Conference Agenda (All times are shown in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) unless otherwise noted)

Pakistan is a densely populated South Asian country facing numerous health challenges. With limited resources, the government is struggling to provide better healthcare facilities to the people. Like other developing countries, digital divide is another area of concern in Pakistan. To address the issue of digital divide, the government established e-libraries as a pilot project in 2018, which are functioning as community centers in the largest province of the country. This paper examines the role of these e-libraries in creating health awareness and providing health information to the public. The study utilized a qualitative research design based on focus group discussions with the head librarians of all 20 e-libraries. The findings revealed that e-libraries are actively involved in creating health-related awareness and connecting the public to health advisors. The e-libraries were engaged in four types of health-related activities, including seminars, awareness campaigns, open health camps, and special health days celebrations, with high attendance from the public. Attendees of these programs returned to librarians with additional health-related queries. The study suggests that there is a need for more liaison between the community and local health care institutions to make these programs more effective in helping individuals manage their health.

Threats against electronic medical and health records are on the rise. These threats include phishing attacks, malware and ransomware, encryption blind spots, cloud threats, and most important one is the internal threat caused by gaps in the level of awareness and knowledge of the employees and health practitioner of handling sensitive healthcare data. Cyber hygiene is a term used to describe both the technical and non-technical threats. In the same way, personal hygiene practices are used to maintain one’s own health and protect against diseases, cyber hygiene security practices are important in protecting and preserving sensitive electronic health information systems. In this paper, we report on the findings of a cyber hygiene study carried out in Kuwait with the objectives of assessing the level of awareness, knowledge and experience of physicians and healthcare professionals. The study identified seven different areas or barriers that impacted the cyber hygiene and the adoption of electronic health medical records in Kuwait. The seven areas include financial barriers, time, difficulty of using technology, lack of management support, negative attitude toward the use of electronic medical records, legal and ethical issues, as well as cultural barriers.

Despite older adults being one of the most important groups of users of eHealth services, including patient accessible electronic health records, these are claimed not to be designed to suit older users, and to not necessarily fulfill their information needs. User-centered design methods often utilized when developing eHealth services have also been claimed not to work well for older adults. This paper suggests an alternative way of collecting ideas and feedback on eHealth from older adults, by including open-ended questions in the data collection of larger studies on eHealth information behavior. When data are collected by methods like focus group interviews and surveys, older adults can be requested to envision an eHealth service that suits their needs. Results from studies in Finland are presented, and show that current eHealth services do not fulfill all information needs of older adults, as answers to the question in both focus group interviews and surveys contain practical suggestions for additional and more comprehensible information, easier ways of searching for needed information, and alternative channels for communication. Open-ended questions can be a cost-effective and timesaving way to help in the design and development of patient accessible electronic health records and other types of eHealth services.

History has repeatedly shown that when it comes to healthcare, there exist significant disparities across different sub-populations. Part of this problem is challenges with access to healthcare services and providers. In recent years, we have seen solutions emerge that attempt to address this issue, namely telehealth. But little to no work has been done to glean insights into factors contributing to lower access and whether telehealth adequately supports populations that struggle with physical access issues. In this paper, we present findings from an exploratory, cross-dataset analysis of healthcare access in Virginia, USA. We conducted quantitative and qualitative analyses lyses to determine correlations between socioeconomic factors and physical access. We found that population density significantly impacts physical access to healthcare. We also found that lower income communities in rural areas appear to be less satisfied with the quality of care and less likely to have adequate access to alternative options such as telehealth services. Our work has implications for research aimed at understanding healthcare access and practice that aims to derive solutions to close the healthcare access gap.

Research in information behavior has examined search difficulties and how people learn during searches but has not fully examined how searchers solve the difficulties on their own and gain new knowledge during this process. This study introduced the concept of insight learning during search to provide a new perspective for the studies in Search as Learning (SAL) and to optimize searchers’ experiences in a more efficient, innovative, and joyful way to combine search and learning. As a preliminary study, we conducted self-reported interviews with 30 participants to collect cases of insight learning during the search process. Based on thematic analysis of the data, we summarized the benefits of insight learning during search, described the process of how aha! occurred after impasse, and identified the antecedent, key, and consequence of insight during the search process. We aimed to help generate more insights by providing three dimensions of key factors to think about. A preliminary understanding of the insights formed in this study could contribute to further discussion about learning during the search and could help design new search tools that support effective learning.

