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

Abstract

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.

Keywords: Article processing charge; Citation advantage; Hybrid journal; Mixed-effect model; Open-access publishing; Paywall.

Figure 1. Data preparation.

(A) With the permission of the Clarivate Analytics™ legal team, we obtained citation records for articles published in hybrid journals by conducting searches in the Web of Science Core Collection for different Web of Science Categories in biology. We verified whether the journals found by each search were hybrid journals and, if so, we downloaded data, including number of citations, OA type, etc., for all articles published in each journal between 2013 and 2018. We also obtained citation metrics that we used as predictors in our full and “matched” analyses. (B) For the matched analysis, we restricted our dataset to compare hybrid gold and closed access articles published in the same volume and issue of our journals. (C) Lastly, we obtained values as of June 2021 for each journal’s APC to test APC values associated with number of citations.

Figure 2. Citations as a function of various model parameters and access type.

Access type is color coded to match the named color scheme (e.g., green is indicated in green), except closed access which is indicated in black. (A) Interaction between access type and author count. The number of authors was treated as categorical. Only values under 64 are plotted to emphasize relationships in the majority of the dataset. (B) Interaction between access type and JCR quartile. JCR Quartile of 1 represents the highest journals by Journal Impact Factor. (C) Interaction between access type and scaled (standardized) AIS values. (D) Interaction between access type and year.

Figure 3. Citations as a function of various variables and access type from same issue of journal.

Access type is color coded to match Fig. 2. (A) Interaction between access type and author count. (B) Interaction between access type and JCR quartile. JCR Quartile of 1 represents the highest journals by Journal Impact Factor. (C) Interaction between access type and scaled (standardized) AIS values. Note: Access type by year is not shown here because this interaction term was not significant in this analysis (see Table 5).

Figure 4. Citations in hybrid gold articles as a function of APC and AIS or year.

(A) Interaction between APC and scaled (standardized) AIS values. (B) Interaction between APC and year of publication.

Figure 5. What to consider when publishing open access.

Authors have many junctures between article submission and appearance in a journal when they can make their research available while also saving money. After deciding which journal is a good fit for their research, if the journal has a lower Journal Impact Factor, authors can opt for the green route without sacrificing many potential citations (although a low profile journal likely will not have a prohibitively expensive APC). If the journal has a high Journal Impact Factor, whether author(s) should pay an APC comes down to their funding—if they have limited funds, they should forgo paying an APC and opt for the green route as that will be likely to garner more citations than publishing closed access. If authors go with the green route, they can submit their articles to a pre-print server before publication and archive in an institutional repository post-publication; the latter suggestion also applies to articles published closed access older than two years.