The following thesis concerns the conceptualization of openness within the open access movement. Open accesscan be understood as a phenomenon or a movement that aims at changing the current system of scholarly communication.Consequentially, the movements goals arose in relation to the escalating serials crisis in scholarly communicationand the increasing power of commercial publishers. The purpose of the thesis is to study three centralopen access declarations with the aim of uncovering the different conceptualizations of openness found withinthese texts. Leaning on the theoretical position known as actor-network theory, the declarations role within a surroundingnetwork is explored by focusing on how openness as a concept has been produced and reproduced bycentral actors. Two overarching questions frames the study: How is openness conceptualized within the declarations?And how can openness, as a concept, be understood as an effect generated by a larger network?The first part of the study focuses on the first question. In order to provide an answer I have conducted athematically structured text analysis of the declarations. The results of this part show that openness, in relation toopen access, is part of a discourse where research is considered a public good. I claim that this indicates thatopenness is related to the larger questions of information freedom and the enclosure of intellectual commons.The purpose of openness is described within the declarations as contributing to mechanisms of decentralized controlover information, which in itself generates a greater efficiency and lower costs in regards to scholarly communication.The second part of the study is concerned with the larger, overarching network and in what way the conceptualizationof openness can be seen as a network generated effect. To answer this question I deploy the theoreticaltools provided by ANT. Focus lies on how the declarations relate to each other and on how central actors havecontributed to the conceptualizations. The results show that openness and open access has shifting meanings thathave been modified in various ways. They also show that actors through a collective negotiation process defineand shape the meaning of openness by circulating ideas on electronic dissemination and distributed processes

Open access has played a significant part in the development of scholarlycommunication. Today, several research funding agencies around the worldrequires that the results of the research it supports must be published openaccess where the underlying idea is that publicly funded research should befree and available to all users. The purpose of this thesis is to discuss the issueof open access publishing from the perspective of researchers in the field ofodontology, focused on their attitudes, behaviors and publishing experienceswith open access. Through a qualitative interview study with fiveodontological researchers, the results have been compared to previous studieson researchers' attitudes and experiences with open access. The results showthat both knowledge and experience with open access publishing is fairly lowamong the participating scientists. Generally, a positive attitude towards openaccess in other research areas can be identified among odontologicalresearchers, but when it comes to publishing within their own discipline openaccess is considered to be insignificant, so due to the availability of journalsamong the researchers considered to be adequate to cover their informationneeds. The results also identifies a negative view of open access publishingthrough institutional repositories, as these are not considered to add any valueto their career development. A quantitative study would have given a moregeneral view of researchers' attitudes and experiences of open accesspublishing. The results of this paper should therefore not be generalized andconsidered as representative of all researchers within the odontologicalresearch discipline. / Program: Bibliotekarie

<p>Open access to scientific literature on Internet is a concept which is supposed to change librarians' work. The aim of the thesis was to examine librarians' perception of Open access. A questionnaire survey was conducted among librarians at libraries with specialisation in technique, natural sciences, medicine and pharmacy in Sweden. Even though Open access can be regarded as an alarming for librarians' work, the results of the survey showed that the future of the librarians' profession can be positive if they flexibly adopt their work routines according to changes in publication forms and library users' needs.</p>

Open access to scientific literature on Internet is a concept which is supposed to change librarians' work. The aim of the thesis was to examine librarians' perception of Open access. A questionnaire survey was conducted among librarians at libraries with specialisation in technique, natural sciences, medicine and pharmacy in Sweden. Even though Open access can be regarded as an alarming for librarians' work, the results of the survey showed that the future of the librarians' profession can be positive if they flexibly adopt their work routines according to changes in publication forms and library users' needs.

