Influence of open access journals on the research community in Journal Citation Reports

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Purpose

The number of open access (OA) journals is rapidly increasing, and it is very important for librarians to understand the influence of OA journals on the research community. This study investigated the influence of the OA journals listed in Journal Citation Reports (JCR) based on various indicators.


Methods

The data for this study were prepared by combining the JCR 2014 to 2019 journal list with the number of hybrid OA articles obtained by searching the Web of Science. Each journal’s JCR indicators and article processing charge were added. The influence of OA journals was compared according to OA type, whether they were published by large publishers, and whether they were top gold OA journals.


Results

Gold OA journals remained weaker in terms of JCR indicators than hybrid journals. However, the top 20 gold OA journals, accounting for 27.0% of all OA articles in JCR 2014 to 2019, were superior in all JCR indicators. The top three OA publishers (MDPI, BioMed Central, and Public Library of Science) showed potential for development despite concerns regarding poor journals. The top three subscription publishers were very active in OA publishing, but their actual share of hybrid OA articles (Elsevier, 5.1%; Springer, 10.1%; and Wiley, 12.4% in JCR 2019) was still insufficient.


Conclusion

Some gold OA journals showed high competitiveness and even the possibility for development beyond traditional journals. The transition of subscription journals to hybrid journals was found to be at the early stage. In light of these findings, librarians should continue monitoring the influence of OA journals.

참고문헌 (Reference)

1 Marques M, "Transitioning to open access : an evaluation of the UK Springer compact agreement pilot 2016-2018" 81 : 913-927, 2020

2 Aspesi C, "The changing academic publishing industry: implications for academic institutions" Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition

3 김상준, "Open access status of journals and articles in Journal Citation Reports" 한국과학학술지편집인협의회 8 (8): 26-31, 2021

4 김상준, "Market share of the largest publishers in Journal Citation Reports based on journal price and article processing charge" 한국과학학술지편집인협의회 7 (7): 149-155, 2020

5 김상준, "Influence of the top 10 journal publishers listed in Journal Citation Reports based on six indicators" 한국과학학술지편집인협의회 7 (7): 142-148, 2020