Hybrid Journals Research Articles

Differences in the reporting of conflicts of interest and sponsorships in systematic reviews with meta-analyses in dentistry: an examination of factors associated with their reporting

BackgroundReporting conflicts of interest (COI) and sources of sponsorship are of paramount importance in adequately interpreting the results of systematic reviews. Some evidence suggests that there is an influence of COI and sponsorship on the study results.The objectives of this meta-research study were twofold: (a) to assess the reporting of COI and sponsorship statements in systematic reviews published in dentistry in three sources (abstract, journal’s website and article’s full text) and (b) to assess the associations between the characteristics of the systematic reviews and reporting of COI.MethodsWe searched the PubMed database for dental systematic reviews published from database inception to June 2023. We assessed how COI and sponsorship statements were reported in the three sources. We performed a logistic regression analysis to assess the associations between the characteristics of the systematic reviews and the reporting of COI.ResultsWe assessed 924 abstracts published in PubMed and on the corresponding journals´ websites. Similarly, full texts associated with the 924 abstracts were also assessed. A total of 639 (69%) and 795 (88%) studies had no statement of COI in the abstracts on PubMed and the journal’s website, respectively. In contrast, a COI statement was reported in 801 (87%) full texts. Sponsorship statements were not reported in 911 (99%) and 847 (93%) abstracts published in PubMed and a journal´s website, respectively. Nearly two-thirds of the full-text articles (N = 607) included sponsorship statements. Journal access was significantly associated with COI statement reporting in all three sources. Open-access journals have significantly higher odds to report COI in PubMed and full-texts, while have significantly lower odds to report COI in the websites, compared with subscription or hybrid journals. type was significantly associated with COI statement reporting on the journal’s website and in the full text. Review registration based on the full text and the number of authors were significantly associated with COI statement reporting in PubMed and in the full texts. Several other variables were found to be significantly associated with COI statement reporting in one of the three sources.ConclusionsCOI and sponsorship statements seem to be underreported in the abstracts and homepage of the journals, compared to the full-texts. These results were particularly more pronounced in abstracts published in both the PubMed database and the journals’ websites. Several characteristics of systematic reviews were associated with COI statement reporting.

Transformative agreements, publication venues and Open Access policies at the University of Milan

AbstractStarting from July 2020 at the University of Milan, one of the largest and most important Italian universities, the first transformative agreements with some major international scientific publishers have come into effect. These agreements allow corresponding authors to publish in open access without directly bearing the publication costs. From the perspective of corresponding authors, these agreements could increase the dissemination of their scientific output and, thereby, the impact on the scientific community. However, transformative agreements are part of a rapidly changing publishing market that already includes open access articles in both so‐called ‘Diamond’ and ‘Gold’ journals. The aim of our study is to understand to what extent the positioning of journals in impact rankings, the disciplinary field of the article, together with the career stage of the corresponding author, influence the choice to publish in a journal covered by transformative agreements rather than in other open access or hybrid journals. The results of our investigation draw attention to the importance of rules in Italy governing scientific careers in different disciplinary fields and potential unforeseen effects of policies favouring open access.

A Critical Appraisal of Reporting in Randomized Controlled Trials Investigating Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment: A Meta-Research Study.

Background/Objectives: In osteopathy, it becomes necessary to produce high-quality evidence to demonstrate its effectiveness. The aim of this meta-research study is to assess the reporting quality of RCTs published in the osteopathic field. Methods: The protocol was preliminarily registered on the "Open Science Framework (OSF)" website. For reporting, we considered the PRISMA 2020 checklist. We included all the RCTs, published between 2011 and 2023, investigating the effectiveness of Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment (OMT) in any possible condition. The search process was conducted on four major biomedical databases including PubMed, Central, Scopus and Embase. A data extraction form was implemented to collect all relevant information. The completeness of reporting was calculated as the percentage of adherence to the CONSORT checklist; the Cochrane ROB 2 tool was considered to assess the risk of bias (RoB) in the following five major domains: randomization (D1), interventions (D2), missing data (D3), outcome measurement (D4), selective reporting (D5). Results: A total of 131 studies were included and the overall adherence was 57%, with the worst section being "other information" (42%). Studies with a lower RoB showed higher adherence to the CONSORT. The "results" section presented the highest differences as follows: D1 (-36.7%), D2 (-27.2%), D3 (-21.5%) and D5 (-25.5%). Significant correlations were also found between the preliminary protocol registration, higher journal quartile, publication in hybrid journals and the completeness of reporting (β: 19.22, CI: 14.45-24.00, p < 0.001; β: 5.41; CI: 2.80-8.02, p ≤ 0.001; β: 5.64, CI: 1.06-10.23, p = 0.016, respectively). Conclusions: The adherence to the CONSORT checklist in osteopathic RCTs is lacking. An association was found between a lower completeness of reporting and a higher RoB, a good journal ranking, publication in hybrid journals and a prospective protocol registration. Journals and authors should adopt all the strategies to adhere to reporting guidelines to guarantee generalization of the results arising from RCTs.

