Del Biondo | An Exploration of Open Access Viewpoints and Self-Archiving Decisions of Yale School of Public Health Primary Faculty | Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication

Abstract:  Introduction: This study explores what primary faculty at Yale School of Public Health know about open access (OA) and whether they self-archive (also known as “green open access”).

Methods: Two medical librarians surveyed 103 public health faculty in the fall of 2022 and achieved a 40% response rate. Follow-up interviews were conducted with eight faculty members, and data were analyzed in Qualtrics and NVivo.

Results: Twenty percent of survey respondents say they do not fully understand what open access means and how they would publish OA. Forty-four percent of survey respondents self-archive works that they know would not otherwise be free-to-read. Some interviewees who self-archive deposit the preprint version of their manuscript in a preprint server at the time they submit to a journal, so that their work is immediately accessible to all. Those who do not self-archive had differing reasons, such as time constraints or a preference for peer review.

Discussion: Our findings suggest that article processing charges (APCs) are a barrier for gold open access publishing and that public health researchers understand OA simply as free access for readers. Interviewees consider open science a core value and believe that research findings should be openly shared for transparency, reproducibility, and information equity.

Conclusion: The findings of this study have implications for students, faculty, and leaders in higher education, librarians, professionals of the publishing industry, public health practitioners, and the public, in that they shed light on current and future publishing practices, along with gaps in OA knowledge, observed at one institution.