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Open research

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Open research is research that is transparent and freely shared. Research can better the state of living of all humans. When the work is open, anyone can read it, check it, and build on it, and the whole store of human knowledge grows faster.

What open research is

Research is a careful search for answers. Most of it ends as a paper, and most papers sit behind a paywall. Data, code, and notes often stay on a private computer. Open research changes that. The question, the methods, the data, the results, and the reasoning are all put where others can see them and use them. Anyone may then learn from the work or repeat it.

Two ideas sit at the center. The first is transparency. A reader can see how a result was reached, not only the result. The second is free sharing. Cost and permission should not keep a student, a teacher, or a researcher in a poor country from using good work. Both ideas serve the same goal, which is better living conditions for people everywhere.

What can be open

Openness has parts. A project can be open in some parts and closed in others. These are the common ones.

  • Open access publishing. The finished paper is free to read. Strictly defined, it also carries an open license that allows reuse.[1]
  • Preprints. A preprint is a paper shared before formal peer review. Servers such as arXiv hold many of them.[2]
  • Open data. The raw and cleaned data are shared under an open license, with notes that explain what each column means.[3]
  • Open methods and code. Protocols, scripts, and software are shared so others can run them.
  • Open peer review. Reviewers may sign their reports, the reports may be published, or the wider community may take part.[4]
  • Open notebooks. The whole record of a project is posted as it is made, including failed experiments.[5]
  • Preregistration. The plan and the analysis are recorded before the data are collected, so readers can tell what was planned from what was found later.[6]
  • Open licenses. A license such as one from Creative Commons tells every reader what reuse is allowed.

How it differs from closed research

In closed research the public sees a summary at the end. The data and methods may be private, and the paper may cost money to read. Others cannot easily check closed work. Open research makes checking normal. Mistakes are found sooner, and good work is reused more widely.

Benefits and limits

The benefits are practical. Students and teachers get free material. Researchers avoid repeating work that already exists. Results that others can repeat earn more trust.

Openness also has limits, and a good researcher plans for them.

  • Privacy. Data about people may need removal of names, limited access, or consent that covers sharing.
  • Safety and dual use. Some work can serve both peaceful and harmful ends, so a team may need to think about what to release.[7]
  • Cost. Making data tidy takes time. Some journals charge an article processing charge to publish open access.[8]
  • Credit. Authors want their work cited. A clear license and a persistent identifier help others give credit.
  • Quality control. Anyone can post anything, so readers must judge sources with care. Preprints have not been through formal review.

Share what you safely can, and say plainly what you kept back and why.

Practicing open research

A student or a teacher can practice open research on a small scale. Here is a simple workflow.

  1. Write the question and the plan in a short note before you start.
  2. Keep raw data, cleaned data, and code in separate folders, and use version control such as Git.
  3. Write down each step as you go, including what failed.
  4. Choose a license for your text, data, and code. Creative Commons licenses are common for text and data.
  5. Deposit the files in an open repository. Zenodo, run by CERN, accepts papers, data, and software, and it issues a DOI for each deposit.[9]
  6. Post a preprint if your field has a server. In physics and mathematics, arXiv is the usual place.[10]
  7. Invite comments, then record the changes you make in response.

The Open Science Framework is an open source project that supports open collaboration in research. It comes from the Center for Open Science, a nonprofit that works to increase the openness, integrity, and reproducibility of research.[11] Wikidata is a collaboratively edited knowledge graph whose data is released as open data, and it can hold structured facts that come from a project.[12] Wikipedia is another place to put verified knowledge to use, so long as each claim cites a reliable source.

Project ideas for a class:

  • Repeat a small published study and report which parts were easy and which parts were hard to follow.
  • Collect a small dataset, such as local weather or bus arrival times, and release it with a license and a data guide.
  • Preregister a classroom experiment, run it, and compare the result with the plan.

A teacher can ask students to review one another's open notebooks. This builds the habits of clear writing and honest records. The material you produce can also become part of Open education.

Discussion questions

  • Which part of research is most important to open first, the paper, the data, or the code?
  • When is it right to keep data closed?

Essay ideas

  • Argue whether open peer review would improve trust in science.
  • Describe how open data could improve living conditions in one community.

AI prompt ideas

  • Explain the difference between a preprint and a peer reviewed paper, then quiz me with five questions.
  • Help me write a preregistration plan for a simple classroom experiment, and ask me questions where my plan is vague.
  • Review my choice of an open license for a project, and list which claims I should verify with the license text.

Readings from Wikipedia

See also

References

  1. ↑ Open access, Wikipedia
  2. ↑ Preprint, Wikipedia
  3. ↑ Open data, Wikipedia
  4. ↑ Open peer review, Wikipedia
  5. ↑ Open-notebook science, Wikipedia
  6. ↑ Preregistration (science), Wikipedia
  7. ↑ Dual-use technology, Wikipedia
  8. ↑ Article processing charge, Wikipedia
  9. ↑ Zenodo, Wikipedia
  10. ↑ ArXiv, Wikipedia
  11. ↑ Center for Open Science, Wikipedia
  12. ↑ Wikidata, Wikipedia
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