Left in the Cold: The Failure of APC Waiver Programs to Provide Author Equity

Rouhi, Sara; Beard, Romi; Brundy, Curtis

doi:10.36591/se-d-4501-5

Cited by 11 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…Waivers are only applied on request, yet such discount policies are not well communicated (i.e., authors are often unaware). Hybrid journals do not usually offer waivers for OA in their journals, and where waivers are in place often do not mitigate costs enough to encourage OA authorship (Lawson, 2015;Mekonnen et al, 2022;Rouhi et al, 2022). Most damagingly, however, in our view waivers support rather than challenge the status quo.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

The APC-Effect: Stratification in Open Access Publishing

Klebel¹,

Ross-Hellauer²

2022

Preprint

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Current implementations of Open Access (OA) publishing frequently involve Article Publishing Charges (APCs). Increasing evidence emerges that APCs impede researchers with fewer resources in publishing their research OA. We analysed 1.5 million scientific articles from journals listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals to assess average APCs and their determinants for a comprehensive set of journal publications, across scientific disciplines, world regions and through time. Levels of APCs were strongly stratified by scientific fields and the institutions’ countries, corroborating previous findings on publishing cultures and the impact of mandates of research funders. After controlling for country and scientific field with a multilevel mixture model, however, we found small to moderate effects of levels of institutional resourcing on the level of APCs. This is what we call the APC-Effect. Effects were largest in countries with low GDP, suggesting decreasing marginal effects of institutional resources when general levels of funding are high. Our findings provide further evidence on how APCs stratify OA publishing and highlight the need for alternative publishing models.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

The APC-Effect: Stratification in Open Access Publishing

Klebel¹,

Ross-Hellauer²

2022

Preprint

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“…Many conservation journals offer a full or partial waiver for these article processing charges (APCs) for authors in lower- and middle-income countries. However, critics argue this does not go far enough to address inequity (Rouhi et al 2022; Sanderson 2023) and Smith et al (2021) demonstrated waivers were ineffective at increasing the representation of low-income authors. Such ineffectiveness may relate to poor communication surrounding waiver eligibility, waiver restrictions, or - less often discussed - negative perceptions towards waivers, which may be seen as patronizing by those they aim to help (Meagher 2021; cOAlition S 2024).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Author Choices in the Current Conservation Publishing Landscape

Yoh,

Holle,

Willis

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Publishing in academic journals helps disseminate scientific research and contributes to a researcher's academic career. Conservation is interdisciplinary and, as such, there are a diversity of practitioners, scientists, and others who contribute to the conservation literature. Currently, little is known about how different journal attributes impact an author's choice of where to publish or how they may act as barriers to publishing in conservation-related journals. Here, we used a Discrete Choice Experiment to determine the interplay between seven attributes and assess journal choice between three demographic groups. Across 1038 respondents, we found that each group exhibited different publishing preferences. Only two attributes showed a consistent response across groups: cost to publish negatively impacted journal choice, including for those in high-income countries, and authors had a consistent preference for double-blind review. Based on our findings, we provide several recommendations to conservation-related journals to reduce barriers to publishing and ultimately benefit conservation science.

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“…However, although OA addresses the ‘access’ issue, it fails to address the ‘creation’ side of the equation and newer models of knowledge creation and access need to be developed. 3 …”

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confidence: 99%

“…However, although OA addresses the 'access' issue, it fails to address the 'creation' side of the equation and newer models of knowledge creation and access need to be developed. 3 As the editor in chief and deputy editors for Global Strategy/Outreach at Trauma Surgery and Acute Care Open (TSACO), we think it is our moral and ethical duty to address these disparities. Recent changes at BMJ Publishing, publisher of TSACO, abolishing APC for all 125 HINARI A and B countries is a welcome development and a step in the right direction.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Making publishing in trauma and acute care surgery possible for all resource settings: a moral and ethical imperative

Malhotra,

Haut,

Gaarder

2024

Trauma Surg Acute Care Open

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Left in the Cold: The Failure of APC Waiver Programs to Provide Author Equity

Cited by 11 publications

References 0 publications

The APC-Effect: Stratification in Open Access Publishing

The APC-Effect: Stratification in Open Access Publishing

Understanding Author Choices in the Current Conservation Publishing Landscape

Making publishing in trauma and acute care surgery possible for all resource settings: a moral and ethical imperative

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