Springer Nature has taken a further step towards its commitment to open science by requiring mandatory data availability statements (DAS) across its journals portfolio and introducing its first unified data policy across the books portfolio. This means that authors submitting manuscripts to Springer Nature journals must provide a DAS that describes how others can access the data supporting the results presented in the article. The DAS will be published alongside the article, making it easier for readers to access the data. The unified data policy across the books portfolio will ensure that all books published by Springer Nature will have a DAS.
Despite researchers' support for open data sharing, less than 40% of authors actively make their data available. Increasingly, governments, funders, and research institutes are adopting data-sharing requirements in their policies. Encouraging data sharing across all publishing formats recognizes this growing need for clearer, more accessible, actionable, and measurable data policies.
As a longstanding supporter of Open Research, Springer Nature is introducing DAS as a standard for its journal portfolio to promote greater transparency and reproducibility. Adopting a unified policy for books for the first time, is a further exciting step towards encouraging open research practices across all publications and driving forward open science for all.
The single journal’s policy will be rolled out across journals progressively. Springer Nature’s previous data policies set a precedent back in 2016 and have been widely reproduced by other publishers since. Nature Portfolio, BMC, and SpringerOpen journals already require a DAS in original publications (BMC being one of the first with this requirement). Springer and Palgrave titles move to mandatory data availability statements following their earlier commitment. Recognizing the different journey that books are on in the move to open science - the single books policy will strongly encourage data sharing, and the use of repositories, but DAS will not be mandatory.
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