Scholarly communication

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Scholarly communication"

Joleen Cox
5 years ago
Views:

1 Scholarly communication Emanuela Casson 10 may 2017

2 What is scholarly communication?

3 The major players in SC The traditional/formal process of scholarly communication consists of four major groups of players with different roles: researchers publishers libraries consumers/users

4 The origins of the scientific journals 1665 Journal des Sçavans Its content included obituaries of famous men, church history, and legal reports. The scope was to inform about everything that was happening in the community of savants Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London The functions of the journal are: o registration(date stamping and provenance) o certification(but he uses no referee system) o dissemination o(archiving)

5 Types of journal articles (1) Letter or communication: short description of important current research findings that are usually fast-tracked for immediate publication because they are considered urgent, usually without experimental data. It may be followed by paper in which the research is further developed. Research note: short descriptions of current research findings considered less urgent or important than those that appear in Letters (or Communications) [Jose Russo, The tools of science: the handbook for the apprentice of biomedical research, Word Scientific, 2011]

6 Types of journal articles (2) Review:provides an overview and critical analysis of relevant published scholarly articles, research reports, books, theses etc. on the topic or issue to be investigated. Reviews are secondary sources; they do not report any new or original experimental work. Paper or article: complete description of current original research findings, with clearly defined structure. They are usually between five and twenty pages. Scientific articles published in scientific journals are primary sources.

7 The structure of the scientific article The structure of the scientific article gradually came to be extremely well-organised (IMRaD)

8 The advantages of formal printed communication 1. information can be spread to a widely scattered group of readers; 2. detailed information, such as descriptions of methods, tables, diagrams, results etc can easily be given; 3. printed documents contain information which can be critically examined and verified; 4. the documents can easily be referred to as and when required; 5. published documents provide a means for establishing "priority" of academic work, and thereby contribute to establishing academic merit for the author(s)

9 Peer review

10 Peer-review Peer review in all its forms is central to scholarly communications. Peer-review is radically different from domain to domain, from discipline to discipline. And, often enough, from journal to journal. In the peer review process, editors, reviewers, and authors cooperatively work together to ensure the qualityof scientific research before it is published. Peer review means that other scientific experts in the field check research papers for validity, significance and originality

11 Peer review: not as old as you might think (1) It would be far too simplistic to say that peer review emerged fully formed from the 17th century. JournaldesSçavanshadan editorial teamasearlyas : the Royal Society of Edinburgh began to distribute submissions accordingtothesubjectmattertothosememberswhoaremostversedin these matters. 1752: Philosophical Transactions editorial responsibility had been transferred to a Committee of Papers, but...

12 Peer review: not as old as you might think (2) Many widely read specialist journals in the 18th and 19th centuries, however, had no systematic refereeing procedures at all. It was not until the late 20th century that external refereeing came to be seen as an essential feature of a respectable scientific journal. 1936, Albert Einstein, Nathan Rosen and Physical Review I see no reason to address the, in any case erroneous, comments of your anonymous expert. On the basis of this incident I prefer to publish the paper elsewhere The 1960s and 1970s seem to have been a crucial period of transition for ideas about peer review. 1973, external refereeing becomes a requirement for publication in Nature

13 Peer-review: acceptance rates (1) The average acceptance rate across all STM journals is about 50% (The STM report But: Sciencenow accepts less than 7% of the original research papers submitted. Nature Chemistry the overall acceptance rate of the journal was roughly 9% Acceptance rates for Elsevier journals Elsevier Journal Finder helps you find journals that could be best suited for publishing your scientific article (I.F., editorial times, % acceptance, embargo period, user license...) Es.

14 Peer-review: acceptance rates (2) Acceptance rates for Wiley Journals ( ) Rejection rates for Springer Journals ( )

15 Peer-review: single and double blind Single Blind Review The reviewers know who the authors are, but the authors do not know who the reviewers are. The most common system in science disciplines. PROS:This allows reviewers to provide honest, critical reviews and opinions without fear of reprisal from the authors. CONS: Lack of accountability, allows unscrupulous reviewers to submit unwarranted negative reviews, delay the review process and steal ideas. Double Blind Review The reviewers do not know who the authors are, and the authors do not know who the reviewers are. Main form of peer review used in the humanities and social sciences. PROS: Reduces possible bias resulting from knowing who the authors are or where they come from, work assessed on its own merits. CONS: Involves some effort to make sure manuscripts are anonymised, reviewers can often guess who the authors are

16 Peer review should not be treated as sacred cow

17 Common criticisms (1) Stifles innovation: there may be a tendency towards conservative judgements. Bias: the violation of impartiality in the evaluation of a submission: (a) error in assessing a submission's true quality (b) social characteristics of the author (c) social characteristics of the reviewer and/or (d) content of the submission. Expensive: peer reviewers are rarely paid by publishers. Expensive mostly in time. But it is also expensive in terms of money for the research community(time = money) and for publishers(infrastructure and staff)

18 Common criticisms (2) Burdensome: criticism of the perceived burden on academics involved in the peer-review process, particularly in the role of reviewer. Peer review is rarely acknowledged as part of the formal workload of an academic researcher. Reviewing is often an out of normal hours activity and therefore adds additional burdens on researchers Lack of evidence of efficacy: Despite these criticisms editorial peer review is viewed by many as important. However, there is little solid evidence on its efficacy.

