The Determinants of Open Access Publishing: Survey Evidence from Germany

30 Pages Posted: 14 Mar 2013 Last revised: 29 Mar 2013

See all articles by Thomas Eger

Thomas Eger

University of Hamburg - Institute of Law and Economics

Marc Scheufen

Ruhr University Bochum

Daniel Meierrieks

WZB Berlin Social Science Center

Date Written: March 13, 2013

Abstract

We discuss the results of a survey conducted in fall 2012 and covering 2,151 researchers in Germany. We show that there are significant differences between the scientific disciplines with respect to researcher’s awareness of and experience with both open access (OA) journals and self-archiving. Our results reveal that the relevance of OA within a discipline may explain why researchers from particular disciplines do (not) publish OA. Besides, several aspects like copyright law, age, profession or the inherent reward system of a discipline play a role. As a consequence, the paper emphasizes that a "one-size-fits-all" approach as promoted by most recent policy approaches is little promising for providing an effective framework for shaping the future of scholarly publishing.

Keywords: academic publishing, open access, copyright, law and economics

JEL Classification: C83, K11, O34

Suggested Citation

Eger, Thomas and Scheufen, Marc and Meierrieks, Daniel, The Determinants of Open Access Publishing: Survey Evidence from Germany (March 13, 2013). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2232675 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2232675

Thomas Eger

University of Hamburg - Institute of Law and Economics ( email )

Johnsallee 35
Hamburg, 20148
Germany

HOME PAGE: http://works.bepress.com/thomas_eger/

Marc Scheufen (Contact Author)

Ruhr University Bochum ( email )

Massenbergstr. 11
BF 8.9
Bochum, 44787
Germany

Daniel Meierrieks

WZB Berlin Social Science Center ( email )

Reichpietschufer 50
D-10785 Berlin, 10785
Germany

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