Researchers' Attitudes Towards Publishing and Citing Preprints – Side Paths to Open Access

The focus group interviews resulted in 387 minutes of material to be analysed, and the evaluation and interpretation of the data is still research in progress. Preliminary results from the initial coding indicate a comparatively high approval of and experience with open access publications in comparison with preprint publications. The quality aspects of open access and preprint publications were discussed in particular detail. There is obviously uncertainty here. The visibility through publications indexed in Web of Science and Scopus is rated highly. And many participants stated that there is pressure to publish, especially with regard to further career steps – partly due to policies or appointment committees. This testifies to a highly hierarchical reputation system. Furthermore, the financing of open access publications by APCs is often viewed critically.

Analysing the data by focused coding and interpreting the data against the background of the demographic information of the interviewees will be the next steps to gain a more in-depth understanding of the publication behaviour with regard to preprints and journal articles. We aim to better understand the motivations of researchers and what drives their decisions regarding different types of publications. These criteria of researchers which foster or hamper the transformation from traditional to open access publishing will be elaborated in our further research.