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November 28, 2008
Models of Digital Scholarly Communication
In the November 21, 2008 issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education, Jennifer Howard highlights the recent report "Current Models of Digital Scholarly Communication" in her article "A New Field Study Identifies Eight Major Types of Digital Scholarship." The Association of Research Libraries and the Ithaka group conducted the report, which was released on November 10, 2008. The report is based on interviews of researchers conducted by librarians. In this article, Howard notes the highlights of the report, including some unique observations on the process of digital scholarship and publishing. As Howard points out, digital publishing continues to operate on the "rules of traditional scholarly culture" despite the recent innovation.
The report identifies either main types of digital scholarly resources. These include e-journals, reviews of scholarly works, preprints and working papers, encyclopedias and annotated content, data resources (mainly in scientific communities), discussion forums, and professional and scholarly hubs such as Web portals maintained by scholarly societies. Howard reports that e-journals were the most popular resources among researchers. The report credits the similarity of e-journals to their traditional print counterparts as the basis for their popularity and credibility. The report also mentions that not only do scholars tend to prefer the traditional style of communication offered by e-journals, they also enjoy the quick and easy access to new work.
In her article, Howard also highlights some new types of electronic communication that surfaced in the report. These include journal "issues in progress" where new articles are posted as soon as they are written, and are not constrained by a publication date. Another popular genre in the digital realm is reviews of scholarly works. Scholars are no longer controlled by the time constraints of printing, thus increasing the turn around time for scholarly peer reviews. The report also mentions blogs, which interestingly, scholars view as communication tools developing scholarly thought, but not as final products. Another interesting find is the differences among disciplines. The report discovered that humanists prefer e-mail lists and discussion forums while social scientists rely on professional and scholarly hubs. Researchers in science, technology and medicine are most concerned with speed, and prefer resources that provide the fastest access to the most up-to-date information.
For more information on the report, including examples of popular digital resources, see Jennifer Howard's article which is currently available for free online at or through the UT Library's e-journal collection. The "Current Models of Digital Scholarly Communication" complete report is available at the Association of Research Libraries website.
Howard, Jennifer. "A New Field Study Identifies Eight Major Types of Digital Scholarship." The Chronicle of Higher Education 55, no. 13 (November 21, 2008): 11.
-posted by Melissa Powers, IS 560 Collection Development
Posted by colldev at November 28, 2008 12:45 PM