Kevin T. Kavanagh, MD, MS, FACS

Survey Results:

Go to Part I: Editors Opionion US and Other Countries
Go to Part II: Editors Opinion Other Countries
Go to Part III: Journal Policy on Article Distribution.

PART I: Editor's Opinion US and Canada ** Go To TOP *

Editors were sent two E-mailings and two US and Canada Snail Mailings. 136 US and Canadian editors from 105 Journals were polled with a survey response rate of 40%.

Authors to post or link full text articles on the web -- Read only format, printing disabled, downloading inhibited.
	No Opinion	Never	Immediately	1 yr	2 yrs	3 yrs	5 yrs	10 yrs	Average
US	3	1	11	13	3	8	4	0
Canada		1	6	4
Total	3	2	17	17	3	8	4	0	1.4

Authors to post or link full text articles on the web -- Printing and downloading enabled.
	No Opinion	Never	Immediately	1 yr	2 yrs	3 yrs	5 yrs	10 yrs	Average
US	3	1	7	13	3	8	6	1
Canada		1	5	3	1	1
Total	3	2	12	16	4	9	6	1	1.9

Of the 51 editors who responded to the question, 98% felt that a Journal should after a certain period of time from publication allow author’s to post or link articles on the internet, with an average of 1.4 years for view only and 1.9 years for article printing.

The internet policy that was proposed was a policy considered by my Journal and not a research question. Thus it was a complex question and not applicable to all Journals. 35 of 43 responding editors felt this was an acceptable policy, of the 8 editors who were not in favor of the policy, 4 indicated it was two restrictive and 2 others indicated their Journal already allowed full text viewing.

PART II: Editor's Opinion Other Countries ** Go To TOP **

Editors from other countries were sent only two E-Mailings regarding the survey. A total of 25 Editors responded out of 255 for a 10% survey response rate.

Authors to post or link full text articles on the web -- Read only format, printing disabled, downloading inhibited.
	No Opinion	Never	Immediately	1 yr	2 yrs	3 yrs	Average
Other Nations	4	1	14	4	0	2	0.5

Authors to post or link full text articles on the web -- Printing and downloading enabled.
		Never	Immediately	1 yr	2 yrs	3 yrs	Average
Other Nations	4	4	12	3	1	1	0.5

Of the 25 editors who responded to the question, 84% felt that a Journal should after a certain period of time from publication allow author’s to post or link articles on the internet, with an average of 0.5 years for view only and 0.5 years for article printing.

The internet policy that was proposed was a policy considered by my Journal and not a research question. Thus it was a complex question and not applicable to all Journals. 12 of 24 responding editors felt this was an acceptable policy, of the 12 editors who were not in favor of the policy, 4 indicated it was two restrictive and 3 others indicated their Journal already allowed full text viewing.

Part III Journal Policy on Article Distribution ** Go To TOP **

USA and CANADA
	Number	Yes	No	No Policy
Permission for Pub Med to Post Abstract	54	76%	6%	19%
Permission for Author to Post Abstract on Web Site	52	19%	33%	48%

Authors
To Send Articles by Mail	52	35%	27%	38%
To Send Articles by Fax	52	35%	27%	38%
To Send Articles by E-Mail	52	23%	31%	46%
To Post on Web View Only	49	14%	43%	43%
To Post on Web For Printing	51	20%	41%	39%

Libraries
To Send Articles by Mail	50	42%	26%	32%
To Send Articles by Fax	50	40%	28%	32%
To Send Articles by E-Mail	50	28%	30%	42%
To Post on Web View Only	48	21%	42%	38%
To Post on Web For Printing	50	24%	42%	34%


Other Countries
	Number	Yes	No	No Policy
Permission for Pub Med to Post Abstract	25	72%	0%	28%
Permission for Author to Post Abstract on Web Site	25	48%	16%	36%

Authors
To Send Articles by Mail	25	64%	20%	16%
To Send Articles by Fax	25	64%	20%	16%
To Send Articles by E-Mail	25	60%	24%	16%
To Post on Web View Only	25	36%	32%	32%
To Post on Web For Printing	25	36%	36%	28%

Libraries
To Send Articles by Mail	25	64%	24%	12%
To Send Articles by Fax	25	64%	24%	12%
To Send Articles by E-Mail	25	52%	24%	24%
To Post on Web View Only	25	40%	24%	36%
To Post on Web For Printing	25	36%	32%	32%