The shift towards open-access publishing continues and in the process some new types of inequality within academia have been revealed. This interesting information came to us from the Times Higher Education and their article, “Open-access charges ‘create new inequalities’ in publishing
A class division between universities, whereby researchers from lower-ranking institutions with fewer resources are often left with little choice but to publish in closed-access journals because they cannot afford to pay the article-processing charges associated with open-access alternatives.
There are a significant number of professionals giving a collective sigh and shaking their heads at this moment. This isn’t news to them.
Research has shown that authors working at lower-ranked universities were more likely to publish in closed journals behind a paywall and less likely to choose publishers that levied a standard article-processing charge for gold or hybrid open access. It would remiss not to acknowledge the tendency for those affiliated with more prestigious, and thereby better funded, universities to have access to greater resources, allowing them more options when it comes to publishing in journals.
Melody K. Smith
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