Ethical Aspects of Open Access:
A Windy Road
December 2018
ALLEA
ALL E uropean
A cademies
Published in Berlin by ALLEA
December 2018
ALLEA
c/o Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and
Humanities
Jaegerstr. 22/23
10117 Berlin Germany
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Redistribution, including in the form of extracts,
is permitted for educational, scientic and private
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Acknowledgements
ALLEA would like to thank the Royal Flemish
Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts for
hosting this event as well as all the speakers for their
valuable contributions. Great attention was paid in
the compilation of this report to ensure an accurate
reection of the discussions of the workshop held in
Brussels on 1 February 2018. The opinions mentioned in
this report may not necessarily reect ALLEA’s opinion
or those of its Member Academies.
Ethical Aspects of Open Access:
A Windy Road
December 2018
ALLEA
ALL E uropean
A cademies
Table of Contents
Foreword.......................................................................................................................................7
Keynote: Ethical Aspects of Open Access – László Fesüs................................................................8
Editorial Responsibility in an Open Access World – Chris Graf........................................................14
Open Data: Balancing Transparency with Resilience – Stephan Lewandowsky.............................20
Questionable and Unethical Publishers: How to Spot Them and Enable Researchers to Avoid
Being Trapped – Lars Bjørnshauge...............................................................................................26
Research Assessment in Open Science – Michele Garnkel...........................................................32
Dealing with the Challenges of Openness – Stakeholder Perspectives...........................................36
Workshop Programme.................................................................................................................40
About the ALLEA Permanent Working Group Science & Ethics.....................................................42
About ALLEA...............................................................................................................................44
7
Ever since the Berlin Declaration in 2003 marked
a milestone in the proliferation of open access
publishing, the topic has attracted large interest
among the scientific community and beyond.
The idea to provide results of research funded
by taxpayer money free of charge to the general
public is as simple as it is enticing. Yet, in the past
15 years, a variety of different models and forms of
access have created a vast, and at times confusing,
system leading to uncertainty among the research
community about this, at its heart, very laudable
development.
The advent of open access coincides with increasing
pressures on the academic community to publish or
perish, whereby researchers feel the need to publish
as many research articles in as many impactful
journals as possible in order to further their careers.
Predatory journals have taken advantage of these
existential pressures and prey on researchers to
circumvent established practices of good research
conduct.
However, open access is here to stay, as the
European Commission’s plans to publish all of the
research funded within its research framework
programmes in open access by 2020 clearly show.
Foreword
It is therefore high time to think about improving
open access publishing, to develop stronger
mechanism against fraud, and to enable researchers
to freely share the fruits of their labour with their
peers and the general public.
This report on ethical aspects of open access
summarises the outcomes of a workshop which
was attempting to do exactly that. Throughout
the various presentations, given by a variety of
stakeholders, solutions from different angles are
provided. We are deeply grateful to our hosts, the
Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and
the Arts, for welcoming us in Brussels, to all of our
speakers, who have made invaluable contributions
to the topic, to the audience for their lively and
interesting participation, and to the members of
the ALLEA Permanent Working Group on Science
& Ethics on whose initiative this workshop came to
be.
We do hope that this report can serve the reader
as a comprehensive overview on the state of the
ethical debate on open access and the various
actors involved in the process to achieve that
European research will in the future be as accessible
as possible.
Professor Göran Hermerén
Chair of ALLEA Permanent Working Group on
Science & Ethics
Professor László Fésüs
Lead workshop organiser; member of
ALLEA Permanent Working Group on
Science & Ethics
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ETHICAL ASPECTS OF OPEN ACCESS
8
Keynote - Ethical Aspects of Open Access
Publishing
László Fésüs, Hungarian Academy of Sciences
The rise of open access publishing in the past 15
years or so has been a laudable development
in general, though lack of clear guidelines and
absent harmonisation procedures on how to
publish correctly in open access and with whom
have provided a breeding ground for unacceptable
and unethical publishing practices.
This presentation will reflect on the trends and
developments in open access publishing; the
ethical concerns and issues derived from open
access publishing; and the reaction of the scientific
community to these challenges.
Trends and Developments in Open
Access Publishing
Open access cannot be looked at in isolation.
Rather it is a development that went hand in
hand with the digitisation of academic research
and, more recently, the involvement of Big Data.
Increasingly this enables researchers to collaborate
more easily across national boundaries and
academic disciplines. At the same time, scientific
output is shifting away from the Western World,
as evidenced by the fact that there are now more
scientific papers published in China than in the
United States (US National Science Foundation,
2018). Involving more people in the scientific
endeavour, spread across more disciplines and
countries, undoubtedly is beneficial to the quality
of research. Yet, an ever-growing system with
little to no regulation may either lead to confusion
among researchers or to questionable business
practices, both of which we can find in the open
access world.
open access publishing has become a global
industry based on the gold access publishing
model, with the Directory of Open Access Journals
(DOAJ) estimating that there are currently around
10.000 OA journals in existence.
Nevertheless, the growth of open access publishing
has not exactly proceeded as anticipated or
predicted. According to a 2017 analysis, only
around 15% of journals publish all accepted articles
as open access (Else, 2018) - financed by charging
per-article fees to authors – and just less than
half have adopted a ‘hybrid’ model of publishing,
whereby they make papers immediately free to
read for a fee.
In 2011, it was predicted (in a presentation made
by Peter Binfield, of PLoS to the Society of
Scholarly Publishing meeting in 2011) that 50% of
STM (Science, Technology, Medicine) publications
would be published by around 100 megajournals in
open access by now. However, the actual number
is closer to a mere 3% of STM publications. Open
access publishing has created an explosion of titles,
most of which seem to be competing for a small
slice of a fixed pie (Davis, 2018). This competition
has only stiffened further with the arrival of big
publishing houses in open access. Arguably, open
access had its roots in a reaction against the very
monopoly of those big publishers, yet by their
sheer market force and competitive advantage,
they have managed to assert themselves in the
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ETHICAL ASPECTS OF OPEN ACCESS
9
field of open access publishing. “The small number
of elite journals with far more submissions than
they can possibly handle in their toll-access flagship
can use this cascading model to reassert themselves
in the marketplace” (Esposito, 2015).
It has to be emphasised that rigorous quality
control, information, dissemination, innovative
technologies in publishing and archiving are not free,
somebody has to bear the costs. The more selective
the editorial process is, the more costly it becomes
to publish high quality journals. “In the absence of
external support, an open access journal has to be
either selective and expensive, or inexpensive but
less selective. Highly selective journals running
in the open access mode struggle to break even,
whereas large-volume, low-selectivity open access
publishing generates substantial profit” (Leptin,
2012).
Research funding organisations across Europe have
in many cases mandated or at least announced
a preference for open access publishing for
research projects financed by them. However,
this preference raises the question of which form
of open access is referred to and, if the answer is
the gold access model, whether diverting funds
from the actual research in order to pay for article
processing charges (APC) - levied by journals to
allow immediate open access - is the right way to
go.
Research institutions and universities now face
the dilemma that, if all of their research groups’
publications were to be published in the gold access
model, the costs for APCs would far exceed their
annual budgets for journal subscriptions.
Two trends and expectations in response to this
dilemma can be observed:
1. Research-intensive institutions would pay
the lion’s share and this would subsidise free
access for less research-intensive institutions and
the pharmaceutical industry. This may lead to
questionable dominance of scientific publishing by
richer institutions.
2. The ‘green’ model of OA publishing emerged,
requiring authors to deposit their manuscript or
its accepted version in a public repository within a
predetermined period of time.
The article is generally made available free of charge
after an embargo period which may vary depending
on the research funders: mostly either 6 months to
1 year in the natural sciences and between 1 to 2
years in the social sciences and humanities.
Uncertainty about open access publishing models
makes compliance cumbersome for researchers.
Open access mandates (gold or green, different
repository requirements, reporting) set by
institutions, funders and governments differ in
various countries.
The European Council Conclusion 9526/16 agreed
to support the transition to immediate open access
as default by 2020 without embargoes (or with as
short as possible embargoes), without financial
and legal barriers, taking into account the diversity
within the scientific community. Though, the
transition process seems to be lasting a lot longer
than expected, and it is not likely to be concluded
before there is a uniform agreement on which
form of open access publishing should be adopted
across Europe. The recent announcement of
several European research funders, called Plan S, to
mandate scientists they fund to publish only in full
open access journals from 2020 might accelerate
this process.
Ethical Issues and Concerns
As seen above, the advent of open access has been
a confusing, de-centralised enterprise with an
absence of regulations and guidelines, leading to a
number of ethical issues faced by those active in the
scientific endeavor.
