Why don more researchers self-archive spontaneously?
(3a) Unawareness of the possibility of self-archiving (3b) Unawareness of the benefits of self-archiving (3c) Worries that self-archiving might be illegal (3d) Worries that self-archiving might reduce one’s chances of getting published (3e) Worries that self-archiving means abandoning peer review (3f) Worries that self-archiving is technically hard to do (3g) Worries that self-archiving is time-consuming (3i) Laziness (3j) and dozens of other worries (4) But not only do Alma Swan’s international, interdisciplinary author surveys show that 95% of authors will nevertheless comply with self-archiving mandates (over 80% of them willingly), but Arthur Sale’s actual analyses of the success rate of mandated institutional repositories, compared to unmandated ones, fully bear out the results of the surveys: Self-archiving mandates work, just as publish-or-perish mandates (and public smoking bans, and seat-belt regulations) work. Swan, A. (2006) The culture of Open Access: researchers’ views and
