Maximizing the Impact of Your Publications in an Open Access Environment

The pressure on nursing scholars to publish their research findings has never been greater. Publications bring scholars and their employing institutions recognition, raise the likelihood of further research funding and are the pathway to a successful academic career.  However, publishing practices and the publishing environment are changing. Whereas frequency of publication was once the main criterion for academic success (Norman & Griffiths 2008) the emphasis today is on producing fewer papers, but ones that are highly used and cited and published in high impact journals.   Added to this the long and sometimes heated debate about the merits or otherwise of open access publishing (Griffiths 2014) of research findings seems to have been superseded by a commitment of major funding bodies internationally to open access publication as a requirement of research funding (HEFC 2014).

So what implications do all these changes in publication practices have for nursing scholars and the evidence based of nursing practice? Is open access publication really a good thing and what do we know about its impact on nursing practice and scholarship? And what is the role of social media in the dissemination of research outputs? These questions will be addressed in a presentation by led by the executive editor of a leading academic nursing journal followed by discussion with the audience.

References

Higher Education Funding Council for England. (2014). Policy for open access in the post-2014 Research Excellence Framework. HEFC, London, UK. Retrieved from http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/year/2014/201407/

Griffiths P (2014) Open access publication and the International Journal of Nursing Studies: All that glitters is not gold. International Journal of Nursing Studies 51 (5): 689-690. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2014.02.010

Norman I J, Griffiths P (2008) Duplicate publication and ‘salami slicing’: Ethical issues and practical solutions. International Journal of Nursing Studies 45 (9): 1257-1260