In this concept paper, we make the case that variables related to reading and comprehension are relevant to the design of searching as learning environments. We propose that measures of cohesion – the lexical and grammatical connectedness within and between texts – be used as signals in retrieval and ranking algorithms for such environments, as cohesion is an important factor in text comprehension and learning. In illustrating this concept, we introduce a use case for learning-oriented search in which the task is to retrieve a multi-document set that functions as a spontaneous learning environment. For this task, features of the document set as a whole are important in addition to features of individual documents. In this paper we focus on the goals of achieving a mid-range level of readability and cohesion across a set of texts in order to balance comprehensibility with challenge and stimulation.

This study evaluates the effectiveness of various readability measures when assessing the difficulty of film materials for English Language Learners (ELLs). Library materials catering to ELLs are frequently limited to formal instruction texts and fiction materials. This study explores the feasibility of less laborious, computational text assessment methods to better understand library holdings from the perspective of ELL appropriateness. The investigation applies traditional formulaic readability measures and modern cohesion methods to film subtitle data. While text difficulty assessment with readability measures has been widely studied, there is a need to investigate which measures are most suitable for film application. In addition to evaluating existing readability measures, a more robust composite score is also presented, combining aspects of traditional readability formulas and modern cohesion methods. The experiments were conducted on real-world datasets and tested on film data marked for difficulty by ELLs.

User search performance is multidimensional in nature and may be better characterized by metrics that depict users' interactions with both relevant and irrelevant results. Despite previous research on one-dimensional measures, it is still unclear how to characterize different dimensions of user performance and leverage the knowledge in developing proactive recommendations. To address this gap, we propose and empirically test a framework of search performance evaluation and build early performance prediction models to simulate proactive search path recommendations. Experimental results from four datasets of diverse types (1,482 sessions and 5,140 query segments from both controlled lab and natural settings) demonstrate that: 1) Cluster patterns characterized by cost-gain-based multifaceted metrics can effectively differentiate high-performing users from other searchers, which form the empirical basis for proactive recommendations; 2) whole-session performance can be reliably predicted at early stages of sessions (e.g., first and second queries); 3) recommendations built upon the search paths of system-identified high-performing searchers can significantly improve the search performance of struggling users. Experimental results demonstrate the potential of our approach for leveraging collective wisdom from automatically identified high-performance user groups in developing and evaluating proactive in-situ search recommendations.

In response to the global disaster of COVID-19, every country has implemented various policies. China, as a developing country, has issued policies to combat COVID-19 that could serve as a reference for future pandemic prevention and control efforts, and may offer lessons for national governance. This paper employs bibliometric methods, text mining, and network analysis to mine and characterize the evolution of China's policies against COVID-19. Specifically, we extract policy targets and identify the policy tools from each policy, cross-compare the policy tools used for different policy targets, and characterize their evolution during the pandemic. Our findings show that policy targets have shifted over different stages to balance epidemic prevention with economic development. We also identify several shortcomings in distribution and utilization of policy tools. To improve policy implementation, it is crucial to align policy targets with appropriate policy tools and ensure a balanced and functional approach to policy implementation.

The outbreak of COVID-19 posed one of the most serious threats to humanity in recent times. The rapid transmission of this virus across the globe and presence of various information imperfections (e.g., absence of information, confusing information, misinformation) made the craft of developing an effective information policy during this pandemic extremely difficult. This study has analyzed the COVID-19 information environment of Australia with an aim to understand the important features of the information flow which, in part, helped Australia to achieve one of the lowest COVID-19 test positivity rates. The findings of this study carry important implications for the design of future information policy imperatives aiming to deal with pandemics, natural catastrophes, and human-made disasters.

Many Black Americans expressed skepticism and hesitancy about the Covid-19 vaccine. The objective of this research is to examine whether there is a relationship between Covid-19 vaccine status, Covid-19 vaccine knowledge, and information seeking about the coronavirus. A national online questionnaire of 222 Black identified individuals completed the instrument in the Summer of 2021. We conducted data analysis using ANOVA and nonparametric correlation tests among the variables. Findings show that individuals who have received the COVID-19 vaccine exhibited greater COVID-19 vaccine-related knowledge compared to people who declined the vaccine, or were hesitant adopters. There is no significant difference in the level of knowledge between those who are hesitant about the vaccine and those who declined it. Finally, there is a moderate positive correlation between COVID-19 vaccine knowledge and engagement in COVID-19-related information seeking. We conclude with strategies to improve the Black American health information environment by way of practice, policy, and action.