19 Fake peer review (1) Retraction Watch < is a blog that reports on retractions of scientific papers.the blog was launched in August 2010 August 2015, 64 more papers retracted for fake reviews, this time from Springer journals more-papers-retracted-for-fake-reviews-this-time-from-springerjournals/ Sarah Kaplan, Major publisher retracts 64 scientific papers in fake peer review outbreak, Washington Post, 18/08/2015

20 Fake peer review (2) SAGE Publications busts peer review and citation ring, 60 papers retracted SAGE Publishers is retracting 60 articles from the Journal of Vibration and Control after an investigation revealed a peer review and citation ring involving a professor in Taiwan.

21 The future of peer review 85% of reviewers spend a median 5 hours (mean 9 hours) 85% of reviewers spend a median 5 hours (mean 9 hours) per review, and evaluate about 8 papers over 12 months

22 New forms of peer review (1) Open peer review:thereviewersknowwhotheauthorsareand the authors know who the reviewers are(open identities). o PROS: Greater accountability and reduced opportunity for bias or inappropriate actions. o CONS: Potential reviewers may be more likely to decline to review. Revealing reviewer identity may lead to animosity from authors, damaged relationships and repercussions for job prospects, promotion and grant funding. But also: - Open reports: review reports are published alongside the relevant article - Open interaction: direct reciprocal discussion between author(s) and reviewers, and/or between reviewers, is allowed and encouraged. In traditional peer review, reviewers and authors correspond only with editors

23 New forms of peer review (2) Open peer review is moving mainstream OpenAIRE survey on open peer review: attitudes and experience amongst editors, authors and reviewers -over editors, authors and reviewers -project during September and October 2016 (OpenAIRE releases the results 2 may 2017) -high levels of experience with OPR amongst sample: three out of four (76.2%) of respondents said that they had they had takenpartinanoprprocess -there seems to be a rather strong pushback against open identities, with 47.7% of respondents believing that open identities will make peer review either worse

24 New forms of peer review (3) Transferable peer review: This is a new system to help transfer peer review between journals es. Wiley journals Transferable peer review pilot Post-publication peer review: is when a paper is scrutinised, replicated and commented on by experts after it is published. New web technologies allow readers to rate papers, and add comments and notes to online articles for readers to see. Es. PubPeer

25 Peer review recognition Several metrics have been developed to appraise and quantify the work of authors, articles and journals. On the contrary, no attention has been given to peer-reviewers and their work. No metrics exist to recognize their performance. Publons is a website and free service for researchers to share, discuss and receive credit for peer review of academic publications. ReviewerCredits.com is a web-based platform keeps history of the reviews performed by a scientist, assigning a Reviewer-Index accordingly. Through the website, researchers can declare completion of peer reviews. The system verifies that the review has been actually performed by asking a confirmation from the journal.

26 The STM journals market

27 The STM journals market - who Large commercial publishing houses increase their control of the science system

28 The STM journals market - price Periodicals price survey

29 Transformation of scholarly communication The crisis in scholarly communication is mainly because of the following factors: There is the high cost of scholarly journals Increasing control of the scholarly journals industry by the commercial firms. Libraries budgets do not match up with escalating prices of journals. Ultimately, libraries subscribe to fewer journals.

30 The paradoxes of Scholarly Communication

31 New models of SC There are three important new ways apart from scholarly communication in which the internet enables the communication of scholars: open access archives open access publishing other means of scholarly communication: academic social networks(researchgate, Academia.edu)

32 What is Open Access? Open-access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions (Peter Suber) OA removes: OA removes: price barriers (subscriptions, licensing fees, payper-view fees) permission barriers (most copyright and licensing restrictions)

33 What is the OA movement? It s a global movement to make scientific and scholarly literature openly accessible online to all users, free of charge so that everyone benefits from the dissemination of knowledge and information. Open Archives Initiative (1999) Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002) Berlin declaration (2003) Dichiarazione di Messina (2004) Timeline of the open access movement

34 Gold road and green road There are two primary vehicles for delivering OA to research articles: publishing in OA journals("gold road") self archiving in repositories("green road") The chief difference between them is that OA journals conduct peer review and OA repositories do not.

35 Gold road OA journals ("gold OA"): conduct peer review (es. BioMed Central) The biggest misconception about open access is that it's that somehow does not use peer review it easier than let authors retain copyright. it easier than OA repositoriesto provide libre OA. some OA journal publishers are non-profit (e.g. PLoS) and some are for-profit (e.g. BioMed Central). sometimes journals have a subsidy from a university or professional society. Sometimes journals charge a publication fee (APS) on accepted articles, to be paid by the author or the author's sponsor (employer, funding agency). For a list of OA journals in all fields and languages, see the DOAJ - Directory of Open Access Journals

36 The dark side of publishing

37 Predatory publishers : Beall's List Beall's List : potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly openaccess publishers hers/ (This service is no longer available, but... ordpress.com/2017/01/23/be alls-list-of-predatorypublishers/)

38 Predatory publishers: exemple /2013/10/09/ed itoriapredatoria/#co mments /2013/11/

39 Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing by dell Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA)

40 Green road OA repositories : can be organized by discipline (e.g. arxiv for physics) or institution (e.g. Padua@research) do not perform peer review. However, they generally host articles peer-reviewed elsewhere. can contain preprints, postprints, or both. If authors transfer copyright to a publisher, then OA archiving requires the publisher's permission.