Is open access disrupting the journal business? A perspective from comparing full adopters, partial adopters, and non-adopters

Two decades after the inception of open access publishing (OA), its impact has remained a focal point in academic discourse. This study adopted a disruptive innovation framework to examine OA's influence on the traditional subscription market. It assesses the market power of gold journals (OA full adopters) in comparison with hybrid journals and closed-access journals (partial adopters and non-adopters). Additionally, it contrasts the market power between hybrid journals (partial adopters) and closed-access journals (non-adopters). Using the Lerner index to measure market power through price elasticity of demand, this study employs difference tests and multiple regressions. These findings indicate that OA full adopters disrupt the market power of non-adopting incumbents. However, by integrating the OA option into their business models, partial adopters can effectively mitigate this disruption and expand their influence from the traditional subscription market to the emerging OA paradigm.

Determinants of Downloads as Demand for Hybrid Journals

Although Big Deal contracts that provide access rights to all electronic journals published by the publisher initially gained favor with university libraries, some libraries have terminated these contracts owing to increased charges since the 2010s. Consequently, they are faced with the problem of selecting journals for purchase within their limited budgets. This study investigates the factors affecting the number of downloads, representing journal demand, to provide libraries with guidance on journal selection. The download equation for 1485 hybrid journals published by Springer Nature is formulated using ordinary least squares. The results found that 5% and 50% of the 1485 journals generated approximately 30% and 85% of the downloads in 2022, respectively. Downloads are concentrated in fewer journals, although the Pareto principle does not apply to hybrid journals. Demand concentration implies that libraries do not need to maintain access rights to all journals. Recently, a few leading publishers have provided access rights to almost all electronic journals based on transformative agreements aiming to promote open access. Therefore, this study’s findings raise the issue of the rationale for bundling electronic journals in transformative agreements, which is similar to Big Deal. Moreover, the results of the download estimation reveal that hybrid journals with more open access articles, larger citation scores, and longer histories acquire more downloads. These findings indicate that open access accelerates the dissemination of research.

Effect of Wear on Symmetric Hole-Entry Hybrid Journal Bearing Compensated by Orifice Restrictor Under Turbulent Regime

This study examines the impact of wear and turbulent flow on symmetric hole-entry hybrid journal bearings with orifice restrictors. Dufranes’s abrasive model for wear effect and Constantinescu’s lubrication model for turbulent flow have been used. A modification has been made to the Reynolds equationand utilized the finite element method to solvealong withflow equation of an orifice restrictor. For selected wear depth parameter values and Reynolds numbers,computed results have been acquired. The minimum fluid film thickness increases for worn bearings when operating under a turbulent regime rather than a laminar regime. Further, the stiffness coefficient decreases for constant external load when worn/unworn bearings function in a turbulent regime.

Combined Effect of Surface Irregularities and Applied Voltage on the Behavior of Hole-Entry Spherical Hybrid Journal Bearings Lubricated with an Electro-Rheological Fluid

Abstract Surface irregularities substantially affect the performance of tribological systems. The influence of three-dimensional surface irregularities has been investigated on the behavior of hole-entry spherical hybrid journal bearings. Recently, smart fluids have been employed in several applications to improve their performance. The interactive effect of electro-rheological (ER) fluid and surface irregularities have also been studied. The modified Reynolds equation and restrictor flow equation have been solved using the finite element technique with appropriate boundary conditions. The results show that consideration of surface irregularities on bearing surface enhances bearing stability. Spherical hybrid journal bearings lubricated by ER fluid increase minimum fluid film thickness and minimize the possibility of metal-to-metal contact. It is found that the combined effect of surface irregularities and ER fluid significantly improved the bearing performance parameters than individual behavior. The bearing designer is anticipated to benefit from the current model.

