Is Open Access for Everyone?

Do non-researchers use open access (OA) research? Since open access manifestos going back decades invoke “curious minds” and those outside of academia as target audiences, this is an important—perhaps even existential—question about open access. The debates currently roiling in the US and elsewhere about research funding and public impact only make the question more urgent.

My research, which I recently presented at the 2025 ACRL conference in Minneapolis, started with this question. For non-experts, accessing and understanding scholarly work requires time, effort, and motivation. The jargon can seem intimidating to those outside of the field. While the idea of information as a “public good” is certainly appropriate in ethical terms, what is actually happening on the ground? Building from that question, I sought to determine who uses OA and why.

In exploring this phenomenon, I applied quantitative and textual analysis to data gathered from the National Academies of Sciences Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) and the Digital Access to Scholarship at Harvard (DASH) institutional repository. My goal was to empirically understand the effect that making paywalled content open has on non-researcher uptake in terms of sheer numbers, as well as eliciting a qualitative understanding of the kinds of people accessing this literature and their motivations for doing so.

The first analysis shows the quantitative effect of an open access policy on NASEM reports. NASEM made all of their scientific consensus reports open access in June 2011; I analyzed more than one million downloads going back to 2006 to calculate the specific effect of the 2011 policy on non-researcher downloads. I found that the move to open resulted in a substantial increase of downloads by non-researchers. Report downloads by those unaffiliated with universities or government went from an average of 72 report downloads per day, pre-OA, to 229 reports downloaded per day, on average, post-OA policy.

In addition to analyzing the NASEM data, I also classified more than 3500 “stories” of OA use collected from Harvard University’s DASH institutional repository. These stories are part of a program titled “Your Story Matters” that asks contributors to describe how they benefit from access to scholarly research.

I discovered that the population using open access research includes not only students but professionals, like teachers, nurses, and NGO workers, motivated to improve their services by leveraging the best available evidence (41 percent of the data set), as well as retirees and a long list of other readers outside of formal research environments who seek out these scholarly resources for personal enrichment and to become better informed members of society (37 percent). The text analysis also revealed a substantial number of amateur researchers, such as citizen scientists and those seeking sources for independent book projects, as well as international students and other “constrained academics” who are not able to gain access via their local institutions (22 percent).

Below is a sample of illustrative comments from those in the DASH data set:

“I'm doing research for a novel to be set in the 1890’s. Needed some idea of single women’s job options. Thank you for making this information available.” (Accessed from the US. Article: “The Work and Wages of Single Women, 1870–1920.”)

“I am fascinated by lizards, and this research being available helps me expand my own knowledge about them. Having research like this available online to everyone is so much more effective in spreading knowledge than having to pay for an article from a journal publication. Thank you Harvard for making learning more accessible!” (Accessed from the Bahamas. Article: “Detective Work in the West Indies: Integrating Historical and Experimental Approaches to Study Island Lizard Evolution.”)

“I am a registered occupational and organizational psychologist in UK. As all of our work is evidence-based, we need high-quality and diverse resources to inform and support programs, tools, workshops, etc that we deliver.” (Accessed from the UK. Article: “Corporate Purpose and Financial Performance.”)

“It has really help[ed] me to read more on the free papers or articles on the Anti malaria drug resistance in respect to Arthemisinin.” (Accessed from Ghana. Article: “Artemisinin resistance without pfkelch13 mutations in Plasmodium falciparum isolates from Cambodia.”)

“73 yr old g-ma, searching for a source of info I can trust. THANKS.” (Accessed from the US. Article: “Partisanship, Propaganda, and Disinformation: Online Media and the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election.”)

Much of the rationale for open access, and open science more broadly, is its payoff to society, both to those living within the country where the research is conducted (e.g., taxpayers), and to the wider world. Yet, measuring that benefit is challenging, since traditional bibliometric approaches, such as citation analysis, do not function well outside of the research world. As information professionals and open access advocates, we need to find ways to communicate the story of open access use by everyday people outside of the research world.

I find that there is a thirst among the non-researcher public for the best available evidence. Furthermore, people are applying the ideas that open access infrastructure and policies make available at home, at work, and within their communities.

As has been widely acknowledged on this platform and many others, open access does not mean “free.” Open science infrastructure, such as repositories, necessitates sustained support from a wide range of stakeholders, including publicly funded organizations at the federal and state levels. During this time of tumult, when the relevance of science is being questioned, preserving open access to expert knowledge will require supporters inside and outside of traditional research communities.

Scientific institutions and universities across the world are being asked to prove their relevance like never before. As advocates for a fairer information environment, we now have the ability to ensure that a much wider population can benefit from direct access to knowledge. Additionally, as this research demonstrates, there is a thirst among the public for such access.

So: “Is open access for everyone?” The answer is yes, but that answer only matters if those who hold the power to enact open policies, and protect open systems, are convinced of this fact.

References

Doshi, A. (2025). An evidence-based inquiry into the public use of open access research. American Library Association. https://www.ala.org/sites/default/files/2025-03/AnEvidence-BasedInquiryintothePublicUseofOAResearch.pdf