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Ethical issues include, but are not limited to:
1. Possibility of restriction in academic freedom
2. Emergence of APC figure as a measure of quality
3. Mushrooming of bogus (‘predatory’) journals
4. Increased use of bogus journals
5. Hybrid journals – ‘double dipping’
Researchers may find themselves in a situation
where they are restricted to publish their work
in channels they consider less appropriate. This
could happen either via administrative open access
mandates requiring publication with a certain
model of open access, or via the limited availability
of funds for APCs.
Depending on the size of earmarked APC funds in
their institution or country, researchers may not
have equal opportunity compared to some of their
peers to freely publish their results as they see fit for
the advancement of their research careers.
These elements may endanger the freedom of
science and the principle of equal opportunity, and
further widen the already existing gap in research
output between countries, including Member
States of the European Union.
In certain areas, we run the danger of linking the
value of scientific results to the amount of APCs
charged for open access publication. APCs cannot
and should not be regarded as a quality measure
for scientific work, as it creates false and artificial
criteria for the assessment of scientific excellence.
The emergence of bogus or predatory journals is a
regrettable development to take advantage of the
lack of clear guidelines in open access publishing,
and it is yet another symptom of the pressure many
researchers face concerning the ‘publish-or-perish’
mentality often applied to career advancement.
According to research done by Shen & Björk in
2015, 8,000 predatory journals published around
400,000 articles.
Predatory journals often name nonexistent people
as their editors and editorial board members
and claim ownership of articles that they have
plagiarised from other publications. Sloppy or no
archiving of articles is commonplace. Typically,
these publishers spam professional email lists,
broadly soliciting article submissions for the clear
purpose of gaining additional income.
Read more about poor editorial standards
in this sting operation conducted by John
Bohannon and published in Science (2013,
342) -> Who’s Afraid of Peer Review?
http://science.sciencemag.org/
content/342/6154/60
Read more about the recruitment of fake
editors in this study by Piotr Sorokowski,
Emanuel Kulczycki, Agnieszka Sorokowska,
and Katarzyna Pisanski published in NATURE
(2017, 543) -> Predatory journals recruit fake
editors.
https://www.nature.com/news/predatory-
journals-recruit-fake-editor-1.21662
Researchers may find themselves more compelled
to publish in a predatory journal to seemingly
more easily disseminate their work, yet they do
so at the cost of solid editorial standards such as
comprehensive peer-review. Others may be duped
by predatory journals or follow poor guidance by
colleagues.
Increasing number of researchers are tempted to
pay and then expect lower standards by publishing
their findings in bogus open access journals which
lack quality control in order to increase their
personal career. This has resulted in misuse of funds
for self-promotion, increasing number of inaccurate
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11
or even fabricated results in the scientific literature,
and misleading scientific claims. Many researchers
are just deceived by predatory journals or are
simply unaware of the difference between bogus
and quality open access journals. Even those who
recognise a potential problem can fall victim.
Predatory journals are becoming increasingly adept
at appearing legitimate (Moher et al, 2017).
Problems associated with open access publishing
also touch upon business ethics. A large proportion
of the traditional subscription journals became
hybrid journals, publishing an increasing number
The above problems pose both a financial as
well as an ethical problem, as was described
in the study by David Moher et al. published
in NATURE (549, 2017) -> Stop this waste of
people and money
https://www.nature.com/news/stop-
this-waste-of-people-animals-and-
money-1.22554
of open, freely accessible papers online for
which publishers collect APCs, in addition to the
subscription payments - for the same journals -
received from libraries and licensing consortia. This
is often called ‘double dipping’. Unless publishers
introduce a transparent system which decreases
subscription payment in proportion to collected
APCs, they will be blamed for exploitation of the
publishing system to gain extra profit.
The repercussions of such unethical business
practices and poor publication standards come to
the detriment of the entire scientific community.
Rattled by scandals and irreproducible research, it
is unsurprising that the public would begin to lose
trust in scientific output, resulting in a rejection of
science and ultimately in a reduction of research
funding.
It should be made very clear that some of the
issues open access faces with regards to unethical
behaviour must not reflect on its commendable
merit of enabling easier and less restrictive access
to scientific publications as a whole.
The responsibility lies with all stakeholders in open
access publishing to ensure that the core principles
of scientific publishing are abided by. These are the
critical, high quality and independent evaluation
of scientific claims and the secure archiving of
validated research.
The academic community must therefore arrive
at a common understanding of open access which
simultaneously provides equal opportunities for
researchers regardless of their location or discipline,
and which does not violate or threaten academic
freedom.
Furthermore, in the absence of a centralised
governing body, it is up to the community to monitor
the publishing scene and communicate with each
other where to publish and which journals to avoid.
Members of the scientific community should be
encouraged to participate in such monitoring
activities, to report misconducts and to support
activities which regularly list, based on well-defined
criteria, credible and bogus (‘predatory’) publishers
and journals.
Recommendations by Moher et al (2017):
» Publishers, research institutions and funders
should issue explicit warnings against
illegitimate publishers.
» Funders and research institutions should
prohibit the use of funds to support predatory
journal publications; make sure that researchers
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ETHICAL ASPECTS OF OPEN ACCESS
12
are trained in how to select appropriate journals
when submitting their work; audit where
grantees, faculty members and research staff
publish.
» When seeking promotion or funding,
researchers should include a declaration that
their CV is free of predatory publications.
» Before approving a study, ethics committees
should ask researchers to declare in
writing their willingness to work with
their institutional resources, such as
librarians, to ensure they do not submit to
any journals without reviewing evidence-
based criteria for avoiding these journals.
To identify predatory journals it is advisable
to follow the 13 characteristics to identify
predatory journals as laid out by Shamseer
et al (2017, see box). Additionally, it may be
worthwhile checking Cabell’s Index, a website
currently listing around 4,000 journals on
a blacklist of predatory journals; 65 criteria
are used to determine whether a journal is
predatory and a white list is also available. The
Directory of Open Access Journals (www.doaj.
org) also provides useful information about
credibility of OA journals.
Salient evidence-based characteristics of potential predatory journals as described by
Shamseer et al (2017)
1. The scope of interest includes non-biomedical subjects alongside biomedical topics.
2. The website contains spelling and grammar errors.
3. Images are distorted/fuzzy, intended to look like something they are not, or which are
unauthorised.
4. The homepage language targets authors.
5. The Index Copernicus Value is promoted on the website.
6. Description of the manuscript handling process is lacking.
7. Manuscripts are requested to be submitted via email.
8. Rapid publication is promised.
9. There is no retraction policy.
10. Information on whether and how journal content will be digitally preserved is absent.
11. The Article processing/publication charge is very low (e.g., < $150 USD).
12. Journals claiming to be Open Access either retain copyright of published research or fail to
mention copyright.
13. The contact email address is non-professional and non-journal affiliated (e.g. @yahoo.com).
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References
Bohannon, J. (2013). Who’s Afraid of Peer Review?. Science. 342(6154). 60-65. DOI: 10.1126/science.342.6154.60
Council of the European Union (2016). Council Conclusions on the Transition Towards an Open Science
System. 9526/16. Brussels.
Davis, P. (2018). Future of the OA Megajournal. The Scholarly Kitchen. https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.
org/2018/01/10/future-oa-megajournal/ (accessed 28 November 2018).
Else, H. (2018). Radical plan to end paywalls. Nature. 561. 17-18. DOI: 10.1038/d41586-018-06178-7.
Esposito, J. (2015). Return of the Big Brands: How Legacy Publishers Will Coopt Open Access. The Scholarly
Kitchen. https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2015/10/14/return-of-the-big-brands/ (accessed 28 November
2018).
Leptin, M. (2012). Open Access – Pass the Buck. Science. 335(6074). 1279. DOI:10.1126/science.1220395
Moher, D., Shamseer, L., Cobey, K. (2017). Stop This Waste of People, Animals, and Money. Nature. 549.
23-25.
National Science Board (2018). Science and Engineering Indicators 2018. NSB-2018-1. Alexandria, VA: National
Science Foundation. https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/indicators/ (accessed 28 November 2018).
Pisanski, K., Sorokowski, P., Kulczycki, E., Sorokowska, A. (2017). Predatory Journals Recruit Fake Editor.
Nature. 543. 481-483.
