SocArXiv

{{Short description|Open archive of the social sciences}}

{{Infobox bibliographic database

| title = SocArXiv

| image = SocArXiv logo.jpg

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| country = United States

| history = 2016 to present

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| providers = Center for Open Science

| cost = Free

| disciplines = Social sciences, arts and humanities, education, law

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| formats = preprints, postprints, working papers

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| web = {{url|https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv}}

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SocArXiv is an online paper server for the social sciences founded by sociologist Philip N. Cohen in partnership with the non-profit Center for Open Science.{{cite web |last1=Cohen |first1=Philip |author-link1=Philip N. Cohen |title=Developing SocArXiv — a new open archive of the social sciences to challenge the outdated journal system. |url=https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2016/07/11/developing-socarxiv-an-open-archive-of-the-social-sciences/ |website=LSE Impact Blog |publisher=The London School of Economics and Political Science |access-date=6 December 2019 |date=11 July 2016}}{{cite web |last1=Chicoine |first1=Sarah |title=SocArXiv |url=https://giving.umd.edu/giving/fund.php?name=socarxiv |website=Giving to Maryland |publisher=University of Maryland |access-date=6 December 2019}} It is an open archive based on the ArXiv preprint server model used for the natural sciences, mathematics, and computer science.{{cite web|last1=Poynder|first1=Richard|title=Open and Shut?: SocArXiv debuts, as SSRN acquisition comes under scrutiny |url=https://poynder.blogspot.com/2016/07/socarxiv-debuts-as-ssrn-acquisition.html |website=Open and Shut? |access-date=19 October 2017 |date=19 July 2016}} The site describes itself as an "open archive of the social sciences, [which] provides a free, non-profit, open access platform for social scientists to upload working papers, preprints, and published papers, with the option to link data and code."{{cite web |title=SocArXiv |url=https://www.library.ucsb.edu/socarxiv |website=SocOpen |access-date=21 December 2020 |language=en |date=21 December 2020}} It also hosts papers in the areas of arts and humanities, education, and law.

The database was launched in 2016, shortly after the purchase of the Social Science Research Network by Elsevier, to meet "a need for a new general, open-access, open-source, paper server for the social sciences, one that encourages linking and sharing data and code, that serves its research to an open metadata system, and that provides the foundation for a post-publication review system." It was built of the Open Science Framework platform, initially as a program of the University of Maryland.{{cite web |last1=Cochran |first1=Angela |title=What Is SocArXiv? |url=https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2016/07/25/what-is-socarxiv/ |website=The Scholarly Kitchen |publisher=Society for Scholarly Publishing |access-date=6 December 2019 |date=25 July 2016}} In 2021, the University of Maryland Libraries became the institutional home of SocArXiv.{{cite web|title=University of Maryland Libraries becomes the institutional home of SocArXiv |url=https://www.lib.umd.edu/news/2021/05/socarxiv |website=UMD Libraries |access-date=1 June 2021 |date=5 May 2021}}

In addition to providing a forum for pre-publication papers as a matter of improving transparency and efficiency, Cohen has called for a central repository for peer-reviews of papers even when the reviews lead to the paper being declined for publication.{{cite web |last1=Flaherty |first1=Colleen |title=Peer Review's Give-and-Take |url=https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/10/24/maybe-there-isnt-peer-review-crisis-least-terms-quantity |website=Inside Higher Ed |access-date=9 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191109031415/https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/10/24/maybe-there-isnt-peer-review-crisis-least-terms-quantity |archive-date=9 November 2019 |date=24 October 2017 |url-status=live}}

As of May 2022, SocArXiv hosted more than 10,000 papers.{{cite web |title=SocArXiv |url=https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/discover |publisher=SocArXiv |access-date=5 May 2022 }}