Publishing your findings is as vital as ever in today's academic world. Open Access (OA) is a popular method of making high-quality, peer-reviewed findings freely available to public. Fortunately, the internet has made it easier to disseminate fresh studies. A new publication that is made available online may be viewed by people all over the globe, boosting its importance as a catalyst for fresh study.
There are a lot of misunderstandings concerning open access. The following are a few frequent open access misconceptions and myths which have all been disproved.
- The quality of open access journals is lower than that of conventional subscription-based publications.
According to studies, open access journals can be just as good as, if not better than, subscription journals.
The Seal for Quality of the Directory of Open Access Journals recognizes a list of over 1000 journals that meet high publication standards and follow best practices in publishing.
With the rise of open access publishing, new methods of assessing quality, such as article-level measures, are becoming more popular, while the more conventional journal impact factor continues to be criticized by academics.
- The peer-review procedure in open-access publications is not as rigorous as it is in subscription journals.
Although some predatory open access journals do not use a proper peer reviewmethod, the great majority of open access journals are conducted ethically and intellectually. With the shifting publishing landscape, authors and readers alike must develop a habit of critically analyzing the studies that have been done they consume. - It is philanthropic of me to make my work open access, yet there is no advantage to me.
Open Access publications not only benefit the economy and society, but they also benefit individual writers academically.
Open access papers have showed gains in article-level measures such as citation count, publication download, and sharing rate in several studies.
- When you publish in a subscription publication, you can't make the same work open access.
Authors might request that the journal in which their article is published allow them to keep the right to upload a version of their work in a topic or institutional repository.
After a set embargo period, several journals have created rules that allow researchers to make their work open access in a digital repository.
Many open access journals are financed by societies or external donors and do not charge article processing charges (APCs). Look out the DOAJ's list of journals that don't charge APCs. Although APCs are necessary to publish in a journal, several organizations provide financial support through open access funding. Grant money is frequently used to pay journal APCs. - I will automatically comply with my funder's open access policy if I publish my paper open access in a journal.
Some sponsors require writers to submit grant-funded works to their own open access repository.
- Promotion and tenure will not be based on open access papers.
There is no reason why a paper published in an open-access publication with a high reputation and peer review procedure should not qualify for promotion or tenure.
Promotion and tenure committees, on the other hand, may still do a lot to assist the open access initiative and promote professors to publish to these journals.
Publishing Open Access allows anybody, everywhere to access, read, and profit from your study, which helps to progress discovery. About 75% of open-access publications receive more citations than non-Open Access counterparts, with an average of 30-50% more citations. Navigating Open Access, on the other hand, is difficult.