Shamseer, L., Moher, D., Maduekwe, O., Turner, L., Barbour, V., Burch, R., Clark, J., Galipeau, J., Roberts,
J., Shea, B.J. (2017). Potential predatory and legitimate biomedical journals: can you tell the difference? A
cross-sectional comparison. BMC Medicine. 15(28). DOI 10.1186/s12916-017-0785-9
Shen, C. & Björk, B.-C. (2015). ‘Predatory’ open access: a longitudinal study of article volumes and market
characteristics. BMC Medicine. 13(230). DOI 10.1186/s12916-015-0469-2
Download workshop presentation
https://www.allea.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/02/LFesusOpen_Access-
The-Problem-Landscape-from-an-
Ethical-Perspective.pdf
WORKSHOP REPORT
ETHICAL ASPECTS OF OPEN ACCESS
14
Editorial Responsibility In The Open Access
World
Chris Graf, Committee on Publication Ethics/ Wiley
The guiding question of this presentation is
concerned with the responsibilities of editorial staff
in the open access world. After all, as we move from
a traditional subscription access world to an open
access world, editorial responsibility is still all about
quality.
In order to achieve this quality assurance, COPE
suggests 10 core practices which journal editors and
journal publishers should - or even must - adhere
to. In addition to these core practices, there are a
number of further actions which could be taken
to tackle some of the challenges today’s research
and publishing ecosystem presents to editorial
staff. Adhering to transparent and clearly defined
standards helps journals to both create a better
understanding within the research community
regarding the reasons why these practices are
needed, while simultaneously increasing the quality
and accessibility of the scientific output.
These core practices are supplemented by a wealth
of resources that elaborate in-depth on many of
these processes, all of which are available on the
COPE website. As the research endeavour varies
slightly from institution to institution, and even
more so between countries, it is of paramount
importance to consider the core practices alongside
existing national and international codes of conduct
for research.
Yet if COPE stopped at just the provision of these
core practices that would not suffice in a research
publishing industry that has seen dramatic changes
over the past few years. One such example of an
unintended consequence has been the increasing
prevalence of fake reviewers, accompanied by
increasing recognition that the peer-review
process could be improved. For entrepreneurs who
understand the intense pressure researchers face to
publish a large body of work in as short a time as
COPE’s Core Practices (https://publicationethics.org/files/editable-bean/COPE_Core_Practices_0.pdf)
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15
possible, the incentive to create services that tempt
researchers wittingly or unwittingly to engage with
fake reviewers in exchange for money becomes
more intense and alluring.
Most researchers do not seek to publish their work
in dubious journals, yet the pressure to publish in
order to advance their academic careers, coupled
with a notable absence of mechanisms to identify
reliable and unreliable peer-reviewed publishers,
can easily lead to less-than-desirable publishing
outcomes. To assist the researchers as well as the
editors, COPE provides an overview of potential
red flags which, if occurring concurrently, should
lead to a more thorough investigation of the
reviewer’s credentials. The list can be accessed
here: https://publicationethics.org/files/COPE%20
PR_Manipulation_Process.pdf
Open access has come up with a variety of different
publishing models, which are added to the already
existing models in established publishing houses.
However, regardless of their subscription model,
high publishing standards and requirements
regarding the scientific merit of an academic
publication must remain the same.
To date, COPE has avoided mentioning predatory
journals or black lists; rather, COPE’s focus is on what
good practice looks like so as to encourage clean
editorial work. One major way of doing that is to
refer researchers to resources which can help them
make good decisions regarding where to publish
their research, such as ‘think.check.submit’ (https://
thinkchecksubmit.org/), which guides researchers
through the process of assessing the appropriate
publishing outlet to submit their research paper.
While reputable journals and publishers will usually
have solid practices in place to ensure the quality of
their published research, it may at times be the case
that those standards slip or that they are simply no
longer fit for their purpose. As such, COPE includes
a sanction process where its members fail to meet
the 10 core practices and need to demonstrate
better practice.
Beyond Editorial Responsibilities
Together with DOAJ (https://doaj.org/), OASPA
(https://oaspa.org/) and WAME (http://www.wame.
org/), COPE has developed a document which
highlights the 16 principles of transparency and best
practice in research publishing
1
. These principles
are used to vet membership applications. Some of
those principles apply to business practices, such
as:
1. Website: A journal’s website, including the text
that it contains, shall demonstrate that care has
been taken to ensure high ethical and professional
standards. It must not contain information that
might mislead readers or authors, including any
attempt to mimic another journal/publisher’s site.
An ‘Aims & Scope’ statement should be included
on the website and the readership should be
clearly defined. There should be a statement
on what a journal will consider for publication
including authorship criteria (e.g., not considering
multiple submissions, redundant publications)
to be included. ISSNs should be clearly displayed
(separate for print and electronic).
2. Name of journal: The Journal name shall be
unique and not be one that is easily confused with
another journal or that might mislead potential
authors and readers about the Journal’s origin or
association with other Journals.
1 Taken from COPE/DOAJ/OASPA/WAME (2018),
Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Re-
search Publishing, version 3. Emphasis speaker. https://
publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines-new/prin-
ciples-transparency-and-best-practice-scholarly-publi-
shing
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3. Ownership and management: Information
about the ownership and/or management of a
journal shall be clearly indicated on the journal’s
website. Publishers shall not use organizational or
journal names that would mislead potential authors
and editors about the nature of the journal’s owner.
4. Governing body: Journals shall have editorial
boards or other governing bodies whose members
are recognized experts in the subject areas included
within the journal’s scope. The full names and
affiliations of the journal’s editorial board or other
governing body shall be provided on the journal’s
website.
5. Author fees: Any fees or charges that are required
for manuscript processing and/or publishing
materials in the journal shall be clearly stated in
a place that is easy for potential authors to find
prior to submitting their manuscripts for review or
explained to authors before they begin preparing
their manuscript for submission. If no such fees are
charged that should also be clearly stated.
6. Revenue sources: Business models or revenue
sources (e.g., author fees, subscriptions, advertising,
reprints, institutional support, and organizational
support) shall be clearly stated or otherwise evident
on the journal’s website. Publishing fees or waiver
status should not influence editorial decision
making.
7. Direct marketing: Any direct marketing
activities, including solicitation of manuscripts
that are conducted on behalf of the journal, shall
be appropriate, well targeted, and unobtrusive.
Information provided about the publisher or journal
is expected to be truthful and not misleading for
readers or authors.
Many bad practices relate to pretending to be
something that you are not; how a journal is
governed, owned and managed, and who is
involved; fees must be transparent and upfront and
a description how the journal makes money must
be provided.
The World is Changing, What Are We
Doing About It?
One of the problems, and subsequent criticisms,
many research publications run into is their lack
of reproducibility, a feature so common that it is
generally referred to as the reproducibility crisis.
Rather than focusing on the immense difficulty
of reproducing an experiment 1-to-1, we ought
to instead rethink how we approach the research
methods.
One way to do that would be an expansion, or
rather re-application, of the peer review process at
an early stage of the research process. Researchers
could first have their methods validated; these
would then be transparently registered, and this
would allow for peer review of the research methods
before the results of the research are known, a
model called Registered Reports (https://www.bps.
org.uk/news-and-policy/we-are-working-wiley-
improve-replicability-and-transparency-research).
Registered Reports would enable researchers to
present their research design and get feedback on
how to improve their research design. If researchers
adhere to these suggestions, journals would more
readily agree to publish their research once it has
been conducted. It is an ‘in principle’ acceptance
before the research is carried out, but at the same
time ensures good research practice while reducing
the temptation to oversell the outcomes of any
given research project.
Methods are only one part on the quest to improve
research; another aspect is data. Data is particularly
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17
susceptible to contain errors, which may range
from simple typos to incorrect structures, all of
which could result in useless research outcomes. By
using data validation, such as this free Wiley service
to validated
13
C NMR data (https://www.wsslabs.
com), researchers can enter their data and have
it validated based on previous data readings from
different researchers who used the same technique.
The programme will then provide a certificate which
can be submitted to the publisher alongside the
final research. It is worth noting, however, that data
validation may only work in fields with comparable
research procedures, such as chemistry or related
fields in the natural sciences.
Consider What We Aspire To
Science is like an orchestra, in which many people
contribute in different ways to a greater purpose.
This means that the median impact factor of
research publications is far below that of NATURE
publications, which are the equivalent to achieving
‘rock star’ status in the science world. We need to be
aware of this discrepancy and keep in mind that, for
the vast majority of research, transparency is more
important than excitement. This in turn means that
transparency must be increased and that being
transparent must be made as easy and as rewarding
to researchers as possible.
A publication by Brian Nosek and colleagues on
promoting an open research culture (Nosek et
al, 2015) describes the TOP guidelines to aim for
research transparency in eight standards and on
three levels. The standard is widely endorsed in
the research community, yet its implementation
is lacking. The authors of this report recognise
this project and, in collaboration with the Center
for Open Science, devised a workshop on TOP
part 2, resulting in the preprint here (https://doi.
org/10.31219/osf.io/sm78t) which aims to make the
recommendations from TOP part 1 implementable.
