When open data closes the door: Problematising a one size fits all approach to open data in journal submission guidelines

Opening data promises to improve research rigour and democratise knowledge production. But it also poses practical, theoretical, and ethical risks for qualitative research. Despite discussion about open data in qualitative social psychology predating the replication crisis, the nuances of this discussion have not been translated into current journal policies. Through a content analysis of 261 journals in the domain of social psychology, we establish the state of current journal policies for open data. We critically discuss how these expectations may not be adequate for establishing qualitative rigour, can introduce ethical challenges, and may place those who wish to use qualitative approaches at a disadvantage in peer review and publication processes. We assert that open data requirements should include clearer guidelines that reflect the nuance of data sharing in qualitative research, and move away from a universal ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to data sharing.

The impact of editorial policies and journal models on the number of articles on social humanities and communication studies related to Covid-19; Evidence from international and Indonesian scholarly work

This study examines scientific publications during a pandemic through bibliometric network analysis. We explored three different journal databases to map COVID-19 research in humanities and social sciences, then zoom in to communication studies. Government policy, e-learning, anxiety, economic impact are popular keywords in international and Indonesian articles on Social and Humanities, while disinformation, health communication, behavior change, and literacy are more prominent in communication articles. The researcher chose the keyword occurrence analysis as the basis for mapping the research theme. The bibliographic network was deployed in three strategies to obtain keyword data co-occurrence from research abstracts, keywords from researchers, and coder's approval keywords. Lastly, Vos viewer is used to creating macro and detailed perspective networks for interpretation. The results show that journal policies and models affect the number of COVID-19 publications in the journal. Finally, this study provides an overview that normative theory and behaviorism play a role in social and communication research.

Evidence on Research Transparency in Economics

A decade ago, the term “research transparency” was not on economists' radar screen, but in a few short years a scholarly movement has emerged to bring new open science practices, tools and norms into the mainstream of our discipline. The goal of this article is to lay out the evidence on the adoption of these approaches – in three specific areas: open data, pre-registration and pre-analysis plans, and journal policies – and, more tentatively, begin to assess their impacts on the quality and credibility of economics research. The evidence to date indicates that economics (and related quantitative social science fields) are in a period of rapid transition toward new transparency-enhancing norms. While solid data on the benefits of these practices in economics is still limited, in part due to their relatively recent adoption, there is growing reason to believe that critics' worst fears regarding onerous adoption costs have not been realized. Finally, the article presents a set of frontier questions and potential innovations.

Evaluating implementation of the Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) guidelines: the TRUST process for rating journal policies, procedures, and practices

Background The Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines describe modular standards that journals can adopt to promote open science. The TOP Factor is a metric to describe the extent to which journals have adopted the TOP Guidelines in their policies. Systematic methods and rating instruments are needed to calculate the TOP Factor. Moreover, implementation of these open science policies depends on journal procedures and practices, for which TOP provides no standards or rating instruments. Methods We describe a process for assessing journal policies, procedures, and practices according to the TOP Guidelines. We developed this process as part of the Transparency of Research Underpinning Social Intervention Tiers (TRUST) Initiative to advance open science in the social intervention research ecosystem. We also provide new instruments for rating journal instructions to authors (policies), manuscript submission systems (procedures), and published articles (practices) according to standards in the TOP Guidelines. In addition, we describe how to determine the TOP Factor score for a journal, calculate reliability of journal ratings, and assess coherence among a journal’s policies, procedures, and practices. As a demonstration of this process, we describe a protocol for studying approximately 345 influential journals that have published research used to inform evidence-based policy. Discussion The TRUST Process includes systematic methods and rating instruments for assessing and facilitating implementation of the TOP Guidelines by journals across disciplines. Our study of journals publishing influential social intervention research will provide a comprehensive account of whether these journals have policies, procedures, and practices that are consistent with standards for open science and thereby facilitate the publication of trustworthy findings to inform evidence-based policy. Through this demonstration, we expect to identify ways to refine the TOP Guidelines and the TOP Factor. Refinements could include: improving templates for adoption in journal instructions to authors, manuscript submission systems, and published articles; revising explanatory guidance intended to enhance the use, understanding, and dissemination of the TOP Guidelines; and clarifying the distinctions among different levels of implementation. Research materials are available on the Open Science Framework: https://osf.io/txyr3/.

Evaluating implementation of the Transparency and Openness Promotion Guidelines: The TRUST Process for rating journal policies, procedures, and practices

Background: The Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines describe standards that journals can adopt to promote open science. The TOP Factor is a metric to describe the extent to which journals have adopted the TOP Guidelines in their policies. Systematic methods and rating instruments are needed to calculate the TOP Factor. Moreover, implementation of these open science policies depends on journal procedures and practices, for which TOP provides no standards or rating instruments.Methods: We describe a reproducible process for assessing journal policies, procedures, and practices according to the TOP Guidelines. We developed this process as part of the Transparency of Research Underpinning Social Intervention Tiers (TRUST) Initiative to advance open science in the social intervention research ecosystem. We also provide new instruments for rating journal instructions to authors (policies), manuscript submission systems (procedures), and published articles (practices) according to standards in the TOP Guidelines. In addition, we describe how to determine the TOP Factor score for a journal, calculate reliability of journal ratings, and assess coherence among a journal’s policies, procedures, and practices. As a demonstration of this process, we describe a protocol for studying approximately 345 influential journals that have published research used to inform evidence-based policy.Discussion: The TRUST Process is a reproducible method for assessing and facilitating implementation of the TOP Guidelines by journals across disciplines. Our study of journals publishing influential social intervention research will provide a comprehensive account of whether these journals have policies, procedures, and practices that are consistent with standards for open science and thereby facilitate the production of trustworthy evidence-based policy. Through this demonstration, we expect to identify ways to refine the TOP Guidelines and the TOP Factor. Refinements could include: improving templates for adoption in journal instructions to authors, manuscript submission systems, and published articles; revising explanatory guidance intended to enhance the use, understanding, and dissemination of the TOP Guidelines; and clarifying the distinctions among different levels of implementation.

Journal policies and editors’ opinions on peer review

Peer review practices differ substantially between journals and disciplines. This study presents the results of a survey of 322 editors of journals in ecology, economics, medicine, physics and psychology. We found that 49% of the journals surveyed checked all manuscripts for plagiarism, that 61% allowed authors to recommend both for and against specific reviewers, and that less than 6% used a form of open peer review. Most journals did not have an official policy on altering reports from reviewers, but 91% of editors identified at least one situation in which it was appropriate for an editor to alter a report. Editors were also asked for their views on five issues related to publication ethics. A majority expressed support for co-reviewing, reviewers requesting access to data, reviewers recommending citations to their work, editors publishing in their own journals, and replication studies. Our results provide a window into what is largely an opaque aspect of the scientific process. We hope the findings will inform the debate about the role and transparency of peer review in scholarly publishing.