Openness in Academic Communities

by Shannon Hedke (I don't know how to invite other authors)
Sorry to mangle your post Shannon, blame html

Sam and Thomas have brought up some interesting points about what I will more generally call "openness". Is this a recent development in the biological community? What is the goal and is there inherent value in openness? I wanted to think a bit about the broader context outside of evolution/ecology/behavior, and throw out some open questions for our community.

First, Thomas discusses the idea that starting research and going to publication is long and difficult, and that we might better serve the community under a different framework. He brings up the on-line only, open access journal <a href="http://www.plosone.org/home.action">PLOS One</a>: submissions are assessed by reviewers on technical merit and not by "importance"; papers can be commented on and rated by users. The problem is, of course, that many of us would like to get jobs, or tenure, and the ranking of the journal can matter more than the quality of the research, since our research output may be evaluated by those not in our field and not able to evaluate quality. The physics community has had an intermediate framework in place for quite some time. "Pre-prints" are apparently made available regularly prior to actual publication in a journal; researchers interested in a particular topic can read and draw their own conclusions about the research, completely independent from any review process, and researchers have access to the information much earlier than they otherwise would. However, the researcher still gets the benefit of publication in whatever hot-shot journal might accept it. Would such an idea work equally well in our community? Is it possible to be an idealist about publishing and still get a job?

But Thomas additionally suggests, perhaps, that the blogosphere -- or some other web-based public forum? -- would be a great place to bring up research ideas and have others respond, perhaps catching methodological or analytical errors prior to analysis, write-up, and submission. But I know researchers who would rather stab themselves in the foot than reveal pre-publication any ideas or conclusions about their research. Are the ideas presented in evolution or ecology somehow more "steal-able" than in physics? e.g., could an idea be more broadly applicable to research in progress by others and thus show up in other's publications without citation, or easier for someone else to take the idea and replicate the experiment quickly? Or is it just hubris to think your research could be that influential? How does this differ from, say, presenting at a conference?

The second idea which came across in Sam's description of this Great Experiment (and is reflected in Thomas's posts) is "openness" in general: being comfortable expressing opinions and thoughts using your own name. I read Sam's introduction to HCJC blog (HicJic blog??) out loud to my husband, Ian, who had just been to the <a href="http://www.mla.org">MLA<

/a> (Modern Language Association) conference in Los Angeles. One of the topics discussed at that conference was increased openness or transparency, in the context of blogging and tweeting using your real identity. The bloggers at <a href="http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/">ProfHacker</a>, most of whom are in English departments, discuss their experiences and thoughts on academia (hosted by the Chronicle of Higher Education), but without the shelter of anonymity. Publishing anonymously was even the subject of a recent blog post in librarian circles (<a href="http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2010/x/">In the Library with the Lead Pipe</a>). In other words, academia is trending towards openness, even for those of us who are not well-established.

Thus, I am all for using this space not just for reporting our reviews on recent published research (the J of HCJC!), but on expanding it to include more general discussions on research, publication, academia, etc.

I am so curious to see what direction this forum takes!