When is an article actually published?An analysis of online availability, publication, and indexation datesStefanie Haustein, Timothy D. Bowman & Rodrigo Costas@stefhaustein @timothydbowman @RodrigoCostas1

Introduction

Motivation and Questions

Methods

Results

Discussion and Conclusion

Outlook

Outline

?

submission acceptance publicationjournal issue

Introduction

submission acceptance publicationjournal issue

Introduction

preprint

submission acceptance publicationjournal issue

onlinepublication

Introduction

preprint

Introduction

JASIST: 270 “Early View” articles

Introduction

JASIST: lag between online publication and journal issue

Introduction

JASIST: lag between online publication and journal issue

Introduction

submission acceptance publicationjournal issue

onlinepublication

preprint

publicationyear

citations citations

• Bibliometric indicators are based on publication year of journal issue

• Lag between online and issue date creates citation advantage

• Publication year insufficient for bibliometric indicators• January vs. December papers• Acceleration of read-cite-read cycle• Online publication before journal issue• Lags between online and issue date

Online dates would allow for more accurate metrics

Motivation and Questions?

• Publication year insufficient for bibliometric indicators• January vs. December papers• Acceleration of read-cite-read cycle• Online publication before journal issue• Lags between online and issue date

Online dates would allow for more accurate metrics

1. Which publishers specify what kind of dates?

2. How reliable are these dates?

3. What existing dates can be used as alternatives?

Motivation and Questions?

1. Which publishers specify what kind of dates? Determining dates provided by publishers

2. How reliable are these dates? Validating online dates with date of first tweet

3. What existing dates can be used as alternatives? Analyzing other dates

• WoS indexing date

• Altmetric.com publication date

• Altmetric.com first seen date

• CrossRef dates

Methods

Dataset• WoS papers published in 2012 with ≥ 1 tweet

captured by Altmetric.com• Matching of 313,301 WoS papers to Altmetric via DOI

• Excluding Altmetric records with preprints (arXiv ID or ADS ID)

• Tweets to papers based on publisher’s website, DOI, PMID

• Identification of top 10 publishers

Methods

• Elsevier

• Wiley-Blackwell

• Lippincott

• Springer

• PLOS

• BMC

• NPG

• ACS

• Oxford

• Sage

Determining available dates

Methods

a = provided via APIm = in the metadata of the article webpage

w = on the article webpage onlyd = as dynamic content on the webpage only

Dataset• Limited to 71,175 papers from Wiley-Blackwell, Springer,

PLOS and NPG due to technical feasibility and relevance

• Retrieving online date information via API and parsing specific HTML tags

Wiley-Blackwell “Early View”Springer “Online First”NPG “Advance Online Publication”PLOS identical to publication date

• Additional dates from WoS, Altmetric.com and CrossRef

Methods

Journal issue date (WoS)

Methods

WoS indexing date

Methods

Altmetric.com publication date

Altmetric.com first seen date

Date of first tweet (Altmetric.com)+ most detailed date information

‒ only for 21% of papers

‒ not always on day of publication

Methods

• Comparison of 58,896 papers with all 6 dates

• Comparing online date to:• Date of first tweet • Journal issue month (first of month)• WoS indexing date• Altmetric.com publication date• Altmetric.com first seen date• CrossRef deposit, first resolution

& update

Methods

validation

potentialalternatives

• Wiley-Blackwell: 27,432 • Springer: 14,473

• PLOS: 9,600• NPG: 7,391

Results: Validation of Online Dates

3.5%34.4%62.2%

657

0.0%37.2%62.8%

151

0.1%1.1%

98.9%92

6

14.5%15.2%70.3%

9768

n=7,391

n=9,600

n=14,473

n=27,432

Difference (days) betw

een first tweet and online date

Before:Equal:After:Mean:Median:

Results: Other Dates

Springeronline date Journal issue

(first of issue month)

WoS indexing date

Altmetric.com publication date

Mean: 146Std dev: 111Min: -269Max: 1850Median: 120

Before: 3.5%Equal: 0.1%After: 96.4%

Mean: 163Std dev: 113Min: -252Max: 1866Median: 138

Before: 0.1%Equal: 0.0%After: 99.9%

Mean: 9Std dev: 48Min: -519Max: 1850Median: 1

Before: 43.4%Equal: 34.1%After: 22.5%

CrossRef dates as more reliable alternatives?

Results (preliminary)

submission acceptance publicationjournal issue

onlinepublication

DOI deposit first resolution update

Results (preliminary): CrossRef

Springer

deposit

update

first resolution

online date

+ 1 year + 2 years + 3 years + 4 years + 5 years + 6 years

78.8% -1 day to online date96.4% -3 to 3 days to online date

collaboration with Joe Wass

• Effect of online-issue lag on:• Bibliometric indicators• OA embargoes

“[T]he manuscript will not be posted [on PMC] until 12 months after the official date of publication. […] The official publication date may thus be considered the online publication date for some journals and the print publication date for others.“

Wiley

“[The embargo period] begins from the publication date of the issue the article appears in. Our embargo periods typically range from 12 – 24 months […].”

Elsevier

Discussion and Conclusion

• Publishers should provide publication dates using same terminology• Inclusion of dates in metadata:

• Submission

• Acceptance

• Publication of preprint

• Publication of Version of Record (VoR)

• Publication of (print) issue

• Via CrossRef? Implementation of date standards

• Via NISO?

Discussion and Conclusion

Thank youfor your attention!Stefanie Haustein, Timothy D. Bowman & Rodrigo Costas@stefhaustein @timothydbowman @RodrigoCostas1