Prioritization of Indicators of the Scholarly Publication System in Iran

The purpose of this study is to prioritize the indicators of the scholarly publication system for implementing this system in Iran.

A qualitative method was used to collect data, and a descriptive method was used to analyze the findings. The statistical population of the research is scholarly publishing experts. The sample includes 19 experts who were selected by snowball sampling. A semi-structured interview was used in this research. The research questions were formulated based on the components and indicators of the scholarly publication system; professors and experts confirmed their validity in two consecutive stages. The interviews continued until theoretical saturation was achieved. The research questions include 12 components: access, communication, control, infrastructure, language, materials (information resources), support, technology, economics, evaluation, education, and ethics. Most of these components include indicators such as form, type, scope, and format, covering 39 indicators. A quantitative method was used to extract the data, and MAXQDA software was used to analyze them.

The research funding showed that in the access component, indicators of access type and scope of access; in communication and control components, indicators of format; In the infrastructure component, the form of the infrastructure; in the language component, the scope of language; in the support component, the indicators of form and type of support; in the technology component, the form of technology; in the economics component, financing; in the evaluation component, the form and format of evaluation are in the priority of implementing the national scholarly publication system. Therefore, in order to implement the national scholarly publication system, the components of technology, education, ethics, and their indicators do not need to be prioritized, but other components must be implemented based on prioritization.

The results of the research indicate that 21 indicators out of 39 ones were prioritized to implement the national scholarly publication system. The components of technology, education, ethics, and all its indicators are necessary to design this system, but the indicators of other components should be considered based on the priorities set. According to the economic, technical and cultural conditions, prioritizing the identified indicators of the scholarly publication system helps the countries and scientific communities start the basic steps for the implementation of the national scholarly publication system to take advantage of its benefits such as improving the quality of scientific outputs, supporting publishing processes, observing ethical principles, developing scientific communication, integrated access to all scholarly outputs, identifying investment opportunities in scientific publication, forecasting future developments and crises in different dimension of scholarly publication ecosystem and reducing costs.