A review of journal policies
for sharing research data
Heather Piwowar, Wendy Chapman
Department of Biomedical Informatics
University of Pittsburgh
ELPUB 2008

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cogdog/123072/

“An inherent principle of
publication is that others
should be able to replicate
and build upon the authors'
published claims. Therefore,
a condition of publication
in a Nature journal is that
authors are required to make
materials, data and
associated protocols
available in a publicly
accessible database …”
http://www.nature.com/authors/editorial_policies/availability.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7197/index.html

Benefits for journal
– allows publications to be useful (and cited) in
additional ways
– demonstrates commitment to quality research
– discourages fraud
Drawbacks for journal
– might decrease submissions
– administrative burden

Prior work in this area
• McCain: 16% of 850 science+engineering
journals have a policy about sharing RRI
• NAS: 53% of 38 life sciences journals
But these reviews are dated,
consider a variety of resources,
and don’t correlate policy to behaviour
McCain. Science Communication, Vol. 16, No. 4. (1 June 1995), pp. 403-431
NAS. Sharing Publication-Related Data and Materials. (2003), p. 33

• In this study, we looked at the data-
sharing policies within Instruction to Author
statements of 70 journals for a specific
data type
• We look at themes within the statements
• We correlate the strength of the policy
statements to the frequency with which the
authors actually share their data

Data type:
gene expression microarrays
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Heatmap.png

Three types of results
1. Themes within data sharing policies
2. Relative policy strength
3. Observed data sharing behaviour

Themes within data sharing policies
• statements of policy motivation
• datatype-specific policies
• requested vs. required
• data location
• data format
• data completeness
• timeliness of sharing
• consequences for not sharing
• exceptions

Relative policy strength
• No applicable policy (43%)
• Weak policy (24%)
– should, recommend, request
– must, but without database accession number
• Strong policy (33%)
– must, required, condition of publication
– requires database accession number

High-impact journals
tend to have
a strong data-sharing
policy

What journal characteristics are associated
with having a data-sharing policy?
Impact Open Society
Subdisciplines…
Factor Access? Publisher?
Journal has a data sharing policy?

What journal characteristics are associated
with having a data-sharing policy?
• Biochemistry
&Molecular Biology
Impact Open Society
• Oncology
Factor Access? Publisher?
Journal has a data sharing policy?

Observed Sharing Behaviour
For each of the 70 journals, we measured
% of papers with links to database
submission entries
% of submission links is our proxy for
% of publications with shared data

Articles published in journals
with a strong data-sharing
policy are more likely to have
publicly available datasets

What journal characteristics are associated
with data sharing behaviour?
Having a data-sharing policy?
Impact Open Society
Subdisciplines…
Factor Access? Publisher?
% of articles with shared data

What journal characteristics are associated
with data sharing behaviour?
• Genetics &
Having a data-sharing policy?
Heredity
Impact Open Society • Multidisciplinary
Factor Access? Publisher? Sciences
% of articles with shared data

Limitation
• Association does not imply causation

Take-home message
• Many, but not all, journals require sharing
of microarray data. Very diverse policies.
• Stronger data-sharing policies:
– high-impact journals
– open-access journals
– published by association
• Policy strength correlates with behaviour
• Policies would benefit from
improved clarity, scope, and accountability

Future work
• Who shares data?
• Who reuses data?
Hopefully the answers will inform our decisions
about where to focus our energy to improve
policies, tools, and incentives

Thank you
Advisor: Dr. Wendy Chapman
Funding: NLM for training grant, and
Pitt DBMI department for travel
grant
My shared data: www.dbmi.pitt.edu/piwowar
Share your research data too!

“Does anyone want your data?
That’s hard to predict[…]
After all, no one ever knocked on your
door asking to buy those figurines
collecting dust in your cabinet before you
listed them on eBay.
Your data, too, may simply be awaiting an
effective matchmaker.”
Got data? Nature Neuroscience 10, 931 (2007)