With the purpose to investigate policies within long-term preservation of digital media in the modern world of Open Access institutional repository, this two year's master thesis was conducted through a qualitative study with quantitative overtures. The main objectives of this thesis centre on the criteria for long-term digital preservation, preservation in relation to institutional repositories, the issues cropping up within the field of institutional repositories, and the essential components of a preservation policy. The theoretical framework is constructed around a model based upon scholarly communication, with its aspects of dissemination, acquisition, preservation, discovery and access, and with the facet of preservation at its centre. The methodology of this study is cued to content analysis and its in-depth investigative process, which was conducted on a sample of ten preservation policies within Open Access institutional repositories that were compared to a standardised expert set of policy categorisation. The results show that a perfect preservation policy does not appear to exist in the current world, based exclusively on the selected sample. This gives a strong indication of a need for further research within the field of Open Access institutional repositories preservation policies. / I syfte att undersöka policyer inom långsiktigt bevarande av digitala medier i den moderna världen av Open Access institutionella arkiv, genomfördes denna tvååriga masteruppsats genom en kvalitativ studie med kvantitativa uvertyrer. De huvudsakliga frågeställningarna i denna uppsats är centrerade kring kriterierna för långsiktigt digitalt bevarande, bevarandet i förhållande till institutionella arkiv, problem som dyker upp inom fältet för institutionella arkiv, och de essentiella komponenterna för en långtidsbevarande policy. Det teoretiska ramverket är uppbyggt runt en modell som utgår ifrån vetenskaplig kommunikation, med dess aspekter av spridning, förvärv, bevarande, upptäckt och tillgänglighet, med bevarande aspekten i centrum. Metoden för denna studie är centrerad till innehållsanalys och dess fördjupande undersökningsprocess, och som applicerades på tio utvalda Open Access institutionella arkivs bevarande-policyer, som sedan jämfördes med enuppsättning standardiserade kategorier, utvalda av experter, för en sådan policy. Resultaten visade att en perfekt långtidsbevarande policy inte existerar i dagens verklighet, om man utgår från studiens urval. Detta ger en stark indikation på att det finns ett behov av att göra ytterligare forskning inom området för institutionella arkivs bevarande policy inom Open Access-världen

Emanating in a Swedish and British context, this study seeks to map and discuss contemporary performative tendencies within the countries’ respective open access movements. This is done through a Posthumanist and Material-Semiotic analysis of nine research funders policy documents for open access to scientific results. Using an actor-network-theoretical apparatus of concepts, the study seeks to assess actors, actants, intermediaries, mediators, agencies, connections and networks in the policy documents of the respective research funders. The study therefore aspires to illuminate the complexities of these networks, similarities and differences between the two countries’ networks and what these networks can say about contemporary tendencies within the Swedish and British open access movements respectively. Actors with their associated agencies and performative connections are analysed and compiled in tables according to the respective research funders. The output is thereafter visualised in a schematic network model and the performative tendencies are assessed. While Swedish council Vetenskapsrådet is defined as a ”spider in the web” of the research funder network, the British network is more fragmentary. As for Bioscientific networks, the Swedish network is of a more peripheral sort while the British consists of sprawling nodes. Within Health Science, there is for both countries a clear direction towards the fortification of infrastructures for data deposition. This can also be said regarding the deposition of monographs in Social Science and the Humanities. These tendencies are discussed in light of international open access research. It is proposed that research funders, libraries and other professionals active within the open access movements considers these tendencies in the forming of service activities. It is also emphasized that similar studies ought to be done in order to further map open access-networks. Two years master’s thesis in Library and Information Science.

<p>To self-archive is to make research publications freely accessible by depositing them in an open digital archive or on a public website. The aim of this thesis is to explore what Swedish scientists think of self-archiving, what they know about it and how they make use of it, in order to understand why they do not self-archive more actively.</p><p>A web survey was conducted which was answered by 296 scientists at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). Results show that only 24 % have previous experience of self-archiving, but that a majority is willing to self-archive if there are no legal objections or if it is demanded by the research funder. The most important reasons why many scientists do not self-archive are that they feel uncertain about copyright issues and/or lack knowledge about self-archiving.</p>

To self-archive is to make research publications freely accessible by depositing them in an open digital archive or on a public website. The aim of this thesis is to explore what Swedish scientists think of self-archiving, what they know about it and how they make use of it, in order to understand why they do not self-archive more actively. A web survey was conducted which was answered by 296 scientists at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). Results show that only 24 % have previous experience of self-archiving, but that a majority is willing to self-archive if there are no legal objections or if it is demanded by the research funder. The most important reasons why many scientists do not self-archive are that they feel uncertain about copyright issues and/or lack knowledge about self-archiving.

Self-archiving as a way to provide open access to research publications is gaining ground in the area of scholarly publishing. An increasing number of research funders and universities are mandating open access for output associated with their research, which calls for evaluation of the effects of the phenomenon. This two years master’s thesis aims to investigate researchers’ experiences of self-archiving. A qualitative web survey was conducted and answered by 41 researchers from several different countries, and a vast majority of the respondents concur with the principle of open access. Although self-archiving shows not to be a guarantee of increased impact for the single researcher, the study shows that might be the case. The results attest that self-archiving can generate for example increased number of collaboration, comments in social media and stronger professional profile, as well as a sense of personal progress. The results illuminate an ongoing change in scholarly communications as self-archiving shows to enable a more flexible and informal communication of research material.