Chinese researchers' perceptions and use of open access journals: Results of an online questionnaire survey

Abstract

This paper reports the results of a survey on Chinese researchers' perceptions and use of open access journals (OAJs). A total of 381 Chinese researchers from different universities and disciplines were investigated through an online questionnaire survey in August and September 2018. The results showed that most Chinese researchers are familiar with and have positive attitude to OAJs. They know OAJs mainly through their peers, colleagues, and friends. PubMed Central, PLoS, and COAJ (China Open Access Journals) are the most well-known OAJ websites among Chinese researchers. As for use, most of the respondents read and cite OAJs frequently and have experience of publishing in OAJs. However, they strongly prefer to use OAJs indexed in reputable databases (e.g. Web of Science, WoS) when making publishing decisions. Significant differences can be seen among disciplines, with researchers in HSS areas using OAJs less frequently than researchers from other disciplines, although they have the same positive attitudes and are equally well informed about them. Younger researchers preferred to rely on prestigious institutions and authors when using OAJs.

Assessing the effect of article processing charges on the geographic diversity of authors using Elsevier’s “Mirror Journal” system

“…This skew is particularly notable given that publication in Gold-OA journals is increasingly required by funders in some of these countries. Finally, the results suggest authors in two of the world's leading producers of scientific publications -China and the USA (Zhou & Leydesdorff, 2006) either remain wary of OA publication or do not find the incentives for publishing OA particularly compelling (Jamali et al, 2020;Xu et al, 2020). When these authors have opted for OA, the clearly prefer established Parent journals over the recently established Mirrors.…”

“…These academic communities might consider open access Mirrors to be of lower quality (Ellers, Crowther, & Harvey, 2017) or be unsure of their status with respect to funder mandates, regardless of the journal's affiliation with an academic society, publisher, or connection with an established subscription journal (Editage, 2018). Authors may also be hesitant to consider them as outlets for their work because they do not yet have impact factors or other metrics used for evaluating personnel, programs, or institutions (Appel, Albagli, Appel, & Albagli, 2019;Pavan & Barbosa, 2018;Xu et al, 2020). Finally, they might also be concerned regarding their status with respect to the OA mandates of their particular funders and institutions in light of the recent decision that mirror-journals are not 'Plan S '-compliant (cOAlitionS, 2021).…”

Untitled

“…It was almost as though they could not mention their name because they were so despised. However, in contrast, Xu et al (2020) found in a questionnaire study of mostly young Chinese researchers that perceptions towards OA publishing were more positive, with most respondents no longer thinking that OA journals published poor quality content or were predatory journals. One possible explanation for the different take on this might be that around a quarter of their respondents were recruited via MDPI, an OA publisher platform, and therefore were likely to be more familiar with OA and to have more experience of publishing in OA journals.…”

Toward internationalization: A bibliometric analysis of the social sciences in Mainland China from 1979 to 2018

“…With higher accessibility and visibility, OA plays an increasingly vital role in knowledge dissemination globally. In addition, previous studies have shown that authors from developing countries are usually more likely to perceive OA positively than authors from developed countries (Kien c , 2017;Xu, He et al, 2020). Therefore, we would like to raise the question of how OA affects the international development of Mainland China's social science research?…”