In the end, what we need to aspire to is embracing
the idea that being a part of a ‘research orchestra’ is
as rewarding as being a ‘science rock star’.
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References
Aalbersberg, I. J., Appleyard, T., Brookhart, S., Carpenter, T., Clarke, M., Curry, S., (…) Vazire, S. (2018). Making
Science Transparent By Default; Introducing the TOP Statement. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/sm78t
COPE/DOAJ/OASPA/WAME (2018). Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing.
Version 3. https://publicationethics.org/files/Principles_of_Transparency_and_Best_Practice_in_Scholarly_
Publishingv3.pdf (Accessed 4 December 2018)
Nosek, B. A., Alter, G., Banks, G. C., Borsboom, D., Bowman, S. D., Breckler, S. J., Buck, S., Chambers, C. D.,
Chin, G., Christensen, G., Contestabile, M., Dafoe, A., Eich, E., Freese, J., Glennerster, R., Goroff, D., Green,
D. P., Hesse, B., Humphreys, M., Ishiyama, J., Karlan, D., Kraut, A., Lupia, A., Mabry, P., Madon, T., Malhotra,
N., Mayo-Wilson, E., McNutt, M., Miguel, E., Levy Paluck, E., Simonsohn, U., Soderberg, C., Spellman, B. A.,
Turitto, J., VandenBos, G., Vazire, S., Wagenmakers, E. J., Wilson, R., Yarkoni, T. (2015). Promoting an open
research culture. Science. 348(6242). 1422-1425. DOI: 10.1126/science.aab2374
Download workshop presentation
https://www.allea.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/02/CGraf_Editorial-
Responsibility-in-the-Open-Access-
World-Best-Practices.pdf
WORKSHOP REPORT
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20
Open Data: Balancing Transparency with
Resilience
Stephan Lewandowsky, University of Bristol
This presentation highlighted the vital importance of
transparency and open data for the success of open
access as a publishing model. It is crucial that the
transformation and implementation of transparency
and open data is driven by the scientific community.
This is presuming that if scientists fail to come up
with suitable ways to make their data accessible
while at the same time protecting it from undue
use, other institutions with less-than-noble goals
might do it for them. Such institutions could include
private businesses, but might also come in the form
of government agencies regulating open access.
Transparency and open data are essential and, at
least on the surface, its harmful potential may not
always be immediately obvious to the untrained eye.
Though, when we talk about these two terms, we
need to consider their full implications, which go far
beyond just making data available. Whether we like
it or not, transparency and open data are political or,
with the right spin imposed on it, can be politicised.
This presentation therefore lays out several
situations where transparency and open data may
be employed to abuse, misrepresent, or mislead
individuals or even society at large.
In particular the focus will be on:
1: Intentions of people requesting data
2: Questions surrounding consent and ethics
3: The competence of people who request data
4: Cherry-picking of research results to suit an agenda
In order to contextualise the above 4 issue areas, it
is crucial to understand what makes transparency
and open data political, who has vested interests,
and how politicisation of scientific research is used
to create uncertainty in the greater population in
order to further someone’s agenda.
Publicly funded scientists, especially if they are held
to the high standards as laid out in the chapter on
editorial responsibility, will have undergone lengthy
procedures before, during, and after their research
to ensure that their datasets are not only sound,
but also in accordance with the FAIR (Findable,
Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles.
This means that their data should be made available
for scrutiny by external channels, regardless of their
ability to pass a scientific judgement on this data.
Privately funded research, by contrast, is generally
exempted from such disclosures.
This may lead to cases as described in Cataldo, Bero
& Malone (2010), in which the tobacco industry used
raw access data and re-analysed it with different
parameters to make the dangers of tobacco-related
morbidity and mortality disappear.
On the other side of the spectrum, scientists may
find themselves accused of withholding data,
despite ample evidence to the contrary. (Compare:
Gianelli 1998).
Both of these scenarios, reinterpreting data and
casting doubt over the integrity of the researcher,
serve the same purpose: to create uncertainty
over the validity of the research produced. This
uncertainty is generally not one that affects the
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21
scientific community, which has sufficient means in
and of itself to navigate such a conflict, but rather
it is aimed at the general public. The assumption
is that as long as the general public believes there
is a disagreement among scientists about certain
issues (climate change, tobacco, vaccinations), no
decisive legislation can be taken in favour of one
position or the other. In matters concerning public
health, this does not only jeopardise the reputation
of the researcher whose data was misused, but
often times it comes as a direct detriment to the
population who is misled.
In the turn towards open access, scientists therefore
need to be keenly aware of the implications that
making their data open and transparent may have
when used nefariously. Levy & Merritt Johns (2016)
put it even more strongly when they speak about
the weaponisation of transparency in science and
governance.
1. Intentions of People Requesting
Data
Depending on whom you ask the question of
whether the intentions of the people/institutions
requesting the data matter or not, you might get
a variety of responses. While open data advocates,
as well as industry representatives requesting
data from publicly funded research for their own
research, would argue that intentions should not
matter, many researchers in public health would
disagree.
The issue at hand is whether people or institutions
who request access to data should disclose any
conflicts of interest that may arise from using
that data, since data can be, and has been, used
selectively to suit a certain narrative. As mentioned
above, the scientific community will usually not be
fooled by these cases for longer periods of time;
the existing checks and balances will eventually
override any harm done by the misrepresentation
of data. However, the question of intention
becomes more complex when it pertains to the use
of data to shape public opinion and, perhaps more
importantly, public policy.
If data is interpreted in a way that omits certain
aspects of the dataset or outright dismisses them,
then doubt is cast on the validity of the entire
research. As such, the appearance of a scientific
debate is created on a topic in which there is actually
widespread scientific consensus. Climate change is
a clear example of a topic where an insignificant
minority of scientists oppose the commonly
accepted position of anthropogenic climate
change. The public is now confronted with two
diametrically opposed positions, neither of which
they may fully understand due to their complexity.
All they know is that one is vastly more inconvenient
than the other. What we end up with is a situation
of public indecisiveness, which lasts as long as this
faux scientific debate remains unresolved. Before
a resolution is found, no meaningful public policy
response will be formulated. In the case of tobacco,
control legislation was delayed significantly as a
result of an apparent scientific ‘debate’ (Proctor,
2011).
2. Questions Surrounding Consent and
Ethics
Any research conducted in which human beings
are the research subjects relies on their explicit
consent to partake in the research. Researchers
need to ensure the confidentiality of their research
subjects’ data and need to make sure that they are
not individually identifiable. However, for a variety
of reasons, full anonymity often proves difficult
to achieve, leaving a backdoor open for potential
abuse via ‘creative’ interpretation of results. There
is a need to carefully think about the implications
of consent. Consentees may not realise entirely
what their consent may entail if their data has to
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22
be made openly available and is therefore possibly
subject to abuse. For the research community, this
poses some difficult questions: how to ensure that
research subjects are aware of knock-on effects of
their consent for one particular study? If they do
understand the possible knock-on effects, would
they give their consent to this study, or to any other
study in the future?
Open data is, by its very nature, susceptible to
abuse. There is a real danger that consent given for
one particular study is misused in further studies by
other researchers or political operatives, without
specifically re-requesting consent for further use.
3. The Competence of People Who
Request Data
While scientists operate in an institutional context
governed by dierent committees and boards
that ensure thorough quality assurance of their
research projects, open data means that someone
without a scientic background can re-analyse
scientically sound data and arrive at dierent
or wrong conclusions. This would not, in and of
itself, represent the biggest of problems. However,
enabled by modern communication technologies,
it has become ever more simple to reach a global
audience via podcasts, social media and the
like, which are easily accessible online. In a way,
communication technology can equally amplify the
voices of the scientists and the voices of the laymen
playing scientists. Sometimes the non-scientists
may even drown out the scientists with more ‘catchy’
or fear-mongering results. For the general public, it
may at times be dicult to dierentiate the validity
of ndings published in journal articles versus other
less scrutinised means of dissemination. In this, the
role of the media must not be understated, as their
only vested interest is selling papers, which is best
done by creating controversy. Smith et al. (2007)
investigated this phenomenon by looking at UK
MMR vaccination rates and its relation to sustained
negative, but false, coverage of the eects of MMR
vaccinations on children.
4. Cherry-picking of Research Results
to Suit an Agenda
In line with the responsibilities laid out in chapter 2,
researchers are now expected to conform to high-
quality standards in the conduct of their research.
They ought to pre-register their hypotheses and
their analysis, against which the data will be
evaluated to ensure that they did not cherry-pick
results or outcome measures. Yet, the same is not
done for those who request data. As a general rule,
if you look at enough data for long enough, you will
be able to find a data set that suits your agenda.
