A Survey on Individual Differences of Open Access Journals

Abstract

Recently, a large public academic institution in the US ended its subscription to the most influential publisher of academic research. This institution was driven by the principle that scientific knowledge should not be locked up behind paywalls as the costs of publishing have grown over the years. The purpose of this study is to investigate the prospects of publishing and accessing scientific knowledge from Open Access Journals (OA) and to get a general understanding of what aspects to decide on when a research scholar intends to publish in a Scopus indexed Open Access journal. OA journals are freely available with no cost on the internet. They provide unrestricted access to scientific literature to spread recent updates in various disciplines of science and technology. Method: In this study, the researcher has conducted a non-random survey in alphabetical order, 30 Open Access Scopus indexed Psychology journals for the purpose of understanding and comparing their policies and article processing charges. Result: Based on the survey, research scholars can make decisions based on which journals would be viable for publishing their articles looking at these policies. While some of the journals do not have article processing fees some of the journals charge article processing fees.