This paper details the findings from a study investigating the efficacy of community-based and -organized information sessions for dispelling public health misinformation around COVID-19. The authors used community-engaged participatory action research methods to co-organize town halls with community members, groups, and officials to disseminate COVID information for two New Jersey towns and townships with differing demographic compositions in late 2020 through 2021. These sessions aimed to share reliable, trustworthy public health and safety information around the COVID-19 pandemic. This small-scale, qualitative study suggests that this type of hyper-localized information session where residents can interact with local leaders and talk openly about local problems around public health can be a point of connection for people with their community, that helps them access and address localized public health problems in myriad ways. In so doing, this study suggests ways to re-imagine public health information and communication practices to promote informational justice.

This paper reports on a qualitative meta-analysis that aimed to identify, qualify, and conceptualise territorial barriers to interorganisational data sharing (IDS). The meta-analysis adopted a total of 69 semi-structured interview transcripts, gathered in two previously completed case studies in China. Case study 1 aimed to develop strategies to overcome barriers to interagency sharing of government data in the development of China’s smart government services. Case study 2 was carried out to investigate and resolve the lack of inter-hospital sharing of patient data in China’s healthcare referral services. By adopting a thematic analysis approach, the meta-analysis pointed to 21 territorial barriers to IDS, which emerged in three themes: psychological ownership, territorial behaviours, and interorganisational dynamism. Territorial barriers that hinder IDS have not been systematically investigated to date. This paper offers a theoretical basis for future studies and serves as a call for more research on territorial barriers in data sharing activities.

Research data sharing is embedded in policies, guidelines and requirements commonly promoted by research funding organizations that demand data to be “as open as possible, as closed as necessary” and FAIR. This paper discusses the challenges of balancing privacy protection with data sharing in a PhD project involving long-tail, small-sized qualitative human subjects’ data. Based on experiences and feedback from project participants, we argue that privacy protection is about respecting the participants and their self-image. This can be achieved through dialogue and involvement of the participants building on the principles of shared stewardship. Further, we suggest that de-identification and plain language consent materials are better at protecting privacy than anonymisation, which in a digital data environment is difficult to achieve and not necessarily a sensible approach for qualitative data, where the gold is in the details. The literature indicates that it matters to participants whether data are reused for research or other purposes, and that they trust the institutions. This supports our claim that research data services must find better solutions for restricted sharing when necessary.

This study develops a grounded theory of how social scientists use resources to facilitate qualitative data deposit and the impacts on making data FAIR and CARE. Drawing from 15 semi-structured interviews with U.S. academic social science faculty who deposited data to ICPSR, I take a resource-centric perspective to address the need for theorizing scientists’ use of resources to bridge the gap between underspecified, heterogeneous data practices and repository requirements. The two primary contributions of the study are: First, I identify three types of resources that social science faculty use to structure data deposit routines: 1) bottom-up, 2) top-down, and 3) borrowed resources. Second, I import a theory from crisis informatics, ‘routine infrastructuring’ to explain how social scientists deposit data to ICPSR. Results reveal that the resources social scientists use function as ostensive routines. I argue routine infrastructuring is not only a way to enact routines, but also one that creates routines. Findings also show that scientists’ use of resources developed ‘in-house’ has a mix of beneficial and negative impacts for making data FAIR and CARE. The study advances the small but growing body of literature that examines routine dynamics from a resource-centric perspective to explain successful data deposit to repositories.

Large investments of public funds to curate huge volumes of various physical samples acquired and stored over decades, and in some cases centuries, provide ample reasons to make these items as openly accessible, as easily discoverable, and as well-documented as possible to ensure this investment results in reuse. The purpose of this study is to understand the curation behaviors of managers of physical collections. Six focus groups were conducted with twenty participants from several physical sample communities. Participants responded to open-ended questions that relate to the entire data lifecycle for their research objects. Results indicated that physical collections would benefit from use of universal metadata and data storage standards to increase sharing across domains. Both of these factors contribute to access and use obstacles all these collections face in different ways. In the context of managers requiring more investments to encourage reuse of these invaluable items, this study hopes to provide preliminary domain-agnostic data to inform design of collections cyberinfrastructure, resources, and services using actual curation behaviors.

