Open@VT

Brian Nosek, Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia and co-founder and director of the Center for Open Science, gave the keynote address for Open Access Week 2014 on Monday night, October 20. “Scientific Utopia: Improving the Openness and Reproducibility of Research” noted the gap between scholarly values and how scholarship is actually carried out, and described how the Open Science Framework can help address this issue.

Brian Nosek, Open Access Week Keynote Address at Virginia Tech

The presentation began with a slide listing the norms (idealistic values) and counternorms (what often happens) of scholarship as opposing pairs, for example communality vs. secrecy. Looking at the counternorms, it was easy to see that these behaviors are aligned with academic incentives and “getting ahead” in general. Nosek also showed the amusing, if disheartening, results of a study comparing researchers’ agreement with the norms, how well their own practices align with the norms, and how well they think the practices of others align with the norms. He then identified current problems in the published literature of positive results and low power, variability in analysis, and selective reporting.

The Center for Open Science helps enable reproducibility, registration, and openness by making them part of the research workflow. COS endeavors to provide the technology to enable change, the training to enact change, and the incentives to embrace change. The technology is the Open Science Framework, which provides versioning, documentation, and other services in addition to connecting parts of a project together (Dropbox, figshare, etc.). COS offers training in statistics, tools, and workflows both online and in-person. And it’s working on incentives such as usage statistics, badges, and registered reports. Interestingly, registered reports move peer review after the design phase rather than after writing the report, addressing the negative results/selective reporting problem. The current incentive in academia is to get published, not to get it right, but COS is helping to change that.

Brian Nosek’s keynote address was delivered to a packed room- we counted 120 attendees. Thanks to everyone who turned out!

Thanks to the University Libraries’ Event Capture Service for the video below.

The University Libraries at Virginia Tech is pleased to announce our 2014 Open Access Week schedule! This year we are offering eight events, highlighted by a keynote address from Brian Nosek, a panel discussion on open access by Virginia Tech faculty and graduate students, and a workshop on reproducible research.

Open Access Week events are open to everyone, and for the first time all events will also be available for NLI credit (look under University Libraries). Here’s more info on our highlighted events:

Brian Nosek

A Keynote Address by Brian Nosek, Professor of Psychology at the University of Virginia and co-founder of the Center for Open Science. His talk is titled “Scientific Utopia: Improving the Openness and Reproducibility of Research” and is sponsored by the Department of Psychology, the College of Science, and the University Libraries. (Monday October 20 at 5:30 pm in Pamplin 30, full details here.)

A Panel Discussion on Open Access, featuring faculty and graduate students at Virginia Tech. This is always an engaging event and it’s interesting to hear how folks from different disciplines are involved with open access. (Tuesday October 21 at 5:30 pm in the Library Multipurpose Room, full details here.)

A Workshop on Reproducible Research Practices, led by the Center for Open Science. Bring your laptop and please RSVP for this one. (Thursday October 23 at 3:00 pm in the Library Multipurpose Room, full details here.)

And we have five additional events, including sessions on our Open Access Subvention Fund, using Creative Commons licenses, author rights, and trends in scholarly publishing. See our full schedule for details, and help us spread the word by posting the schedule flyer and keynote address flyer on your office door and/or local bulletin board. Feel free to contact me at pyoung1@vt.edu if you have any questions. See you then!