Previous points above highlight that sometimes
only very little spin is required to obfuscate the
original meaning of a data set.
Requiring an analysis plan as a condition to access
data is both in accordance with the Accessible
component of the FAIR principle, which allows for
moderation of access, and it would allow to better
protect sensitive data by providing a measure to
guard against improper usage.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that science needs to be open
and transparent. However, there is an important
distinction to be made between a scientific
debate and the public debate. Conflating the
two, intentionally or unintentionally, can lead
to uncertainty and indecisiveness in the public
perception, with, at its worst, harmful outcomes for
the population.
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23
We need to recognise that openness and
transparency facilitate science, but they also aid in
the dissemination of noise, nonsense, commercial
interests, and political propaganda. The scientific
community needs to be acutely aware of this and
cannot cast it aside.
A solution is to create a balance between the
researchers and their data on the one hand, and
the users requesting the data on the other. This
would provide a symmetrical structure, wherein the
people requesting the data must show that they
are competent enough to appropriately use them.
This must go hand in hand with institutionalised
mechanisms of accountability, such as independent
national arbitration boards that decide on data
availability or, in contested cases, can provide
independent re-analyses.
Pre-registration of intended uses by the requesting
party would be another step towards better use of
open data.
At all times, the consent of the research subjects
needs to be observed and the consentee needs to
be aware of the full implications of their consent.
To protect against undue accusations of withholding
data, the peer review process should include a
determination of whether all data has been made
available and used appropriately.
Transparency and open data are at the core of good
research practice, though the above challenges
remain and require innovative solutions from within
the scientific community.
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24
References
Cataldo, J.K., Bero, L.A., Malone, R.E (2010). ‘‘A delicate diplomatic situation’’: tobacco industry efforts to gain
control of the Framingham Study. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology.63. 841-853. 1016/j.jclinepi.2010.01.021
Gianelli, L. (1998). Memorandum to ‘‘Secret Science’’ Work Group, Philip Morris, 10 April. Available at: http://
industrydocuments.library.ucsf.edu/tobacco/docs/klyc0069. (accessed 27 November 2018).
Levy, K., Merritt John, D. (2016). When open data is a Trojan Horse: The weaponization of transparency in
science and governance. Big Data & Society. 3(1). 1-6. https://doi.org/10.1177/2053951715621568
Proctor, R. N. (2011). Golden holocaust: Origins of the cigarette catastrophe and the case for abolition.
University of California Press
Smith, A., Yarwood, J., Salisbury, D.M. (2007) Tracking mothers’ attitudes to MMR immunisation 1996–2006.
Vaccine. 25(20). 3996-4002. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2007.02.071
Download workshop presentation
https://www.allea.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/02/SLewandowsky_
OpenData-Balancing-Transparency-
With-Resilience.pdf
WORKSHOP REPORT
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26
Questionable and Unethical Publishers: How
to Spot Them and Enable Researchers to
Avoid Being Trapped
Lars Bjørnshauge, Directory of Open Access Journals
Since the advent of the Budapest Convention
on open access 15 years ago, two concurrent
publishing models in open access have emerged, the
green model and the gold model. While distinctly
different in the kind of access they provide to the
end user, both are considered open access formats,
leading to widespread confusion among the
research community. Gold open access is providing
immediate access to the final published version
in fully open access journals, be it with or without
article publishing charges (APC), most articles are
published with APCs, but the majority of open access
Journals are operated without APCs. Green open
access provides access to earlier versions of the
papers archived in open access repositories, often
after an embargo period defined by the publisher.
This presentation will examine the issue of
questionable publishing, which is not restricted to
open access publishing, yet its ongoing confusion
on terminology provides a fertile environment for
publishers to engage in questionable behaviour.
This chapter will therefore look at what constitutes
questionable publishing, what drives it, and how to
detect questionable journals.
What Constitutes Questionable
Publishing
Over the past years, we have witnessed a growing
understanding within the research community, but
also among policy-makers, that the accessibility
of research results is conducive to the creation
of better scholarship. Yet we are still lacking the
incentives to effectively distribute and provide
access to the knowledge created through research.
Decision makers and research funders still accept
that research results are not readily available in open
access immediately after publication. In recent years,
however, an increasing number of research funders
have moved to recommend and even require that
the research they are funding is published in open
access, but they still leave it up to the researcher to
choose where and how (open/not open) to publish
it. What is needed, thus, is a re-thinking within the
funding community to better get to grips with how
the research they are funding is actually accessible
for the research community on a global scale and
specify the requirements in terms of compliant
publishing channels. This means that a paper should
be available immediately out in the open, including
the underlying data as well as any software that
was used to obtain this data. Publishing needs to
be perceived, in a way, as the responsibility of the
academic community, much like academic freedom
is considered paramount for good research design.
Bohannon (2013) in his study Who’s Afraid of Peer
Review? somewhat infamously published results
showing that multiple open access journals fell for a
sting to publish fake research, leading to questions
around their approach to peer-review. However,
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27
recalling the main idea of this chapter that
questionable publishing is not restricted to open
access publishing, only one year later, Van Noorden
(2014) broke the news that legacy publishers had to
withdraw more than 120 papers which were proven
to have been computer-generated. Questionable
publishing is therefore not exclusive to open
access publishing, but the business model of open
access, where it is relatively easy to set up a journal
and solicit articles, has certainly made it easier to
engage in questionable practices. Regardless of the
shape these questionable practices may take, they
are the ones that are considered, as coined by Beall,
‘predatory journals’.
Yet, the term predatory may itself not be entirely
applicable, or at least not only to the journals that
are commonly chastised with the term. If we assume
that predation in the publishing industry is based
on the interest to make a profit, then exploiting
the divide between libraries (that typically pay for
subscriptions) and scholars (who typically expect
and demand access to those subscriptions) in
order to make extraordinarily high profits could
be considered predatory conduct. In the same
way, continuing to raise prices at several times
the rate of inflation, even as those increases cause
direct injury to libraries by robbing them of budget
flexibility or even make it impossible for them to
continue providing resources, is very much driven
by an interest to make a bigger profit. However,
both of these practices are commonplace, even
for publishing houses which are not generally
considered predatorial. Though, blame should not
fall on the publishing industry. Instead, academia
should re-assess their thinking to outsource the
dissemination of their intellectual production
without service level agreements to a third-party,
the publishers.
As such, the term ‘predatory publishers’ should not
be used, as its terminology is unclear. In the same
way as the terms ‘illegitimate publishers’, ‘deceptive
publishers’, and ‘unethical publishers’ all touch on
certain aspects that are wrong within open access
publishing, but none can be globally applicable.
Thus, the term ‘questionable publishers’ provides a
more accurate and realistic description.
Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
definition of questionable publishers:
Questionable publishers are publishers who
are not living up to reasonable standards in
terms of content, services, transparency and
business behaviour.
Indubitably, questionable publishers are a problem.
The question remains, however, just how big of
a problem they really are. Shen & Björk (2015)
estimated that at the time of their investigation,
around 8.000 questionable journals containing
about 420,000 papers existed. A similar study
conducted by Crawford (2017) came to the
conclusion that many of those journals are actually
empty. He came to the conclusion that there are
3275 (active) journals, with about 121,000 articles
published in them.
In their analysis, Shen & Björk noticed that
questionable publishers originate and are spread
throughout the world, with India being the single
largest country of origin at 27.1%. The same holds
true for the authors, with India being home to about
34.7% of all authors publishing in questionable
formats.
What Drives Questionable Publishing
In the assessment of questionable publishing
practices, five main drivers can be identified:
1. Ignorance
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28
2. Aggressive marketing
3. Publish-or-perish
4. Research Assessment
5. Exclusion
Ignorance
At times, researchers show a stunning lack of
attention to the fate of their paper. It appears as if all
available energy was used up in the production of the
research, only to then ignore entirely what happens
with their papers afterwards. This may derive from
ignorance around peer-review, archiving, indexing,
and the like. In principle, this means that a solid
research product may be published on a platform
whose quality standard is far below the quality
standard used in the production of the research.
Aggressive Marketing
Researchers often find themselves aggressively
targeted by scientific journals’ marketing
campaigns urging them to publish their research
in their journal. Ease of access to publishing, thus,
becomes an alluring prospect in a career-driven
world. Especially, when considering the third point
in this list.
Publish-or-Perish
In order to advance their academic careers,
researchers are now keenly aware of the need to
include as many publications as possible on their CV,
regardless of their individual merit. Unfortunately,
in too many cases, this behaviour still pays off
with better career prospects, while there are few,
if any, repercussions to be feared when publishing
in those journals. Particularly researchers in the
Global South may be tempted to pay money to
have their research published if it ends up enabling
them to get a better CV.
