The future of OA books - white paper

A global Springer Nature survey of more than 2,500 academic book authors provides in-depth insights into attitudes towards open access.

The survey looks at researchers' motivations for publishing a book, and analyses the parameters and key drivers which influence academics to publish OA or not. The white paper also identifies the major obstacles to OA publication which book authors still face: from a lack of awareness of OA publishing options and low funding, to concerns about how OA books are perceived. 

2,542 book authors completed the survey which ran for two weeks in February and March 2019. 

• The majority of book authors support the idea that all future scholarly books should be open access
• Pro-open access attitudes are stronger among junior researchers, researchers based in Europe and Asia, and previous open access book authors
• Ethical reasons (equality in access), and reaching a larger audience are identified as key motivations for choosing open access for books
• Lack of awareness, concerns about quality, and lack of funding are barriers to OA publication
• The majority of book authors want more financial support from funders for open access book publication
• Gold open access is the most preferred policy for open access books
• Reputation of publishers matters less to open access book authors but is still the deciding factor for publication.

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