Today there is increasing emphasis on knowledge exchange (KE), the movement of knowledge and expertise amongst diverse groups to enhance research uptake, use, and impact in healthcare, government, and community settings. Library and information science (LIS) professionals are central actors in KE though community engagement, scholarly communication, literacy, and cultural heritage initiatives, but (how) is this work formally documented and evaluated? Through interviews with 24 information professionals working in varied settings, we considered how KE activities fit into the current library assessment and evaluation landscape. Using thematic analysis, we identified challenges with placing this work within current assessment practices and evaluation frameworks and showing its value, as well as a desire for alternative, more dynamic assessment and evaluation methods. We discuss these findings with respect to previous research in LIS and KE more broadly to consider professional and organizational implications.

Patron-perpetrated sexual harassment (PPSH) is a form of gender-based violence and a pervasive problem in libraries. However, contending with PPSH requires the performance of emotional labour by library workers because of workplace cultures and professional values that prioritize patron and institutional comfort. To better understand library workers’ emotional labour as they respond to PPSH, we analyzed 512 survey responses where participants shared their experiences of, their responses to, and feelings about, PPSH. Three responsive strategies emerged: acceptance, indirect refusal, or direct refusal. Overwhelmingly, library workers reported negative emotions about the incidents. Despite these negative feelings, library workers consistently responded to PPSH by performing emotional labour that upheld “polite and professional” values. Our findings raise concerning questions for the field of library and information studies about the implicit and explicit expectations placed on library workers to perform emotional labour in response to PPSH, particularly within the context of a feminized profession and with the knowledge that PPSH harms library workers. Our goal is to support library workers to “find a way to say ‘no’” to gender-based violence in the workplace.

In modern society, though public libraries must be equal and neutral “places” to address social problems such as the crisis of democracy and social isolation, it is unclear how the roles and functions of “Library as Place” appear in modern library management policies or practices. This study aimed to clarify the characteristics of public library policies in Norway and Oslo and the practices of the Oslo public library from the perspective of the “Library as Place.” Using Kawamoto and Koizumi’s (2023) model, a qualitative content analysis and case analysis were conducted of the roles and functions of “Libraries as Place” in Oslo, Norway, identifying the access to materials and information that libraries have traditionally afforded alongside the implementation of distinctive functions such as Cultural activities, Cutting edge, Improving life skills, and Meeting place as concrete practices. These functions contribute to public libraries becoming places in the heart of the community whose services are accessible to all.

Public library makerspaces are said to facilitate user empowerment, but this empowerment has yet to be fully explored in terms of how or whether it is occurring, or for whom. Libraries need to assess any processes of empowerment to evaluate their support for their users’ needs and to assess the success of their makerspace services. This paper addresses these evaluation needs by describing a checklist developed from ethnographic research in makerspaces based on Ivan Illich’s theory of “convivial tools,” which forward power to their users to decide how, why, and when to use them. This checklist translates research into practice with a tool for practitioners and researchers. It can assist librarians as they explore the impacts of their services on their communities, and can advance research about makerspaces and power for the purposes of social justice. It also offers an example of how to translate research into evaluative practice.

Data Science is a burgeoning area in the iField. But Data Science practices have far outstripped the field’s ethical safeguards. We argue that Data Science graduate education programs must address this critical problem. In this theoretical and conceptual paper supported by documentary evidence, we develop an ordinary macroethics that we call data flourishing. We contend that this macroethics is most appropriately developed through a holistic, human-centered data science (HCDS)-based pedagogy that concentrates on cultivating communities of ethical practice (COEPs) through social learning. We favor embedding this principle throughout iField programs’ graduate data science curricula and by extension, throughout the entire data science education enterprise. This paper aligns with the 2023 ASIS&T annual meeting theme of translating research into practice, especially the twin themes of “improving decision-making” and “understanding the power of information to develop human happiness, equality, and wellbeing.”

