Sladen Blog

What Authors Need to Know About Preprints

In a previous blog post, we introduced you to the NIH Preprint Pilot project and covered some key points on defining preprints, locating preprints, and how preprints may affect your research. This post will touch upon some of the considerations that authors may want to be aware of when deciding whether or not to post a preprint of their manuscript to a preprint server.

Just to recap, preprints are public drafts of research manuscripts that have not been peer-reviewed. Some authors and researchers see value in preprints for providing rapid dissemination of research results (as evidenced throughout the COVID-19 pandemic), encouraging critical feedback from peers, establishing priority on findings, and even developing new collaborations between researchers. However, it’s important to remember that these works are not peer-reviewed and therefore may report flawed findings or contain poor quality research.

Let’s face it, research is hard. As an author you want to make good decisions around getting that hard work published in the best possible journal and letting the accolades roll in. Is going the preprint route right for you and your team? Here are some things to consider:

• Get the whole team on board. Depositing your work on a preprint server must be a group decision. Your co-authors may have some reservations about disseminating research without peer-review, especially with topics related to patient care that could potentially be harmful if flawed. This article provides some great tips for addressing preprint concerns among co-authors:

Ettinger CL, Sadanandappa MK, et al. A guide to preprinting for early-career researchers. Biol Open 15 July 2022; 11 (7): bio059310. doi: https://doi.org/10.1242/bio.059310

• Choosing a preprint server. There are a number of field-specific preprint servers currently in operation. ASAPbio provides a preprint server directory that highlights key features of each server. The most popular servers in the biomedical/health sciences fields are bioRxiv and medRxiv. Each server has specific rules for the types of content they will accept. For example, medRxiv’s purpose is to share the results of research studies in the health sciences, therefore they only accept original research articles, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses. Content such as case reports, narrative reviews, or editorials will not be accepted for inclusion. You should refer to the preprint server’s submission guidelines to avoid being declined.

While preprint servers do not do any type of peer-review, because of the sensitive nature of medical publications, medRxiv does do a brief screening process of submitted manuscripts. They run a basic check for offensive, non-scientific, or any content that does not meet ethical research standards. Also, because they cannot verify patient consent, any manuscripts containing photos or demographic information that could possibly identify an individual are rejected.

• Know journal policies regarding preprints. Some journals will not accept a manuscript that has been posted online as a preprint. There are a couple of resources that can help you discover a journal’s preprint policy such as Transpose and Sherpa Romeo—but be sure to double check the journal’s submission guidelines to verify straight from the source!

• Be prepared to choose a license for your preprint. Typically, authors retain the copyrights of preprints and can choose from a variety of Creative Commons licenses. However, keep in mind that the type of license you choose for your preprint can also affect journal acceptance down the road.

• Take care not to overlap submissions. It is standard policy that you do not submit the same manuscript at the same time to multiple journals for consideration. Think of preprint submission in a similar way. You can post a preprint manuscript to a server prior to journal submission, but never once the manuscript has been accepted by a journal or if it has already been published. The ICMJE (International Committee of Medical Journal Editors) provides more details on Overlapping Publications.

Most preprint servers will provide a DOI of the manuscript when it has been posted. It’s important to provide this information to a journal upon submitting your manuscript, or in the very least, notify the journal that a preprint has been made public. Furthermore, if your manuscript is accepted by a journal and ultimately published, it is your responsibility to indicate on the original preprint record that there is a published version. You can’t post the published version, of course, but supplying the link or DOI of the final version should cover it.

The decision to post your work to a preprint server should not be taken lightly. It’s important to be aware of both preprint server policies and journal submission policies because they can affect one another along the path to publication.  Ask yourself, what route will give your manuscript the greatest chance of success?