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Review
. 2025 Jul 25;57(9):235.
doi: 10.3758/s13428-025-02759-3.

A sharing practices review of the visual search and eye movements literature reveals recommendations for our field and others

Hayward J Godwin  1 , Haden Dewis  2 , Peter T Darch  3 , Michael C Hout  4 , Daniel Ernst  5 , Philippa Broadbent  2 , Megan Papesh  6 , Jeremy M Wolfe  7   8
Affiliations
Review

A sharing practices review of the visual search and eye movements literature reveals recommendations for our field and others

Hayward J Godwin et al. Behav Res Methods. .

Abstract

The sharing of research outputs is an important endeavor, one that is increasingly required by funders and publishers alike. Here, we catalogued and examined data sharing practices, using our own field of visual search and eye movement behavior as an example. To find outputs from scientific research, we conducted two searches: a Literature Search and a repository search. Overall, we found that researchers in our field generally shared outputs that enabled others to analytically reproduce published results. It was rare for researchers to share outputs that enabled direct replications of their work, and it was also rare for researchers to share raw data that would enable secondary data analyses. Comparing the results of our two searches of the literature, we found that a lack of metadata substantially reduced the rates at which outputs could be found and used. Based on our findings, we present a set of recommendations summarized in our 'Find It - Access It - Reuse It' scorecard. The scorecard is intended to assist researchers in sharing outputs in a manner that will enable others to better find, access, and understand them - and this includes researchers in other fields beyond our own.

Keywords: Data sharing; Eye tracking; Open science; Secondary data analyses; Sharing practices review; Visual search.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Conflicts of interest/Competing Interests: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. Ethics approval: Not applicable – systematic review. Consent to participate: Not applicable – secondary data analysis. Consent for publication: Not applicable.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Selection and filtering process for the results of our two searches
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Literature search: Where were the outputs shared online?
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Bar chart showing rates of output sharing for different types of outputs from our literature search and repository search. Note. See main text for definitions of terms
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Rates of sharing different types of datasets from our literature search and repository search
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Proportion of samples sharing by-fixation, by-trial and by-participant datasets in open and closed formats
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
Bar chart showing the proportion of OSF Projects returned by our two searches that included different types of metadata in their project information
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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