41 SHERPA/RoMEO

the publisher s agreement http://www.sparc.

42 SPARC Author Addendum The SPARC Author Addendum is a legal instrument that modifies the publisher s agreement

43 Open Access doubts SOAP Study of Open Access publishing (project funded by the European Commission under FP7) quality of repositories fear of plagiarism lack of time other?

44 Academic Social Networks

45 The researchers do differ from other social media users is the tendency(or need) to share publications. Thedifferentfunctionsof asite seem toaffect the extent to which users are active, and also seem to correlate to different user types. Content sharing sites had the most active users (68% of the 1.1 million researchers sampled from ResearchGate, and 46% of the 1 million researchers sampled from Academia.edu, had posted content to the platform) Document sharing systems, such as ResearchGate and Academia.edu, stand out as the most successful spaces for both content generation and social networking, because they support easy sharing of full text documents, the primary academic output for a researcher

46 ResearchGate and Academia.edu ResearchGate < and Academia.edu < are social networking platforms whose primary aim is to connect researchers with common interests. Users create profiles on these services, and are then encouraged to list their publications and other scholarly activities, upload copies of manuscripts they ve authored, and build connections with scholars they work or co-author with. Both services are commercial companies.

47 Scholarly collaboration network? Analysis of researchers behavior within these platforms suggests that most register to use them for egoist motives rather than for collaborative purposes: - users viewers and producers, majority are viewers(academia.edu 73%) - the low level of participation in groups(the Question& Answer feature,islittleused-only1%ofusersraisingaquery) Given that a substantial proportion of researchers are not using the social/collaborative aspects of these sites, their success may be more as private desktop reference managers than as scholarly networks. The members gather together for common purposes but nonetheless carry out their activities independent of one another. Ortega, Jose Luis, Academic Social Networks: Collaborative Environments or Diogenes Clubs?, dec 8, 2016,

48 A social networking site is not an open access repository (1)

49 A social networking site is not an open access repository (2) Openness and interoperability Long-term preservation and access Business models Use of your contacts and personal data Terms of Use (ResearchGate and Academia.edu) Copyright infringement (frequently!) A social networking site is not an open access repository / Office of Scholarly Communication - University of California

50 References Baldwin, Melinda, In referees we trust?, Physics Today, february 2017, 70, 2, 44 Bosch, Stephen; Henderson, Kittie, Fracking the Ecosystem : Periodicals Price Survey 2016, LibraryJournal, 21 april 2016, Csiszar, Alex, Peer Review: Troubled from the start, Nature, April 2016, 532(7599), p Kaplan, Sarah, Major publisher retracts 64 scientific papers in fake peer review outbreak, Washington Post, 18/08/ Larivière V; Haustein S; Mongeon P., The oligopoly of academic publishers in the Digital Era, PLoS ONE, Lee, Carole J.; Sugimoto, Cassidy R.; Zhang, Guo, Bias in peer review, Journal of the american society for information science and technology, 2013, 64(1), p Long, Matthew P.; Schonfeld, Roger C., Supporting the changing research practices of Chemists, New York, Ithaka S+R, The scientific article in the age of digitization/ by John Mackenzie Owen.- Dordrecht: Springer, c2007 ISBN Ortega, Jose Luis, Academic Social Networks: Collaborative Environments or Diogenes Clubs?, dec 8, 2016,

51 Osterloh, Margit ; Kieser, Alfred, Double-Blind Peer Review: How to Slaughter a Sacred Cow, pp in Incentives and Performance: Governance of Research Organizations/ Isabell M. Welpe, Springer, 2014 Ross-Hellauer, T., What is open peer review? A systematic review, F1000Research, 27 april 2017, 6:588 Smart, Pippa, Peer review: an expensive business, Learned Publishing, 2016, 29(1), p Velden, Theresa; Lagoze, Carl, The value of new Scientific Communication models for Chemistry: white paper, october Ware, Mark, Mabe, Michael, The STM Report : an overview of scientific and scholarly journal publishing, 4. ed., The Hague : International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers, Wu, Jianguo, Improving the writing of research papers: IMRAD and beyond, Landscape Ecology, 2010, 26(10), p Zuckerman, Harriet; Merton, Robert K. Patterns of evaluation in science: institutionalisation, structure and functions of the referee system, Minerva, January 1971, Volume 9, Issue 1, pp A social networking site is not an open access repository / Office of Scholarly Communication - University of California [09/05/2017]

Scholarly communication

Scholarly communication 2016/11/04 Emanuela Casson What we talk about Definition and players Scientific journals o brief history o functions o types of journal articles Peer-review The STM journals market