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International Open Access Week - Early observations from the ‘Open research practices, engagement and perspectives’ survey.

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International Open Access Week October 19-25
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Early observations from the ‘Open research practices, engagement and perspectives’ survey.

By Tom Moore 

With the 2020 Open Access Week theme “Open with Purpose: Taking Action to Build Structural Equity and Inclusion” we thought this would be a good opportunity to give some early observations from the survey conducted between May and October 2020 of Leicester researchers on ‘Open research practices, engagement and perspectives’. The observations will focus on two areas:

  • Potential for local structural inequity and exclusion: Role (the position in research career)
  • External research funding

The survey was jointly produced by the REF environment and library research services teams. For the research services team, the primary purpose of the survey was to take stock and get a picture of where the research community at Leicester are with the Open Research agenda. To identify potential case studies and to help us target and develop our advocacy, training and engagement program.

Survey responses

The survey was (optionally) anonymous and categorised by REF unit of assessment (UOA). We received 250 responses, with representation from all UOAs. The majority of responses (78%) were from ‘staff members’ on teaching & research, research only and teaching only contracts, this was followed by ‘postgraduate researchers (PGR’s)’ (14.4%) and ‘postdoc researchers (PDR’s)’ (7.6%). Over half of respondents (56%) had external research funding; for ‘staff members’ this rose (59%) and dropped for PGR’s (44%) and PDR’s (42%).

Observations

  1. Over 80% of respondents have an ORCID. This was a pleasing finding. There was little difference between funded or not, however the figure dropped to 45% for PGR’s.
  2. Most respondents have not participated in producing pre-prints (68.9%) or in Open Peer Review (77.5%). Those with external research funding (36.43%) produced pre-prints more than those without (21.82%).
  3. There was near unanimous agreement in there being ‘value in anyone being able to access my research’ (95%) and an overwhelming ‘preference to publish open access’ (82.5%) with PDR’s in strong agreement (79%).
  4. ‘Engaging and adopting open research practice’ and ‘Sharing research data and other research outputs’ should receive more credit (reward and/or recognition). ‘Strong agreement’ was highest from PGRs (47.22% & 52.78%) and PDR’s (42.11% & 68.42%) compared to that of staff members (26.15% & 31.28%).
  5. There was strong agreement across all groups that there was a ‘need for more support for open research activities’, this was highest among externally funded researchers (51%), PGRs (52%) and PDR’s (57%).
  6. 80% of respondents agreed that the University of Leicester should endorse a statement ‘committing to the values, principles and culture of Open Research’, with this rising to over 90% for PGR’s.

What next

Analysis of the survey will take place over the coming months, these early observations show that for PGR’s and PDR’s there is value in adopting open research practices and a need for more support and recognition.

There will be a new series of open research training sessions running between January and June 2021, these will be advertised and available to book toward the end of 2020 for PGR’s and for staff.

We want to hear from you

We are always interested in learning more about your open research practice. Please get in touch by email  or we would be happy to arrange a consultation via teams with one of our Research Services Consultants.

OA Week: virtual drop-in

Please join us on Friday 23rd October 11:00-11:45 for our Ask the Library Open Access team event.

This is your opportunity to ask questions about open access funding arrangements, transformative publishing agreements we have signed, OA requirements of research funders, Plan S, Wellcome Trust open research requirements,  or anything else related to open access and open data.

We encourage you to submit your question in advance. No registration required, feel free to join us in Teams. We look forward to hearing from you.

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