The Z-Inspection® Process is a form of applied research for the ethical assessment of AI systems. It is quickly establishing itself as a robust method to ethically assess AI in Europe. The process is predicated on the European Union's Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI, outlining ethical principles intended to guide European AI development. In contrast, the United States has only recently released its holistic version of such guidelines, the Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights. The aim of this paper is to assess the suitability of the Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights as an ethical framework underpinning the use of the Z-Inspection® Process in the United States. This paper provides preliminary findings of comparative analysis of European and United States ethical frameworks for responsible AI development. Findings outline primary ethical concepts that are shared between respective frameworks. Findings suggest the US Blueprint is suitable as an ethical framework for the Z-Inspection® Process. There are notable omissions within the US framework which would require further development for Z-Inspection® use. Discussion will consider opportunities for adapting Z-Inspection® to the United States context, including contributions from the information professions and research.

This paper presents the history, internal processes, and finalized report of the Trans Metadata Collective (TMDC), founded to address the lack of attention paid to trans and gender diverse issues in galleries, archives, libraries, museums, and special collections (GLAMS). The TMDC, an ad-hoc group of nearly a hundred information professionals, developed best practices for the description and classification of trans and gender diverse information resources. These guidelines prioritize transparency, cultural sensitivity, correct identification, explicit descriptions of transphobia, and regular assessment of trans-related content. It examines the effects of commonly used standards and controlled vocabularies such as Resource Description and Access (RDA) and Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) on trans and gender diverse people and critiques the inadequacy of these standards’ representation of those communities. The TMDC provides guidance for using existing LCSHs, recommends alternative subject vocabularies, and proposes revisions to improve representation. The paper advocates individual agency in naming and gender identification, with recommendations on contacting creators and documenting their preferences. The TMDC emphasizes the importance of minimizing potential harm and protecting privacy in metadata creation. Overall, the report aims to enhance the representation and inclusion of trans and gender diverse communities in GLAMS institutions.

Extant discourses in Indigenous Knowledge Management [IKM] emphasize the need to support Indigenous self-determination, data sovereignty and self-governance. To channel archival attention in this manner contributes to a larger shift in IKM towards stewardship praxes that empower Indigenous communities through culturally responsive and responsible praxes. The role of radical empathy in motivating this change, however, remains under-explored. In this paper, we introduce eight mutually inclusive empathy-driven propositions to transform the stewardship of Indigenous knowledges through an ethics of care framework. Grounded in a te ao Māori worldview in Aotearoa (New Zealand), we discuss how orienting ourselves to empathy motivates specific kinds of dialogic engagement that gives voice to Indigenous peoples in diverse global Indigenous contexts to share what cultural values should shape their research and knowledge stewardship. In doing so, we offer actionable ways to make positive differences in the lived experiences of Indigenous individuals and communities as they interact with and lead contemporaneous stewardship praxes.

Data science may be used to determine similarities between musical scores. Programs are written in C++ to capture note progressions from musical scores and to compare progressions from different songs to identify overlapping areas. These tools enable the study of musical borrowing across musical genres and may assist in copyright violation cases. Results indicate that within the Celtic music genre, borrowing occurs across greater than 10% of the songs.

The citation of scientific papers is considered a simple and direct indicator of papers’ impact. This paper predicts papers’ citations through team-related variables, team composition, and team structure. Team composition includes team size, male/female dominance, academia/industry collaboration, unique race number, and unique country number. Team structures are made up of team power level and team power hierarchy. Team members’ previous citation number, H-index, previous collaborators, career age, and previous paper numbers are a proxy of team power. We calculated the mean value and Gini coefficient to represent team power level (the collective team capability) and team power hierarchy (the vertical difference of power distribution within a team). Taking 1,675,035 CS teams in the DBLP dataset, we trained the XGBoost model to predict high/low citation. Our model has reached 0.71 in AUC and 70.45% in accuracy rate. Utilizing Explainable AI method SHAP to evaluate features’ relative importance in predicting team citation categories, we found that team structure plays a more critical role than team composition in predicting team citation. High team power level, flat team power structure, diverse race background, large team, collaboration with industry, and male-dominated teams can bring higher team citations.

As of spring 2023, the scholarly community has been eager to explore how AI-produced content should be integrated into both academic writing and scholarly publishing. This paper investigates the prevailing responses to the introduction of ChatGPT in November 2022 and the interest that has been afforded it by both the academy and the publishing industry. A review of the published literature on aspects of ChatGPT authorship was carried out, finding that government and the publishing industry have unequivocally asserted that large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT do not posses the traits of a person and are not able to author texts as a result. Other approaches, including practice, have been less vehement. To assess the integration of instructions on referencing ChatGPT using APA, top Google hits in the .edu domain were collected and analyzed over a 6-week period from March 14 to April 18, 2023, a time during which official recommendations of the APA Style were finalized. Findings reveal that librarians were quick to provide guidance, but slow to update that guidance, contributing to the potential for misunderstanding the affordances of and best practices for work with LLMs.

