IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0154217.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Quality Assessment of Studies Published in Open Access and Subscription Journals: Results of a Systematic Evaluation

Author

Listed:
  • Roberta Pastorino
  • Sonja Milovanovic
  • Jovana Stojanovic
  • Ljupcho Efremov
  • Rosarita Amore
  • Stefania Boccia

Abstract

Introduction: Along with the proliferation of Open Access (OA) publishing, the interest for comparing the scientific quality of studies published in OA journals versus subscription journals has also increased. With our study we aimed to compare the methodological quality and the quality of reporting of primary epidemiological studies and systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in OA and non-OA journals. Methods: In order to identify the studies to appraise, we listed all OA and non-OA journals which published in 2013 at least one primary epidemiologic study (case-control or cohort study design), and at least one systematic review or meta-analysis in the field of oncology. For the appraisal, we picked up the first studies published in 2013 with case-control or cohort study design from OA journals (Group A; n = 12), and in the same time period from non-OA journals (Group B; n = 26); the first systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in 2013 from OA journals (Group C; n = 15), and in the same time period from non-OA journals (Group D; n = 32). We evaluated the methodological quality of studies by assessing the compliance of case-control and cohort studies to Newcastle and Ottawa Scale (NOS) scale, and the compliance of systematic reviews and meta-analyses to Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews (AMSTAR) scale. The quality of reporting was assessed considering the adherence of case-control and cohort studies to STrengthening the Reporting of OBservational studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) checklist, and the adherence of systematic reviews and meta-analyses to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) checklist. Results: Among case-control and cohort studies published in OA and non-OA journals, we did not observe significant differences in the median value of NOS score (Group A: 7 (IQR 7–8) versus Group B: 8 (7–9); p = 0.5) and in the adherence to STROBE checklist (Group A, 75% versus Group B, 80%; p = 0.1). The results did not change after adjustment for impact factor. The compliance with AMSTAR and adherence to PRISMA checklist were comparable between systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in OA and non-OA journals (Group C, 46.0% versus Group D, 55.0%; p = 0.06), (Group C, 72.0% versus Group D, 76.0%; p = 0.1), respectively). Conclusion: The epidemiological studies published in OA journals in the field of oncology approach the same methodological quality and quality of reporting as studies published in non-OA journals.

Suggested Citation

  • Roberta Pastorino & Sonja Milovanovic & Jovana Stojanovic & Ljupcho Efremov & Rosarita Amore & Stefania Boccia, 2016. "Quality Assessment of Studies Published in Open Access and Subscription Journals: Results of a Systematic Evaluation," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(5), pages 1-11, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0154217
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0154217
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0154217
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0154217&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0154217?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Declan Butler, 2008. "PLoS stays afloat with bulk publishing," Nature, Nature, vol. 454(7200), pages 11-11, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhongheng Zhang & Sven Van Poucke, 2017. "Citations for Randomized Controlled Trials in Sepsis Literature: The Halo Effect Caused by Journal Impact Factor," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(1), pages 1-13, January.
    2. Antonio Perianes-Rodríguez & Carlos Olmeda-Gómez, 2019. "Effects of journal choice on the visibility of scientific publications: a comparison between subscription-based and full Open Access models," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 121(3), pages 1737-1752, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Solomon, David J. & Laakso, Mikael & Björk, Bo-Christer, 2013. "A longitudinal comparison of citation rates and growth among open access journals," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 7(3), pages 642-650.
    2. Kyle Siler & Vincent Larivière & Cassidy R. Sugimoto, 2020. "The diverse niches of megajournals: Specialism within generalism," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 71(7), pages 800-816, July.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0154217. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.