NEWS AND ANALYSIS


Such results suggest a tension between policy directions and research practice. Publishing practices seem to be more strongly influenced by the ‘impact factor’ and a researcher’s immediate research interests and peers, than by the opportunities of wide availability and models that support open dissemination. One of the interests of the G8 statement was access to research by developing nations. This was stated as an important principle and one that open research can enable. Again we see from the survey results that this is not a factor that features highly for researchers when considering publishing options. In contrast to this, however, the survey showed that, when researchers are themselves in the position of a reader, there is a strong desire for openly-available resources on the web. When asked what they do when they cannot get immediate access to a book or journal in their library around 90 per cent of the respondents said they would next search for a free version online and, failing that, would simply give up and look for an alternative resource.


A comparative Ithaka survey, undertaken at the same time in the USA, showed similar results in the preference for searching freely-


available resources. However, in contrast to the UK, the US researchers tend to opt for interlibrary loan before they give up and look for a different resource to the one they originally sought. This could reflect the different service models for interlibrary loan between the UK and USA. So, how can the gap between these two aspects of research practice be bridged to meet


We may see generational shifts in practice, but incentives for researchers to publish openly need to be more explicit


policy aspirations? Inevitably, change takes time. We may see generational shifts in practice, but incentives for researchers to publish openly need to be more explicit. Clearly the latest survey findings show that, if a resource is available openly, other researchers will use it. It can therefore be assumed that there will be higher citation rates if an article is OA – and this has been backed by many studies. Research Councils UK’s policy on OA will


force a change in the publishing practice of academics by insisting on OA and supporting the associated publication costs. However, the management of the publication fees across researchers, universities and publishers, and the rates of article charges applied, are potential barriers that need to be reduced if the resistance to this is to be overcome.


A key argument in favour of OA has been that it increases the impact of research outside universities.


Interestingly, the academics


responding to our survey did not see advice on increasing the impact of their publications as important, compared to other support that could be offered.


This might change, of course, as the UK Research Excellence Framework includes impact as a component, and it becomes clearer how OA can increase research impact, as illustrated by recent reports from the Open Access Implementation Group. Policy levers of this kind, if used wisely, can be effective in influencing practice. The Jisc/ RLUK survey of academics shows that there is still work to do to bring policy and practice closer together.


Rachel Bruce is innovation director at Jisc. David Prosser is executive director of RLUK


JOURNAL’S EVOLUTION INTO TWITTERSPHERE


Last year the journal Methods in Ecology and Evolution began asking authors to include tweetable abstracts in their submissions. Samantha Ponton explains why and how


I


n November 2012, the online-only journal of the British Ecological Society (BES), Methods in Ecology and Evolution, introduced a new submissions requirement for all articles. We began to ask authors to submit a ‘tweetable abstract’. One of our sister journals, Journal of Ecology, followed suit in April 2013. To introduce our new submission requirement, a new box was added to our ScholarOne manuscript submission website, for authors to enter their text. We have not provided any detailed guidelines for authors, but have simply included the following statement next to the box: ‘Tweetable Abstract: Limit 120 characters – describe the novelty/key finding of your manuscript’. We ask for a maximum of 120 characters so that we can also add a link to the article. The initiative was also widely publicised through our


www.researchinformation.info @researchinfo


Twitter account and on the Methods blog. It is important to note that the text provided during the submission process is not used automatically. It is checked by the assistant editor and, providing it represents the article well, it is then used along with a link to the article. Before this introduction we mainly tweeted article titles, which were sometimes modified, but it is more interesting if an author can concisely state their key message in their own words. However, if a tweetable abstract is not usable, we revert back to tweeting the title. Either way, our followers will see our tweets and hopefully click on the links to read the articles. So far, approximately 75 per cent of Methods submissions have had a usable tweetable abstract – a healthy percentage, particularly considering that we only introduced the


initiative recently and that not all researchers are familiar with Twitter.


The most common mistake made by the remaining 25 per cent is to provide 120 words, instead of 120 characters. We have also found that very few authors use the symbols ‘@’ and ‘#’ in their tweetable


The most common mistake made by the remaining 25 per cent is to provide 120 words, instead of 120 characters


abstracts, to refer to an author’s Twitter username or to tag a key word, respectively. This will be an interesting trend to watch as authors become more informed about Twitter and as more metrics are gathered that could show the effects of this activity.


Samantha Ponton is assistant editor of Methods in Ecology and Evolution


AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2013 Research Information 9


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