This article proposes a multilabel poem topic classification algorithm utilizing large language models and auxiliary data to address the lack of diverse metadata in digital poetry libraries. The study examines the potential of context-dependent language models, specifically bidirectional encoder representations from transformers (BERT), for understanding poetic words and utilizing auxiliary data, such as author's notes, in supplementing poetry text. The experimental results demonstrate that the BERT-based model outperforms the traditional support vector machine-based model across all input types and datasets. We also show that incorporating notes as an additional input improves the performance of the poem-only model. Overall, the study suggests pretrained context-dependent language models and auxiliary data have potential to enhance the accessibility of various poems within collections. This research can eventually assist in promoting the discovery of underrepresented poems in digital libraries, even if they lack associated metadata, thus enhancing the understanding and appreciation of the literary form.

In this short paper, we employ a month-long autoethnography to investigate the utilization of ChatGPT through metaphor analysis. We conceptualize three metaphors—unreliable narrator, court jester, and sounding board—that possess the most explanatory capabilities in describing what ChatGPT is, when it can be used, and how it can be helpful. We posit that grounding the use of ChatGPT in metaphors could facilitate discussions and streamline the intricate mechanism of Large Language Models (LLMs). Our study indicates that by proffering playful metaphors as substitutes to apocalyptic and arcane ones, we can enhance the accessibility and comprehensibility of ChatGPT for non-experts and policymakers, thereby potentially contributing to more informed and productive dialogues about the role and potential of LLMs in everyday life.

Records play an important role in supporting business activities and in ensuring accountability in all types of organisations. However, recordkeeping research has mostly focused on the government sector and on large organisations. Little attention has been paid to small organisations which have limited resources to create and manage the records that they are required to produce and the records that could support their engagement in diversified activities. In this paper, we report the findings from 16 focus group discussions with community-based organisations in Bangladesh which are in the process of transitioning from informal to registered organisations and, in order to do so, must formalise their recordkeeping practices. We discuss the recordkeeping needs and capabilities of these organisations and the recordkeeping problems that they are experiencing. We argue that it is important to support the development of a recordkeeping culture as part of capacity-building in these organisations so that they can function effectively and be sustainable.

This paper presents how Brazilian judiciary organizations are advancing towards a preserved digital environment, and how this process is improving the country’s legal system. First, it analyzed the legal norms published by some of the most relevant Brazilian institutions and how these norms fostered the major courts to immediately start projects related to digital preservation. Second, the major challenges faced by these organizations while fulfilling the legal requirements were listed, and a general strategy to attend to them was defined. Subsequently, a model was established to fulfill these requirements. The model was structured to consider the possibilities of future expansion. As the main result of this research, a model capable of setting archival digital preservation projects was designed for the first time, enabling their consequent application by judiciary institutions in Brazil.

This paper reports on an exploratory analysis of the social media policies of municipal governments in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. With a strong Public Records law and language clearly indicating that social media posts are government records, Massachusetts provides a framing for research into municipal policy on social media use, retention, preservation, and access. Of the 351 municipalities in the Commonwealth, just 87 have publicly accessible Social Media policies. These policies indicate that municipal governments take their responsibilities around social media records management seriously, they do not offer many specifics around how they will engage directly with posts from privately-owned social media platforms. Implications of these findings suggest that the digital preservation community must continue to develop tools and methods to preserve social media records the support broader efforts around government transparency and accountability, as well as advocate for platforms to include features to support responsible public sector social media use.

Archives serve as repositories for items of enduring value. Archivists use a process called appraisal to evaluate the value of these items. While various theories and methods have been developed to guide the appraisal and many issues have been identified, little is known about how archivists conduct appraisals or what efforts they undertake to mitigate these issues. As such, this exploratory and qualitative study aims to examine the appraisal practices of archivists in university special collections, the role of the collection policy, and how these policies deal with problematic aspects of appraisal. This study found that university special archivists view appraisal as a complex but systematic process and implement the collection policy’s principles and methodologies into their appraisal practices. Moreover, this study revealed that archivists try to establish and maintain effective relationships with donors and communities throughout the entire appraisal process.