Botlitica: A generative AI-based tool to assist journalists in navigating political propaganda campaigns

The hype on generative AI has raised concerns about the spread of disinformation but also opened up new opportunities for hybrid journalism. The proliferation of political propaganda campaigns spread across digital media during election periods constitutes a challenge for journalists who struggle to exercise information gatekeeping. AI-based tools can in principle help, but journalists are resistant to using them since they are sceptical about their compliance with news values and their scarce user-friendliness. To cope with such issues, we present Botlitica, a GPT3-based chatbot able to answer users’ questions according to the information shared on different social media by a given political party which is, thus, embodied by the AI agent in the conversation. The back-end and front-design of the chatbot are devised to privilege transparency. We report the results of a preliminary evaluation of Botlitica which show that the tool fastens journalists’ capabilities to navigate propaganda campaigns inducing them to exercise critical thinking.

Impact of Open Access status on journal metrics in infectious diseases and clinical microbiology – A cross-sectional study

IntroductionWhile Open Access (OA) journals provide free access to articles, they entail high article processing charges (APC), limiting opportunities for young researchers and those from low-middle income countries to publish OA. MethodsCross-sectional study, evaluating APC and academic impact of full OA (FOA) journals in infectious diseases (ID) and clinical microbiology (CM) compared to hybrid journals. Data were collected from Journal Citation Reports and journals’ websites. ResultsAmong 255 journals, median APC was 2850 (interquartile range [IQR] 1325–3654$). Median APC for 120 FOA journals was significantly lower than for 119 hybrid journals (2000, IQR 648–2767$ versus 3550, IQR 2948–4120$, p < 0.001). FOA journals had lower citation numbers and impact metrics compared to hybrid journals. ConclusionWhile FOA ID/CM journals have lower APCs, they also lower academic impact compared to hybrid journals. These findings highlight the need for reforms in the publication process in view of achieving equitable data dissemination.

Plan S and Open Access (OA) in Quebec: What Does the Revised FRQ OA Policy Mean for Researchers?

Objective – Our article examines the effects of Quebec’s provincial funding agency (FRQ)’s revised 2022 OA policy on researchers. Following FRQ’s participation as a cOAlition S funding agency, which involves endorsing Plan S principles, we provide an overview of the OA options for researchers. We examine these options under the FRQ 2019 and FRQ 2022 policy years, account for the effect of transformative agreements (TA) on OA publishing options, as well as the financial implications for researchers under the revised policy. Methods – The researchers extracted a list of FRQ-funded publications from years 2020 to 2022 using the DOI registration agency Crossref. Using this sample set, the researchers quantitatively analyzed OA options under the previous policy and the revised one, comparing the two. To determine the effect of transformative agreements (TAs)s, we reviewed current agreements offered through Canada’s national licensing agency Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN). Results ­– We found that the self-archiving method for open access (OA) is reduced under the revised 2022 policy. Our results lead us to anticipate the pressure felt by authors who will be required to pay article processing charges (APCs) to meet grant requirements. Conclusion – The current publishing patterns of FRQ-funded researchers are primarily concentrated in hybrid journals not covered by transformative agreements. As such, researchers will face additional financial costs should these publishing patterns continue. Concerted efforts among all stakeholders (researchers, universities, libraries, and funders) are needed to sustainably transition to immediate OA. French version – https://spectrum.library.concordia.ca/id/eprint/993806/

Choice of Open Access in Elsevier Hybrid Journals

Open access articles in hybrid journals have recently increased despite high article processing charges. This study investigated the impacts of grants and transformative agreements on authors’ choice of open and non-open access articles by comparing two article types. The samples were hybrid journals launched independently by Elsevier. The results revealed that the authors who received more grants in countries with transformative agreements were more likely to choose open access articles. By contrast, authors in developing countries were likely to publish non-open access articles. These findings imply that authors’ choices depend on the funding systems and open access policies in individual countries. Consequently, open access may become a barrier to the dissemination of work for researchers who have financial difficulty choosing open access, although it enables everyone to access articles free of charge.

Does it pay to pay? A comparison of the benefits of open-access publishing across various sub-fields in biology.

Authors are often faced with the decision of whether to maximize traditional impact metrics or minimize costs when choosing where to publish the results of their research. Many subscription-based journals now offer the option of paying an article processing charge (APC) to make their work open. Though such "hybrid" journals make research more accessible to readers, their APCs often come with high price tags and can exclude authors who lack the capacity to pay to make their research accessible. Here, we tested if paying to publish open access in a subscription-based journal benefited authors by conferring more citations relative to closed access articles. We identified 146,415 articles published in 152 hybrid journals in the field of biology from 2013-2018 to compare the number of citations between various types of open access and closed access articles. In a simple generalized linear model analysis of our full dataset, we found that publishing open access in hybrid journals that offer the option confers an average citation advantage to authors of 17.8 citations compared to closed access articles in similar journals. After taking into account the number of authors, Journal Citation Reports 2020 Quartile, year of publication, and Web of Science category, we still found that open access generated significantly more citations than closed access (p<0.0001). However, results were complex, with exact differences in citation rates among access types impacted by these other variables. This citation advantage based on access type was even similar when comparing open and closed access articles published in the same issue of a journal (p<0.0001). However, by examining articles where the authors paid an article processing charge, we found that cost itself was not predictive of citation rates (p=0.14). Based on our findings of access type and other model parameters, we suggest that, in the case of the 152 journals we analyzed, paying for open access does confer a citation advantage. For authors with limited budgets, we recommend pursuing open access alternatives that do not require paying a fee as they still yielded more citations than closed access. For authors who are considering where to submit their next article, we offer additional suggestions on how to balance exposure via citations with publishing costs.

