely, DSpace (Mean = 2.92, SD = 0.906) and Greenstone digital library software (GSDL) (Mean = 2.18, SD = 0.699) are high amongst the academic librarians in India. In total, 33.4%, 11.5% of the participants are using DSpace and GSDL, respectively, on regular basis. Fishers’ exact test shows that factor(s) i.e. qualifications and participation in workshop/seminar affect the level of awareness and usage of open source DRS. The results show that there exits strong relation between participation in workshop/seminar and awareness and usage of DSpace (Fishers’ exact test = 13.473, p < 0.05).

Originality/value

This paper is the new type of study exploring level of awareness and usage of open source DRS by academic librarians in India. It identifies the factors that affect the awareness and usage of open source DRS. It is the first study to analyze the statistical significance between Indian librarians’ participation in workshop/seminar and their level of awareness and usage of different open source DRS.

Integrating FAIR Data Science Competences in Higher Education Curricula: The Role of Academic and Research Libraries  | FAIRsFAIR

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“Our point of departure for the workshop was to present the findings from FAIRsFAIR survey activites conducted by the European University Association (EUA) in collaboration with partners of the FAIRsFAIR project during 2019 to investigate the extent to which FAIR research data management principles are present in university curricula. These findings and the related recommendations are documented in the recently published report D7.1 FAIR in Higher Education.  For easy reference, a quick graphic overview of the report is provided at this webpage. 

The findings most pertinent to workshop participants include:

Awareness of the FAIR principles is considered high among professional and support staff (e.g. data stewards, librarians), moderate among the institutional leadership, but still rather low among researchers and especially students.
Higher education institutions are increasingly aware of the need to integrate digital skills into their curricula. Only 38% of respondents to this question stated that their organisation had a related strategy in place at institutional or departmental level – or both. However 31% stated that although there was no strategy yet in place, their institution was developing one.
The extent to which data science skills are currently being addressed in university teaching is reported to be rather low overall at the bachelor and master level and moderate at the doctoral level. Respondents expressed an urgent need to strengthen the teaching of data-related competences at all three levels. …”