Research data management requirements in social and behavioral sciences academic journals

Abstract

Considerations of sharing research data when publishing in academic sciences journals have become increasingly common in the last decade thanks to mandates by national and international granting agencies. Yet, similar directives for social and behavioral sciences journals have been slow to gain traction. This presentation explores the presence of research data management language in manuscript submission directions for the top 136 academic journals in sociology, psychology, political science, and general social sciences as determined by 2015/2016 Scimago and Eigenfactor journal rankings. Official journal websites were examined via content analysis for specific data policies, as well as general mentions of data sharing and data management. The presentation makes unique contributions to existing data management and scholarly communications literature by: 1) drawing attention to data language used by publishers of social and behavioral sciences journals; 2) examining existing data policies and requirements for publication from journals; and 3) discussing how brief or non-existent journal data policies interrupt the data lifecycle.