Article processing charges of health professions category journals in SCOPUS

Introduction and aim: Scientific journals are a key communication channel for the transmission of scientific information, and the publication of articles is mandatory in scientific advancements. Open access publishing enables greater visibility of scientific outputs but publication in open access is rarely free (Van Norden, 2013; Pourret 2022). The aim of this research is to examine the article processing charges (APCs) of journals in the Health professions category within the SCOPUS database, along with their respective business models (hybrid, OA or diamond OA).Methods: We collected data on journals using Scimago, DOAJ and Sherpa Romeo databases, as well as the homepages of journals and publishers. Using the SCImago Journal &amp; Country Rank data for the year 2022, we filtered journals belonging to the field and category of "Health Professions (miscellaneous)". Data were gathered on the number of journals in Scopus, the type of journal (hybrid, open access, diamond journal) and the cost for publishing (APC) an original scientific article/review article in open access. Information about the type of the journal was collected in Sherpa Romeo/DOAJ databases, information on the APCs was found on the pages of the journal or publisher.Results: A total of 60 journals belonging to the category of Health professions in Scopus were identified, with 28 (47%) of them also in the Web of Science database according to Scimago. Of these 60 journals, 28 are hybrid journals, 32 are in open access (53%), including 10 in open access with an APC, and 22 completely free - diamond journals. The publication cost in all journals is in the range from €0 to €3,385.00, with an average median price of €788 (ranging from €0 to €2,895). The average APC is significantly lower in open access journals than in hybrid journals (median €881, ranging from €92 to €2466, versus €2895, ranging from €2045 to €2977), which is in line with previously published results in the medical field (Siler et al, 2018). Most of the diamond journals are in the 3rd (6 out of 22) and 4th quartiles (9 out of 22) or have only recently (3 out of 22) been included in the Scopus database.Limitations of the study: The study sample is small, and has only 60 journals, while there could be more journals connected with health professions in other Scopus categories. Information about waivers was not collected.Conclusion: Journals of the 1st and 2nd quartile, which are considered an important criterion for advancement in the biomedical field, are mostly hybrid journals and the APCs are very high. Consequently, the conclusion emerges that health professions do not have a large selection of journals for publishing in open access, and therefore it is necessary to educate authors to self-archive their articles.

The oligopoly’s shift to open access: How the big five academic publishers profit from article processing charges

Abstract We aim to estimate the total amount of article processing charges (APCs) paid to publish open access (OA) in journals controlled by the five large commercial publishers (Elsevier, Sage, Springer Nature, Taylor &amp; Francis, and Wiley) between 2015 and 2018. Using publication data from WoS, OA status from Unpaywall, and annual APC prices from open data sets and historical fees retrieved via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine, we estimate that globally authors paid $1.06 billion in publication fees to these publishers from 2015–2018. Revenue from gold OA amounted to $612.5 million, and $448.3 million was obtained for publishing OA in hybrid journals. Among the five publishers, Springer Nature made the most revenue from OA ($589.7 million), followed by Elsevier ($221.4 million), Wiley ($114.3 million), Taylor &amp; Francis ($76.8 million), and Sage ($31.6 million). With Elsevier and Wiley making most of their APC revenue from hybrid fees and others focusing on gold, different OA strategies could be observed between publishers.

“Find the Joy”: A War Correspondent’s Tweets and the Rise of an Affective Age in News

This study provides empirical support for undertheorized phenomena in contemporary digital news reporting—the foregrounding of joy-based news values and the presentation of affective, immanent atmospheres—as they manifest in U.S. National Public Radio correspondent Tim Mak’s daily Twitter threads from the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Multimodal textual analysis of 647 tweets over 31 threads shows how affordances of newer media platforms facilitate a shift toward affective, immanent, and engaged journalism that blends traditional news style and judgment seamlessly with personal observations, contextual curation, stream-of-consciousness detail selection, and audience interaction to produce a kind of hybrid journalism that might foreshadow a transformation not just in reporters’ interaction with audiences, but also in an undertheorized reorientation to news itself.

