Is publishing gold open-access worth it? An assessment of hybrid and gold open-access publishing models of medical journals on their impact

Abstract

Background Hybrid and gold open-access (OA) are the most common publishing models. The latter requires fees to allow full-text visibility upon publishing, whereas hybrid journals offer the option to publish gold OA or for free (subscription-based) where only users with access can get the full-text. We aimed to evaluate the impact of the publishing model and other factors on medical journals’ impact. Methods A sample of hybrid and gold OA medical journals indexed in Web of Science (WOS) and Scopus were included. The effect of the publishing model and other factors on journals’ impact factor (IF), CiteScore, quartile, and number of citations was assessed. Results 402 journals were included, 201 in each group. Hybrid and gold OA journals had a median age of 32 and 21 years, respectively (P<0.001). The median publishing cost in gold OA journals was $2,690, and 46.3% of them publish continuously. Publishing model, journal’s age, being of an organization/society, and EMBASE indexation didn’t affect IF, CiteScore, number of citations, and WOS quartile (P>0.05). However, gold OA model wasn’t significantly associated with Q1 ranking in Scopus (OR, 0.49; 95% CI, 0.25-0.94; P=0.032), which indicates that hybrid journals were more likely to have such ranking. Conclusion These findings indicate that gold OA publishing doesn’t necessarily result in higher impact, which contradicts the claim that such model enhances citations. Therefore, authors can continue to publish in hybrid journals without being concerned about getting cited. Gold OA journals are encouraged to reduce their fees to facilitate global research access.