Science, technology and medicine (STM) journals play a pivotal role in advancing the open access (OA) movement by offering various OA services. Despite their significance, few studies have explored the factors that influence adopting OA practices and the underlying mechanisms from an editorial standpoint. In this study, we investigate the attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions of 17 editors from China’s STM journals through semi-structured interviews. Our preliminary findings suggest that motivations, behavioral intentions to engage in OA practices, individual journal characteristics, social reference norms and institutional policy contexts would influence OA practices in STM journals, thus structuring a theoretical framework. We believe that such an understanding of influencing forces and viewpoints of STM journals can provide valuable insights for stakeholders seeking to bridge gaps and strengthen the open science ecosystem.

This short paper presents an analysis of the distribution of downloads in medical literature, with the aim of understanding the specific conditions unique to the medical research field that necessitate the use of black open access sources such as Sci-Hub. The dataset used in this analysis was obtained by scraping the official Sci-Hub domains during the summer of 2022, and it provides valuable insights into user behavior and interaction with the website. The results demonstrate that a significant portion of the downloads from Sci-Hub during the period were related to medical journals, indicating the acute needs and time-sensitive nature of medical research. The data further highlights that a majority of the downloaded papers were related to medicine or medical subjects, underscoring the importance of easy and immediate access to the latest research and literature. The study emphasizes the pressing need for universal access to essential health-care information and the importance of continued efforts to democratize access to medical literature. The use of black open access sources like Sci-Hub serves as a reminder of the urgency to find alternative solutions that ensure medical professionals have the necessary resources to provide the best possible care for their patients

Despite increasing advocacy for open access (OA), the uptake of OA in some disciplines has remained low. Existing studies have linked the low uptake in OA publishing in the humanities and social sciences (HSS) to disciplinary norm, limited funding to pay for article processing charges (APCs), and researchers’ preferences. However, there is a growing concern about inequity in OA scholarly communication as it has remained inaccessible and unaffordable to many researchers. This study therefore investigated inequity in OA publishing in Canada. Using semi-structured interviews, qualitative data was collected from 20 professors from the HSS disciplines of research-intensive universities in Canada. Data was analyzed with NVivo software following the reflexive thematic analysis approach. Findings revealed three main causes of inequity in OA publishing among the participants. These are the cost of APCs, unequal privileges, and gender disparities. Hence, there is a need for concerted efforts by funding agencies, stakeholders, higher education institutions, and researchers to promote equity in OA scholarly communication. Some recommendations for improving equity in OA publishing are provided in this paper.

This study investigates the impact of open review on citation counts of academic articles. By collecting articles published in the material science area of Nature Communications from 2014 to 2018, we exploit the adoption of voluntary open review in 2016 to examine how article citation counts are associated with open review using propensity score matching and regression analysis. OLS regression results show that open review comes at the expense of fewer citations received by articles. Specifically, open-reviewed articles received 44% fewer citations than their non-open-reviewed counterparts. An additional mediation analysis reveals that this decrease in citations may be partially attributed to the lengthening of the review cycle of articles that were open reviewed–open-reviewed articles experienced 16% longer review cycles; every 16% extension of the review cycle led to 5.8% fewer citations. Results remained qualitatively similar when we restricted the citation windows to three years since publication. Contrary to previous findings concerning the positive effects on articles’ citation impact, our preliminary results call for additional efforts in identifying the costs and benefits associated with open review.

Ownership of digital information products in the digital age presents an intricate issue. While research has shown that individuals experience a sense of ownership over their digital possessions, the scope of digital ownership rights in comparison to physical entities remains unclear. Amongst various digital products, e-books stand out due to their ubiquity. This paper presents the results of an empirical research study that used an online survey to examine e-book consumers’ perspectives on digital ownership and digital rights. The study revealed that while most participants value and desire ownership rights, certain conventional ownership rights, such as reselling, gifting, and lending, are deemed less significant and can be relinquished by consumers due to cost-related factors. Furthermore, contrary to prevailing assumptions, the study found no discernible generational gap concerning people’s perceptions of digital ownership rights. These findings hold implications for researchers, policymakers, and public-interest groups seeking to advocate for the public’s digital rights.