Research Assessment
While some blame lies with the researchers, it
is perhaps more important to note that those
in charge of assessing the merits of a scientific
publication often fail to comply with their obligation
to thoroughly ensure that the journal in which the
research was published actually is of sufficient
quality itself. Research assessment cannot be done
only by looking at the number of publications of
a researcher, or an impact factor of a journal, but
must focus on the actual research.
Exclusion
In line with the finding of Shen & Björk, there seems
to be a certain bias by dominant indexing platforms,
such as Scopus or Web of Science, against research
that was not produced in the Global North. In
response, researchers from the Global South often
feel the need to find a workaround to get published.
First and foremost, those managing or funding
research need to re-think how they evaluate the
research they govern. Research assessment can
only be based on the actual content of the research,
and not on any other metric, such as impact factor
or number of publications.
Institutions that issue mandates to publish the
research they fund in open access should develop
mechanisms to guide researchers to assess the
various publishing channels. One way to do that
could be by creating and disseminating lists of
accredited publishing channels, which is what more
and more governmental institutions and authorities
do.
Another aspect, closely related to the concept of
research integrity, is publishing literacy. Knowing
how and where to publish, and how to share must
be an integral part of researcher’s training.
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29
How to Spot Questionable Publishers/
Journals
In its most basic form, the 5 minute check as outlined
by Gavia (2012) can serve as a comprehensive
starting point to identify the black sheep in the
publishing community.
The 5 Minute check to assess the credibility of a
journal -> Gavia Library
» Competent web-site?
» Mass e-mails asking for editors and submissions?
» In the DOAJ? – if not: worrying
» Usage statistics?
» Staple in the discipline?
» Misspelled journal titles?
» Journal launch dates – many at the same time?
» Empty shells- no/few articles?
The DOAJ does not seek to primarily exclude
those with questionable publishing practices.
Rather, it aims to promote open access journals
that behave in line with the Principles of
Transparency in Scholarly Publishing (https://doaj.
org/bestpractice), which the DOAJ co-developed
with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE),
the open access Scholarly Publishers Association
(OASPA), and the World Association of Medical
Editors (WAME.), to assist journals to become
attractive publishing channels.
When a journal applies for listing in the DOAJ, the
journal needs to both adhere to these principles as
well as be able to respond to no less than 54 questions
concerning the policies and working mechanisms
of the journal before they can be included in the
DOAJ. These questions ensure that the journal is
in line with quality assurance guidelines accepted
in the community and include questions about the
editorial board, the peer review process, archiving/
preservation, plagiarism, openness, licensing and
copyright, re-use rights, and charges.
In this process, it may well be that a publisher does
not satisfy every single criteria at the moment
of application. However, the DOAJ is keen to
support these publishers to improve their internal
structures. A single appearance of a shady practice
does not in and of itself warrant exclusion from the
DOAJ. Rather this prompts communication with
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ETHICAL ASPECTS OF OPEN ACCESS
30
the journal to help and advice in improving the
journals’ practices. It is the accumulation of several
bad practices which arouses suspicion and will lead
to rejection.
However, there are also a number of bad practices
which should raise red flags among those dealing
with journals. If a journal displays inappropriate
marketing practices such as email spamming; if it
has a title that includes ‘International’, ‘American’,
or ‘European’; if it is very broad in scope; if it
displays fake impact factors; if it advertises quick
publishing; if it has a low publication fee; if it has
little to no quality control of articles; and if it has a
low or no standard for peer-review, suspicions over
the integrity of the journal are justified.
Blacklists
Blacklists are incomplete by definition and
susceptible to legal challenges as well as personal
bias. This stigmatises publishers rather than help
them get better (Neylon, 2017).
Whitelists
Whitelists (lists of accredited journals) may be a
better tool in that regard. They show that a journal
abides by certain standards. These standards can
be used as a basis for research evaluation, rewards
system, promotion and resource allocation. In
other words, if you do not publish in an accredited
publisher, you may not get support for APCs. The
aim must be to steer researchers towards using
whitelisted journals rather than avoiding blacklisted
journals.
1. Peer review process
2. Governing Body
3. Editorial team/contact
4. Author fees
5. Copyright
6. Identification of and dealing with
allegations of research misconduct
7. Ownership and management
8. Website
9. Name of journal
10. Conflicts of interest
11. Access
12. Revenue sources
13. Advertising
14. Publishing schedule
15. Archiving
16. Direct marketing
The 16 principles of transparency in scholarly publishing as described by
COPE, OASPA, WAME, and the DOAJ
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References
Bohannon, J. (2013). Who’s Afraid of Peer Review?. Science. 342(6154). 60-65. DOI: 10.1126/
science.342.6154.60
Crawford, W. (2017). The Problems with Shen/Björk’s “420,000”. https://walt.lishost.org/2017/04/the-
problems-with-shenbjorks-420000/ (Accessed 30 November 2018)
Gavia Lib (2012). https://gavialib.com/
Neylon, C. (2017). Blacklists are technically infeasible, practically unreliable and unethical. Period. https://
cameronneylon.net/blog/blacklists-are-technically-infeasible-practically-unreliable-and-unethical-period/
(Accessed 30 November 2018)
Shen, C. & Björk, B.-C. (2015). ‘Predatory’ open access: a longitudinal study of article volumes and market
characteristics. BMC Medicine. 13(230). DOI 10.1186/s12916-015-0469-2
Van Noorden, R. (2014). Publishers withdraw more than 120 gibberish papers. Nature. https://www.nature.
com/news/publishers-withdraw-more-than-120-gibberish-papers-1.14763 (Accessed 30 November 2018).
DOI:10.1038/nature.2014.14763.
Download workshop presentation
https://www.allea.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/02/LBjoersnahuge_
Questionable-and-Unethical-Publishers-
How-To-Sport-Them-and-Enable-
Researchers-To-Avoid-Being-Trapped.
pdf
WORKSHOP REPORT
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32
Research Assessment In Open Science
Michele Garnkel, European Molecular Biology Organization
This presentation is concerned with how a shift
towards open science would fundamentally impact
research assessment and, subsequently, the
prospects of career academicians. At the very heart
of scientific publishing, as defined by the National
Research Council of the National Academies
(2004) of the United States, lies the intention to
move science forward. The act of publishing is a
quid pro quo in which authors receive credit and
acknowledgement in exchange for disclosure of their
scientific findings. This method of disseminating
scientific findings has been proven and tested for
decades and constitutes the foundation of the
modern scientific publishing industry.
The caveat, as this presentation points out, is that
publishing in a renowned journal and achieving
a high impact factor, i.e. number of citations,
has arguably become in and of itself the most
important metric to assess the quality of scientists.
The result has been an academic industry in which
scientists at all career levels, though particularly
young scientists, feel the pressure to publish a large
volume of publications as quickly as possible, a
development known as ‘publish-or-perish’.
In the transition towards open science and
particularly open access, this publish or perish
culture has at times led to questionable publishing
practices. Scientists may feel the need to publish
their research in journals with high visibility and
impact or in journals without due respect for
appropriate quality assurance and peer-review, the
latter of which is undermining the trustworthiness
of their own research as well as that of the scientific
community as a whole.
This presentation thus intends to highlight what
the purpose of publicising scientific information
should be, as well as to point out methods which
would enable it to better achieve its intended goals,
namely to improve the overall quality of published
scientific output.
Regardless of which shape the scientific publication
comes in (be it open access, the traditional
subscription-based model, and even preprints)
there are certain core principles that need to be met
in order to meet the quality standards of scientific
publications.
The 11 core principles that EMBO bases its
scientific publishing on have strongly influenced
the ‘Declaration on Research Assessment – DORA’,
which was adopted in 2012 and has since become a
global initiative covering all scientific disciplines as
well as key stakeholders in the scientific landscape.
The single most pertinent recommendation from
this declaration vis-à-vis research assessment is
“the need to eliminate the use of journal-based
metrics, such as Journal Impact Factors, in funding,
appointment, and promotion considerations.” The
declaration makes it very clear that “Journal Impact
Factors should not be used as a surrogate measure
of the quality of individual research articles to
assess an individual scientist’s contributions, or
in hiring, promoting, or funding decisions.” The
reality, however, shows that Journal Impact Factors
have become exactly that: a convenient means to
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EMBO 11 core principles
1. Transparent review 7. Approachable Editors
2. Scooping Protection 8. Informed Evaluation
3. Referee Cross-Commenting 9. Manuscript Transfers
4. Single Round 10. Flexible Formatting
5. Fast Process 11. Pre-publication screening
6. Source Data
judge the perceived merit of a scientific publication,
for both researchers and assessors. This is not to
say that metrics-based assessments are not useful
per se, though it still needs to be figured out how
to meaningfully integrate them in the research
assessment process. The problem that arises for
the assessors is that the alternative - a thorough
review - is expensive and time-consuming and
therefore, given the volume of publication, often
too cumbersome or even outright impossible.
