The experiences of COVID-19 preprint authors: a survey of researchers about publishing and receiving feedback on their work during the pandemic

Narmin Rzayeva · Susana Oliveira Henriques · Stephen Pinfield · Ludo Waltman

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Academic Publishing and Open Access Publishing and Scholarly Communication scientometrics and bibliometrics research

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic caused a rise in preprinting, triggered by the need for open and rapid dissemination of research outputs. We surveyed authors of COVID-19 preprints to learn about their experiences with preprinting their work and also with publishing their work in a peer-reviewed journal. Our research had the following objectives: 1. to learn about authors' experiences with preprinting, their motivations, and future intentions; 2. to consider preprints in terms of their effectiveness in enabling authors to receive feedback on their work; 3. to compare the impact of feedback on preprints with the impact of comments of editors and reviewers on papers submitted to journals. In our survey, 78% of the new adopters of preprinting reported the intention to also preprint their future work. The boost in preprinting may therefore have a structural effect that will last after the pandemic, although future developments will also depend on other factors, including the broader growth in the adoption of open science practices. A total of 53% of the respondents reported that they had received feedback on their preprints. However, more than half of the feedback was received through "closed" channels-privately to the authors. This means that preprinting was a useful way to receive feedback on research, but the value of feedback could be increased further by facilitating and promoting "open" channels for preprint feedback. Almost a quarter of the feedback received by respondents consisted of detailed comments, showing the potential of preprint feedback to provide valuable comments on research. Respondents also reported that, compared to preprint feedback, journal peer review was more likely to lead to major changes to their work, suggesting that journal peer review provides significant added value compared to feedback received on preprints.

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2021The evolving role of preprints in the dissemination of COVID-19 research and their impact on the science communication landscape 2020Pandemic publishing: Medical journals strongly speed up their publication process for COVID-19 2015Accelerating scientific publication in biology 2019Tracking the popularity and outcomes of all bioRxiv preprints 2020Comparing quality of reporting between preprints and peer-reviewed articles in the biomedical literature 2019bioRxiv: the preprint server for biology 2020Will the pandemic permanently alter scientific publishing?2022Tracking changes between preprint posting and journal publication during a pandemic

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