Performance Analysis of Textured Spherical Hybrid Journal Bearings Operated With Magnetorheological Fluid

Abstract Recently, textured surfaces have been used to enhance the performance of tribological systems. This paper examines the effect of textured surfaces on hole-entry spherical hybrid journal bearings operated using magnetorheological (MR) fluid. The different geometric shapes of textured surfaces, including spherical, rectangular, and conical, have been selected for numerical analysis. Next-generation design for tribological systems based on MR fluid lubrication emphasizes dynamic performance. MR fluid responds quickly, and its rheological characteristics can be simply adjusted. The present paper also deals with the non-Newtonian behavior of MR fluid on the bearing performance characteristics parameters. The finite element method is used to solve the modified Reynolds equation. The findings of numerical simulation show that the application of textured surfaces and MR fluid improves the values of minimum fluid film thickness and stability of the bearing.

Trends in reader access and article processing charges among urology journals: A systematic review

ABSTRACT Introduction: This bibliometric study is designed to investigate the relations of urology journals with access types and article processing charges (APCs) to assess the changing paradigm in urology publishing. Methods: The three major databases: The Master Journal List directory by Clavirate Analytics, Scopus® and PubMed were queried for relevant journals in urology and subspecialties. Characterization of urology journals was undertaken, and citation metrics and APCs were compared across access types. A partial sampling was used to investigate the number of open access (OA) articles according to access types and correlations with both APCs and CiteScore. Results: Seventy-seven journals were included into the study. Gold and diamond OA journals comprised 35.4% of urology journals in 2009 and were increased to 49.3% in 2022. No significant difference was found for change in the CiteScore of 2017 and 2021 between the access types, F (2,63) = 0.152, P = 0.859, η2 = 0.005. A moderate positive correlation was found between APCs and CiteScore for both hybrid (rs [27] =0.431, P &lt; 0.0005) and gold OA (rs [27] =0.489, P = 0.007) journals. The authors need to pay $1175 more to publish their articles in OA model in hybrid journals. The number of articles published in OA model by hybrid journals were not correlated with APCs (rs = 0.332, P = 0.078) but correlated with CiteScore (rs = 0.393, P = 0.035). Conclusions: A paradigm shift in urology publishing toward OA model has been occurring. Authors choose prestige, OA model, rapid publication, and less rigorous peer-review to publish their articles. APCs bear only moderate correlation with the citation metrics of the urology journals.

Brazilian regions and international scientific collaboration

There is little information on the differences between Brazilian regions regarding the quantity and quality of North-South and South-South scientific collaboration. Data from 2012 to 2021 was collected in InCites. Variance, principal components, discriminant and canonical analyses were carried out. Regional differences for publishing indicators are highly variable. Brazilian first, last or corresponding authors tend to publish in journals in quartiles 3 or 4 (poorer quality). These tend to be poorly cited, have a lower percentage of documents cited and have fewer publications in hybrid journals. Collaborations with industry tend to have higher citation impact. While the percentage of documents in open access journals positively affected the impact of North-South collaboration (NSC), it negatively affected South-South collaboration (SSC). Publishing in hybrid journals was important for increasing the impact factor in SSC. Factors such as article processing charges and open access should be considered when financing international collaboration. The inequalities between Brazilian regions for international collaborations tend to be numerical and not necessarily qualitative.

Does double dipping occur? The case of Wiley’s hybrid journals

Does double dipping occur? The case of Wiley’s hybrid journals

A decade of changes in OA and non-OA journal publication and production

The objective of this study was to explore the trends in the publication and production of open access (OA) and non-OA journals and articles over the last decade. Non-OA journals include subscription and hybrid journals, the articles of which cannot be freely accessed by researchers. To conduct this study, we used SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) data from 2011 to 2021. In analyzing the SJR data, we categorized publishers by the number of journals and articles published. The results showed the following: (a) although the number of OA journals has increased rapidly between 2011 and 2021, their share of total publications is still significantly lower than that of non-OA journals; (b) between 2011 and 2021, the number of publishers of non-OA journals had decreased slightly, while the number of OA journal publishers has increased rapidly; (c) publishers of all sizes increased the production of OA journal articles between 2011 and 2021, but the share of top publishers increased the most; and (d) MDPI, as a born-OA publisher, has become a global leader in OA journal article publishing in recent years.