Trends In Academic Publishing In 2022

Even though academic publishing was going through a moment of transition, that transition may not have been as profound as some would have anticipated. Amidst digitalisation, giant retail behemoths, and artificial intelligence-driven innovation, many publishers seemed to be doing their everyday business in the same way they had done for decades.

Since 2020, Covid-19 has shocked the planet and caused us all to re-evaluate our lives. Supply networks were disrupted from top to bottom; businesses were forced to shutter; offices were closed, and a new work-from-home culture formed.

After all, as Warren Buffett famously stated, "It's only when the tide goes out that you can see who's been swimming naked," and 2020 indeed revealed which companies had undergone a digital transformation; which had the most excellent flexibility; and which had the best culture towards change management, among other things.

We are now functioning in a scientific publication environment that is more open, immediate, and accessible than it was only a few months ago, which is a welcome development.

In this article, we look at some of the main themes that have evolved due to the coronavirus disruption of the scientific publication environment, which will continue through 2022.

COPYRIGHT_SZ: Published on https://stationzilla.com/academic-publishing-trends/ by Suleman Shah on 2022-05-13T04:01:24.474Z

People And Processes Driven Changes

Covid-19 shocked the globe in 2020, and the situation remained the same in 2021, forcing all academic institutions to re-evaluate their practices. Supply networks were disrupted from top to bottom; businesses were forced to shutter; offices were closed, and a new work-from-home culture formed.

Given these developments, the audience for Academic Publishing recognised the lessons of 2020, which helped promote change in 2021. During the year 2021, the academic publishing industry was progressing toward the OneOfficeTM model, thanks to advances in data science and the technological capabilities of internal teams.

In this study, academic publishers were dedicated (30%) to using XML proofing with real-time editing capabilities. They believed that data-driven decision making should be the top priority for their company (18% ).

It is predicted that the number of open access articles would increase by 20%, resulting in a decrease in income. 70% of respondents predicted that the production in 2021 will be equal to or greater than that in 2020.

Automation And Artificial Intelligence

To accommodate and react to researcher and journal needs during the epidemic, new system communications protocols and integrations are being developed. The Aries Systems Ingest API automates procedure (Application Programming Interface).

The Ingest API simulates the process of submitting an article to a journal. It is automated, eliminating the need for researchers to upload files and enter data. Automation simplifies researcher effort while speeding peer review and publishing.

This facilitates data deposit and disclosure regulations and promotes open data. It also supports fair data principles including discoverability, accessibility, interoperability, and reuse.

Before COVID-19, integrating third-party systems that employ artificial intelligence and machine learning to evaluate submitted papers would have taken days or needed specialised expertise. AI can extract vital data and populate a database, eliminating labour and human mistakes.

With the purpose of reducing mistakes and speeding up publishing by combining peer review and production, the idea is to capture more academic appraisal of research articles as data.

Budget Cuts

While several donors, such as Wellcome, have openly said that their research funding will continue for the time being, many others are suffering and have announced significant changes to their budgets and programmes.

One striking example is Cancer Research UK, a foundation that finances over half of all cancer research in the United Kingdom. It will reduce its research funding by up to 10% due to the extraordinary financial impact of COVID-19.

Similarly, the Canadian Cancer Society anticipates a decline in contributions of up to $100 million, or about half of its budget, in the next year.

At the same time, we're finding that the sheer amount of submissions in many COVID-related domains is forcing publishers to cope with a double-digit increase in submissions. According to certain publications, submission rates are five times greater than this time last year.

Social Media And Reprint Growing

Social media is a crucial developing trend contributing to the increased visibility of scientific publications. Social media is drawing a lot more attention to scholarly articles. The rising accessibility of preprints, in conjunction with the way social media is driving access to that information, is a trend that will continue.

Many publishers have made COVID-19-related information available to be shared more rapidly. There has been significant growth in the amount of research published via preprint servers and a push toward more open research publication.

As a result of this publication boom, there has been a surge in public interest in science. Readership and article views of COVID-related preprints are over seven times that of other categories of research preprints, according to several publishers.

Conclusion

At the beginning of 2021, open access business models were at the top of the list of publisher worries. Every stage of the scholarly publication lifecycle has evolved dramatically, and players have stepped up to meet the stringent demands of scientific researchers all around the globe.

The movements have been in the direction of open science, quick open publication, speeding discovery and cooperation, and making discoveries widely accessible to new audiences.

About The Authors

Suleman Shah - Suleman Shah is a researcher and freelance writer. As a researcher, he has worked with MNS University of Agriculture, Multan (Pakistan) and Texas A & M University (USA). He regularly writes science articles and blogs for science news website immersse.com and open access publishers OA Publishing London and Scientific Times. He loves to keep himself updated on scientific developments and convert these developments into everyday language to update the readers about the developments in the scientific era. His primary research focus is Plant sciences, and he contributed to this field by publishing his research in scientific journals and presenting his work at many Conferences. Shah graduated from the University of Agriculture Faisalabad (Pakistan) and started his professional carrier with Jaffer Agro Services and later with the Agriculture Department of the Government of Pakistan. His research interest compelled and attracted him to proceed with his carrier in Plant sciences research. So, he started his Ph.D. in Soil Science at MNS University of Agriculture Multan (Pakistan). Later, he started working as a visiting scholar with Texas A&M University (USA). Shah’s experience with big Open Excess publishers like Springers, Frontiers, MDPI, etc., testified to his belief in Open Access as a barrier-removing mechanism between researchers and the readers of their research. Shah believes that Open Access is revolutionizing the publication process and benefitting research in all fields.