Knowledge and use of self-archiving options among academic librarians working in universities in Africa

Pages145-160
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/ILS-01-2018-0003
Published date12 March 2018
Date12 March 2018
AuthorEbikabowei Emmanuel Baro,Eriye Chris Tralagba,Ebiere Joyce Ebiagbe
Subject MatterLibrary & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library & information services
Knowledge and use of
self-archiving options among
academic librarians working in
universities in Africa
Ebikabowei Emmanuel Baro
The University Library, Federal University, Otuoke, Nigeria
Eriye Chris Tralagba
The University Library, Evagel University, Akaeze, Abakaliki, Nigeria, and
Ebiere Joyce Ebiagbe
Bayelsa State College of Health Technology, Ogbia, Nigeria
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of the study is to investigate the extent to which academiclibrarians in African
universitiesknow and use self-archiving options to make their papers visibleglobally.
Design/methodology/approach An online survey was designed using SurveyMonkey software to
collectdata from 455 academic librarians working in 52 universitiesin Africa.
Findings The study revealed that the academic librarians in Africa are aware of ResearchGate,
institutionalrepository, personal website/server, kudosand Mendeley and they actually upload papers to self-
archiving platforms such as institutional repository, ResearchGate, academia.edu and personal websites/
servers. Factorssuch as increased exposure of ones previously published work, providesexposure for works
not previously published (e.g. seminar papers), broadens the dissemination of academic research generally
and increases ones institutionsvisibility were among the options the academic librarians rated as very
importantfactors that motivate them to submit their scholarly outputto the self-archiving options. It was also
found that majority of the academic librariansin Africa checked the publisherswebsite for copyright policy
compliancebefore submitting their papers to the platform.
Practical implications The study called for academic librariansin developing countries to voluntarily
sign-up toregister with self-archiving options suchas ResearchGate, kudos, Mendeley.com, academia.eduand
others to enablethem self-archive their published papers for access globallyby students, researchers, etc.
Originality/value The ndings of this studywill add to the body of knowledge by bringing to light the
extent of awarenessand use of self-archiving optionsby academic librarians in universities in Africa.
Keywords Africa, Open access, Academic librarians, Self-archiving, Institutional repository,
Academic social networking sites
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Author self-archiving is promising to increase visibility of articles with clearly perceived
benets of sharing scholarly output. Self-archiving is dened as storing the scientic
research outputs in researchersown Web pages/websites, organizational websites or
institutional repositories(Erturk and Sengul, 2012). Self-archiving is making ones academic
research available on open accesssites. Open access (OA) publishing makes onesresearch
visible by removing it from behind paywalls and rendering it accessible to anyone with an
Academic
librarians
working in
universities
145
Received5 January 2018
Revised3 February 2018
Accepted18 February 2018
Informationand Learning Science
Vol.119 No. 3/4, 2018
pp. 145-160
© Emerald Publishing Limited
2398-5348
DOI 10.1108/ILS-01-2018-0003
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2398-5348.htm
internet connection. An increasing number of research funding bodies are now expecting
this as part of their requirements. Lupton (2013, p. 2) argued that making your research
available on open access services increases citation and helps ensure greater impact.One
advantage of self-archiving an article is that, the article can be accessible to wideraudience
by a simple Google search.
Ezema (2013) pointed out that, Africa as a whole is yet to completely embrace new
information technologies, although recent developments indicate that researchers in the
continent are accepting the new technologies in their day-to-day activities. Ezema (2013)
found that research activitiesare very low in Africa. Second, it is also true that much of the
research publications generated in Africa are highly underutilized in the global scholarly
community. Reason for this isapparently because scholarly publications from the continent
lack global visibility. Disseminating your work or paper helps to advance new research to
peers across the globe and builds onesown reputation. The study by Smith (2013) found
that 84 per cent of the authorsthought that more could be done to raise visibility,impact and
usage of their work.
Unfortunately, many do not shareor disseminate their research after being published in
the peer-review channel as they, in most cases, are not aware of the benets or how to use
informal networks to distribute their research. The problem is that not all researchers are
aware of these channels or how to use them, making the change in the scholarly
communication model slowerthan expected. The fast growth of academic social networking
sites and institutional repositories leads to a need to know how these sites are populated.
The ndings of this study will add to the body of knowledge by bringing to light the extent of
awareness and use of self-archiving options by academic librarians in universities in Africa.
As scholarly publications proliferate, you may well wonder whether the research you have
worked so hard to publish is actually reaching readers and making a difference. It is
imperative for Africanscholars to self-archive their research works publishedas this will make
works from the African continent to be accessible globally. This in other words, will make
authors from Africa to be visible withthe opportunity of collaborating and sharing ideas with
authors from the developed world. Therefore, the present study aims at investigating the
extent researchers engage with self-archiving. To do this, the following research questions
are raised to guide the study.
Research questions
RQ1. To what extent are LIS authors in Africa aware of theself-archiving options?
RQ2. Which of the self-archiving options do LIS authors in Africa upload/submit their
papers to?
RQ3. What motivates LIS authors in Africa to upload/submit their papers to self-
archiving options?
RQ4. To what extent are LIS authors in Africa complying with publisherscopyright
policy?
Literature review
Self-archiving by academics and librarians
Self-Archiving:the so called green routeto open access is a way of making full-text articles
available to the public for free. This means that authors can make their research papers
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