Self-Archiving and Journal Subscriptions: Flawed Method and No Data

[Stevan Harnad <harnad@ecs.soton.ac.uk>]

         ** Apologies for Cross-Posting **

     Self-Archiving and Journal Subscriptions:
     Critique of Publishing Research Consortium Study

     by Stevan Harnad

The following is a critique of:

     Chris Beckett and Simon Inger, Self-Archiving and Journal
     Subscriptions: Co-existence or Competition? An international Survey
     of Librarians' Preferences. Commissioned by the Publishing Research
     Consortium (http://www.publishingresearch.org.uk) from Scholarly
     Information Strategies Ltd (SIS), a scholarly publishing consultancy
     October 2006 http://www.publishingresearch.org.uk/prcweb/PRCWeb.nsf/

     SUMMARY OF CRITIQUE: There is no evidence to date that Open Access (OA)
     self-archiving causes journal cancellations. The Publishing
     Research Consortium commissioned a study of acquisitions librarian
     preferences to see whether they could predict such cancellations
     in the future using a "Share of Preference model," but the study
     has a glaring methodological flaw that invalidates its conclusion
     (that self-archiving will cause cancellations). The study consisted
     of asking librarians which of three hypothetical products -- A, B
     or C -- they preferred least and most, for a variety of hypothetical
     combinations of 6 properties with 3-4 possible values each:

         1. ACCESS DELAY: 24-months, 12-months, 6-months, immediate access
         2. PERCENTAGE OF JOURNAL'S CONTENT: 100%, 80%, 60%, 40%
         3. COST: 100%, 50%, 25%, 0%
         4. VERSION: preprint, refereed, refereed+copy-edited, published-PDF;
         5. ACCESS RELIABILITY: high, medium, low
         6. JOURNAL QUALITY: high, medium, low

     No mention was made of OA self-archiving (in order to avoid "bias");
     but, as a result, the survey cannot make any prediction at all
     about the effects of self-archiving on cancellations. The questions
     were about relative preferences for *acquisition* among competing
     "products" having different combinations of properties, and it treated
     OA (0% cost) as if it were just one of those product properties. But
     self-archived articles are not products purchased by acquisitions
     librarians: they are papers given away by researchers, anarchically,
     and in parallel. Hence from the survey's "Share of Preference model"
     it is impossible to draw any conclusions about self-archiving
     causing cancellations by librarians, because the librarians were
     never asked what they would cancel, under what conditions; just what
     hypothetical products they would prefer over what. And of course they
     would prefer lower-priced, immediate products over higher-priced,
     delayed products! But if all articles in all journals were
     self-archived, the "Share of Preference model" does not give us
     the slightest clue about what journals librarians would acquire or
     cancel. Nor does it give us a clue as to what they would do between
     now (c. 15% self-archiving) and then (100% self-archiving). The
     banal fact that everyone would rather have something for free rather
     than paying for it certainly does not answer this question, or fill
     the gaping evidential gap about the existence, size, or timing of any
     hypothetical effect of self-archiving on cancellations. Nor does
     the study's one nontrivial finding: that librarians don't much
     care about the difference between a refereed author's draft and
     a published-PDF. (Let us hope that this study will be the last futile
     attempt to treat research as if it were done in order to generate or
     protect journal revenues. Even if valid evidence should eventually
     emerge that OA self-archiving does cause journal cancellations,
     it would be for the publishing community to adapt to that new
     reality, not for the research community to abstain from it, and
     its obvious benefits to research, researchers, their institutions,
     their funders, and the tax-paying public that funds the funders and
     for whose benefit the research is conducted.)
     (http://www.scholinfo.com).

[SNIP]

Stevan Harnad
AMERICAN SCIENTIST OPEN ACCESS FORUM:
http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html