You should publish Open Access, where possible.
Making your thesis publicly available in an open access repository such as ResearchDirect has the following benefits:
- The general public, which has invested in the University, can access your findings.
- Allows more exposure and influence for your research.
- Helps build your scholarly reputation and research profile.
- Practitioners can apply your findings.
- Other researchers, especially in developing areas, can see and easily access your work.
Facts about Open Access:
- Open Access papers are more likely to be read than non-open access because they are more readily available and easier to access.
- The more your paper is read, the more likely it is to be cited.
- Most open-access journals are peer-reviewed (98% of journals listed in the DOAJ are peer-reviewed).
- A journal’s impact factor is not a reliable indicator of quality. The quality of a scholarly journal is dependent on its authors, editor, and referees, not its business model or access policy.
- The majority of open access journals do not charge Article Processing Costs (APC) (approximately 70% of journals listed in the DOAJ do not charge APC).
- Depositing your Author Accepted Manuscript (or 'post-print) into Western's institutional repository ResearchDirect, and the Library will manage the embargo period on your behalf.
- When publishing in an OA journal, the author remains the copyright owner and retains reuse rights. This is achieved via Creative Commons license. Authors can choose the licence associated with their work and how it is shared and reused, and ensure it is correctly attributed.
Where do I start?
- Decide which pathway of Open Access you wish to use to achieve open access e.g. Gold Hybrid, or Green Open Access.
- Ensure the journal you wish to publish belongs to a reputable publisher, and not a predatory publisher.
- Use tools such as ARTiFACTs to document ownership of your scholarly content, which establishes the provenance of research outputs and accelerates sharing and recognition of contributions to the scholarly record. Also helps to make unpublished work citable.
- Contact your School Librarian:
- to discuss including the share-alike clause in the publisher license, to support students and researchers in providing ad hoc content that the library would not normally be able to subscribe to or purchase.
- to develop a research publishing plan appropriate for your discipline.