This leads to the question: if impact factor and other
metrics-based assessments should be discarded as
a means to judge researchers (and it seems that
increasing open access publishing may make them
somewhat redundant anyway), what are better
ways to assess research in the future?
One approach which has gained some traction
has been the use of preprint servers such as ArXiv/
BioRxiv, where scientists can upload their final,
though still pre-peer-review, articles online to
invite comments. Reservations towards the use
of preprint servers come mostly from researchers
who may be afraid to make their research known
before their name can be officially attached to it
because of fears that they could be scooped. This
is a legitimate concern, and any system focussing
on preprint servers must take scooping protection
into consideration. At EMBO, this means that if you
submit a preprint, or a regular article submission for
that matter, and someone else publishes a similar
research afterwards, the original article shall still
be printed, provided it satisfies all other quality
standards.
Preprints may be the future of research.
Researchers, as the authors of their papers, should
have control over their publications. As it stands
currently, peer-review on preprints is not at all
times a formalised process yet, though there is
some indication that the community is moving
towards formalising it. Nevertheless, there is little
doubt that preprints encourage openness and, it
is expected, honest behaviour. As such, it may be
integral to the improvement of research integrity.
One aspect that still needs to be addressed is the
sustainability of preprint servers. This question
revolves around ownership of the respective servers
and how to ensure that articles remain accessible
even after the owner no longer exists. This is a
question primarily of funding and of maintaining
those servers, which in the end does create some
costs.
Providing the opportunity to publish a research
article preprint is very much shaped and driven
by the suppliers of research infrastructures.
However, their provision is a moot point without
better training for research practitioners. Despite
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34
intensifying efforts on the European level, many
practitioners still lack the basic skills to conduct
research properly, including vital aspects such as
data management plans, use of controls and the
like. The onus to communicate and provide these
trainings to research practitioners - particularly
those at the beginning of their careers - is on the
institutes, but also on the supervising positions.
A further aspect obfuscating the assessment of
research is the high number of authors many
collaborative research projects contain. There is
little doubt that modern research, especially in the
natural sciences, would not be possible without
large teams, often in collaborative efforts between
research institutes. Yet a list of authors does not
indicate to which extent an individual researcher
has contributed to a given paper. For example,
senior professors may use this system to bolster
their bibliographies and their impact factor, by
appearing on research papers without a significant
contribution, while technicians and data managers
may receive no credit for their work on a particular
research problem. A potential solution would be a
simple rebranding away from the term ‘authorship’
and in favour of the term ‘contributorship’. It is
of paramount importance in the assessment of
research and researchers to know precisely who
did what and who was responsible for any given
research project. As such, existing platforms like
CASRAI (www.casrai.org) supplemented by the use
of ORCID (www.orcid.org) identifiers could help in
establishing a system in which it is possible to assess
not only the quality of someone’s research but also
to assess the quality of their individual contribution
to that research.
Conclusion
The transition towards open science offers the
opportunity to do away with some long-standing
mechanisms of research assessment, such as the
use of Journal Impact Factors. More open and
honest means of scientific publishing, coupled with
a reform of the academic research assessment
system, would allow researchers to publish their
research open access without jeopardising their
career prospects. Researchers need to be able
to put their unpublished research on preprint
servers for scrutiny without the fear of having their
research scooped by someone else. Preprints may
be the future of scientific publishing, provided that
questions of sustainability are solved and that the
researchers themselves receive adequate guidance
in their use. Furthermore, the system of authorship
needs to be reformed to better depict the individual
researchers’ contributions.
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References
DORA (2012). San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment. https://sfdora.org/read/ (Accessed 4
December 2018)
National Research Council (2004). Sharing Publication-Related Data and Materials: Responsibilities of Authorship
in the Life Sciences. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/10613.
Download workshop presentation
https://www.allea.org/wp-content/
uploads/2018/02/MGarfinkelOpen-
Access-and-Assessing-Research-
Performance.pdf
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Dealing with the Challenges of Openness –
Stakeholder Perspectives
Lidia Borrell-Damian, European University Association
Maud Evrard, Science Europe
Göran Hermerén, Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities
Martin Stokhof, European Research Council
Marcel Swart, Young Academy of Europe
Stuart Taylor, Royal Society
Moderation: Maura Hiney, Royal Irish Academy
Reflecting on the presentations made earlier that
day, this diverse panel, consisting of representatives
from science funders, performers, young researchers,
and the academies, was asked to respond to two
questions: “What is the positive impact of open
access in your sector?” and “if there are specific
actions in your sector that are already or will be
undertaken to mitigate some of the challenges
mentioned throughout the workshop”. Afterwards,
the discussion was widened to include all participants
of the workshop. For reasons of conciseness, the
following text compiles the relevant responses under
the separate headings of the original two questions.
What is the Positive Impact of Open Access in
Your Sector?
The panel was unanimous that, by and large, open
access has/will have overwhelmingly positive
impacts on their respective sectors. The panel
acknowledged that open access still has challenges
and shortcomings but stressed that there needs
to be a shift towards open access as part of a
wider reform of academic publishing and research
assessment, including an adaptation of the peer-
review system to ensure the quality of publications
in an open access world.
Regarding the positive impacts of open access, it
was pointed out that any assessment of open access
needs to recognise that, as it stands, only about a
quarter of research articles published worldwide
are immediately available to read. In a majority
of cases the outputs of research, often publically
funded, are hidden behind paywalls or, at the very
least, access is restricted by embargo periods.
This means that the current model of academic
publishing erects significant monetary barriers to
anyone trying to access cutting edge knowledge.
To researchers in well-endowed research systems
this might be merely a nuisance, but to researchers
coming from low income research systems, this
effectively prevents them from utilising the most
up to date knowledge in their fields.
Therefore, the panel agreed that enabling more
researchers to access more research outputs more
readily will undoubtedly increase the speed of
scientific progress worldwide. In this sense, open
access contributes greatly to facilitating borderless
research across geographic and disciplinary
boundaries. It was also noted that open access
articles have higher download rates and reach a
greater readership. In practical terms this means
that in times of crisis (such as during the Zika virus
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37
outbreak) open access can hasten the dissemination
of knowledge and ultimately help to find a solution
more quickly. As such, it is generally expected that
open access will also lead to an increase in scientific
output. However, in order to enable researchers
to take full advantage of open access, a research-
friendly copyright reform is needed. A particularly
crucial tool in this regard is text and data mining,
which would allow researchers to trawl and exploit
more information than they otherwise could by
conventional means.
The accessibility of open access not only has the
benefit of a faster dissemination of scientific
knowledge, but can increase transparency in
research. Increased readership goes hand in hand
with increased scrutiny and a quicker correction
of the research record in cases of inaccuracies
in content or interpretation. In an open access
system, it is easier for researchers to make their
research visible, which is an incentive to ensure that
their research methods and conduct are beyond
reproach. As such, it is assumed that increased
transparency would enhance overall trust in
research, a particularly welcome and pertinent
development given the ongoing debates around
fake science, which have been introduced in
previous presentations.
For early career academics, open access is one of the
most important recent developments in research.
This group is particularly affected by the publish-
or-perish culture, resulting in the need to publish
as many papers as quickly as possible to further
their careers. Young researchers are simultaneously
excited about the prospects of easier pathways
to getting published and increasing visibility, but
they are also apprehensive about the implications
of open access on research assessment. Young
researchers in particular feel the pressure to publish
in high impact journals, which are assumed to
indicate high quality through excellent peer review.
However, because of the way in which the journal
impact factor is calculated (citations over time),
some of the newer open access journals have yet to
achieve high impact factors.
With open access, there is an opportunity for
comprehensive reform of the peer-review system
as we know it, but this must go hand in hand with
quality. Moving away from high-impact, journal-
centric publishing, to, for example, open peer
review, not only challenges the current system, but
the way in which research is currently evaluated.
With ever larger volumes of publications, assessing
a researcher based on citation rates of papers and
the impact factor of the journals in which they
publish has long been a favoured proxy of quality in
higher education and, so far, viable alternatives are
few and far between. That said, open access opens
the way for other quality measures but much work
remains to be done in this area of second generation
metrics.
