Oxford University Press sign the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment

We are pleased to announce that we have signed the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), which is a worldwide initiative that recognizes the need to improve the ways in which scholarly research is evaluated. In signing the declaration, we are demonstrating our support for the responsible assessment of individual scholarly research outputs on their own merits. This further reflects our commitment to work towards a fair and effective research ecosystem.

For us at OUP, recognizing the value and impact of individual research contributions is a principle that we have long committed to implementing. In addition to joining community initiatives, such as DORA, we are a participant in the Initiative for Open Citations (I4OC) which enhances the discoverability and use of scholarly citation data to support the assessment of the impact of research.

To measure and promote the value of individual research outputs, article-level metrics are available for all articles published on the Oxford Academic platform, including article downloads, citations and Altmetric Attention Scores. We will also shortly enable researchers to record author contributions using the CRediT taxonomy, increasing the transparency of author roles and enabling authors to get credit for their contributions.

As a DORA signatory, we will continue to promote a wide range of measures of research impact as part of our commitment to the responsible use of metrics and recognition of high-quality research.

Speaking about DORA, Rhodri Jackson, Publishing Director, Open Access at OUP, said: “As the breadth and diversity of scholarly research becomes increasingly important in addressing major global challenges, our support for DORA at OUP will focus on helping improve methods of evaluating research. In signing DORA, it is our ambition to continue to contribute to cultural change in research assessment and in the recognition of the value of all scholarly outputs.”

Professor Stephen Curry, Chair of the DORA Steering Committee, said: “I warmly welcome OUP’s decision to sign DORA – a clear indication of their support for efforts to implement responsible assessment of research and scholarship. I am pleased to learn that OUP is committing to practical steps to implement the DORA principles, which will involve providing guidance to authors and editors on the appropriate use of journal and article-level indicators. We will be happy to do what we can to help OUP promote DORA's approach to responsible evaluation both within the company and to the worldwide scholarly community.”