In conclusion, the community feels that open
access will go a long way to improving openness
of research as well as its transparency for peers
and the public. However, it was also clear that
successful implementation of open access needs
concurrent reforms in the peer-review and research
assessment systems.
Are there specific actions in your sector which
have already been, or will soon be, undertaken
to mitigate some of the challenges mentioned
this morning?
In addressing this question, the panel highlighted
a variety of different actions that need to be taken
in order to make open access successful. However,
it was agreed that sectors cannot advance the
open access agenda in isolation. As such, the panel
agreed that any action taken by one sector to
further the open access agenda needs to be holistic
and take account of its feasibility for other sectors.
Ultimately, what is needed is a long-term change in
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the culture around academic publishing and career
progression. Despite its very obvious implications
on a large section of academic life, open access
does not yet enjoy the level of awareness within the
community that would be required to effectively
overhaul the system.
To further highlight the need for awareness raising,
the panellists cited excerpts from the European
University Association’s annual survey on open
access (https://eua.eu/downloads/publications/
open%20access%202016-2017%20eua%20
survey%20results.pdf), which further illustrate
that many active researchers are just not aware of
open access and its benefits. The simple conclusion
that can be drawn from this is that, no matter
how beneficial open access may be, as long as the
researchers who are publishing do not know about
it, the entire endeavour is more or less pointless.
open access needs to be community-driven since
funding agencies and the like depend on their
community, not vice-versa.
As the panel agreed about the need for a long-
term culture change, the steps needed in order to
facilitate this development became the focus of the
discussion. As a foremost priority, it was considered
essential to train young researchers in academic
publishing as soon as they enter the academic
system. They need to be taught that the current
publication system is outdated and become aware
of the benefits of open access. However, for a
successful uptake of open access, it is vital that they
are not only shown the benefits of open access,
but they also require assurances that publishing in
an entirely new system will not have detrimental
effects on their career progression. Some of the
guidelines required to help researchers navigate
this complex web of open access publication
already exist. Institutions like the aforementioned
Think.Check.Submit or the DOAJ clearly show how
and where to publish open access.
In order to provide these reassurances, several
different actors need to contribute their share.
Universities and other research performing
institutions will have to set up clear and harmonised
guidelines on open access publishing within their
institutions, which include guidance on data
management, legal aspects, and storing and
sharing of publications. These adaptations need
to be supported by funding agencies which should
encourage open access publishing wherever
possible. Encouraging open access publishing,
however, will only be successful if the publishing
industry also embraces open access. This might be
the most demanding step in the whole process, as it
would turn a long-standing and universally accepted
model of academic publishing on its head since
trying to squeeze open access into the traditional
publishing model runs the danger of trying to
combine two mutually exclusive publishing models
without any assurances that they go together.
Once the above conditions have all been met, the
remaining issue - and not at all a trivial one - is how
to reform the research assessment system. As it
stands, research assessment is intimately linked
to the prestige of high impact publication, often
expressed as Journal Impact Factor. In order for
open access to be widely applicable and desirable,
research assessment and academic publishing need
to be decoupled. This would require a rethinking
of the rewards system for researchers, including
providing recognition for good open access
publishing practices. Additionally, a welcome side
effect of a reformed publishing model would be a
reduction in so-called ‘salami slicing’, a term used
to describe the practice of publishing multiple
articles out of essentially the same research in order
to bolster bibliographies and impact factor. It was
noted that other parts of the world such as North
America appear to put less emphasis on impact
factors and the like without detrimental effects to
research quality.
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In conclusion, there are a wide range of activities
already underway that will contribute to mitigating
some of the unresolved questions in open
access. However, a concerted effort between all
stakeholders is required to avoid duplication of
work, seamless implementation and, most of all,
an open access publishing system that works for
all research disciplines and researchers from all
backgrounds.
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Workshop Programme
9:00 Welcome/Short introduction Welcome: KVAB President Joos Vandewalle
Welcome/Introduction: Chair of Permanent Working Group
Science & Ethics, Göran Hermerén
9:15 Outcomes of ICSU Open Data in
Science Workshop, summing up
Roger Pfister, Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences
Find the ICSU Workshop Report at: http://euro-isc.org/
thematic_work/opendata/
9:25 Keynote – Ethical Aspects of Open
Access Publishing
Followed by Q&A
Laszló Fesüs, Hungarian Academy of Sciences
09:55 Editorial Responsibility in the Open
Access world
Followed by Q&A
Chris Graf, Committee Of Publication Ethics - COPE/ Wiley
10:25 Open Data: balancing transparency
with resilience
Followed by Q&A
Stephan Lewandowsky, University of Bristol
11:25 Questionable and Unethical
Publishers: How to spot them and
enable researchers to avoid being
trapped
Followed by Q&A
Lars Bjørnshauge, Directory of Open Access Journals
12:15 Research Assessment in Open
Science
Followed by Q&A
Michele Garfinkel, EMBO
13:45 Dealing with the Challenges of
Openness: Stakeholder Perspectives
Lidia Borrell-Damian, European University Association
Maud Evrard, ScienceEurope
Göran Hermerén, Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and
Antiquities
Martin Stokhof, European Research Council
Marcel Swart, Young Academy of Europe
Stuart Taylor, Royal Society
Moderation: Maura Hiney, Royal Irish Academy
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The ALLEA Permanent Working Group on
Science & Ethics
The ALLEA Permanent Working Group on Science and Ethics (PWGSE) is concerned with a wide range of
issues, both ‘internal’ (within the scientific community) and ‘external’ (relations between science and society).
Since ethical considerations have been an essential component in the consolidation of a united Europe, and
also in the creation of ALLEA, the PWGSE was established to bring together experts from academies across
Europe and provide them with a platform for continuous debate on research ethics and research integrity.
The PWGSE has been extending its capacities and activities during recent years, in order to adequately fulfil
its mission of collective deliberation on topics such as research integrity, ethics education in science and
research training, ethics of scientific policy advice, trust in science, scientific misconduct, and plagiarism,
among others.
Further issues recently addressed include dual use of research outcomes, ethical aspects of risks, science
and human rights, support for higher education and research in Palestine, research on human embryos,
synthetic biology, nanotechnologies etc. Additionally, the group provides expertise for the Horizon 2020
funded ENERI project (European Network of Research Ethics and Research Integrity), which aims to train
experts in ethics related issues and to harmonise research integrity infrastructures across Europe.
The PWGSE meets regularly and has also convened thematic meetings in wider settings, typically in
partnerships with other relevant organisations such as the European Commission, the European Science
Foundation (ESF), the International Council for Science (ICSU), and UNESCO, among many others. The
members of the PWGSE drew on its extensive network of experts and institutions for the successful execution
of the revision process of “The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity”.
Members of the ALLEA Permanent Working Group on Science and Ethics
» Göran Hermerén (Chair) – Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities
» Maura Hiney – Royal Irish Academy
» László Fésüs – Hungarian Academy of Sciences
» Roger Pfister – Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences
» Els Van Damme – Royal Academies for Science and the Arts of Belgium
» Martin van Hees – Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
» Krista Varantola – Council of Finnish Academies
» Anna Benaki – Academy of Athens (Greece)
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» Anne Fagot-Largeault – Académie des Sciences (France)
» Michael Quante – Union of the German Academies of Sciences and Humanities
» Bertil Emrah Oder – Bilim Akademisi (The Science Academy, Turkey)
» Pere Puigdomenech – Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona / Institute for Catalan
Studies (Spain)
» Deborah Oughton – Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters
» Zbigniew Szawarski – Polish Academy of Sciences
» Raivo Uibo – Estonian Academy of Sciences
About ALLEA
ALLEA is the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities. It was founded in 1994 and brings
together almost 60 Academies of Sciences and Learned Societies from over 40 countries in the Council of
Europe region. ALLEA is financed by annual dues from its Member Academies and remains fully independent
from political, religious, commercial or ideological interests.
Member Academies operate as learned societies, think tanks, or research performing organisations. They
are self-governing communities of leaders of scholarly enquiry across all fields of the natural sciences, the
social sciences and the humanities. ALLEA therefore provides access to an unparalleled human resource
of intellectual excellence, experience and expertise. Furthermore, its integrative membership structure
comprises Academies from both EU and non–EU member states in Europe.
ALLEA seeks to contribute to improving the framework conditions under which science and scholarship
can excel. Jointly with its Member Academies, ALLEA is in a position to address the full range of structural
and policy issues facing Europe in science, research and innovation. In doing so, it is guided by a common
understanding of Europe, bound together by historical, social and political factors as well as for scientific and
economic reasons.
ALLEA
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A cademies
ALLEA
Jaegerstrasse 22/23
10117 Berlin
Germany
www.allea.org
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