Open science is a topic for all researchers, but can have a particular impact for mental health researchers.
It can seem like a bit of a buzz word that is increasingly used. But what does it mean and what practices should you follow as a mental health researcher? When it comes to the mental health field, making your research available to all can mean an even bigger impact. The big question is how do you actually do it?
This post was originally on the Mental Health Research Matters blog and has come to live on our site. There are three main resources here which are a great starting point when considering your options for making your research more open, or for finding others who have made their research and all it involves accessible to all.
They are:
- An article by Emily Farran et al who have produced a massive piece of work covering practices for making research available in many fields, including medical sciences, psychology, sociology and for qualitative studies methods. “Open Research: Examples of good practice, and resources across disciplines”.
- A working document by Sam Parsons and Zoe Catchpole which provides a compendium of papers, websites and training suggestions for open science practices within mental health research specifically. Open and Reproducible Research – Resources for MH networks
- UNESCO has recently released a recommendation for the first international standard which is definitely worth checking over: UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science | UNESCO
For the original Mental Health Research Matters post, the open research community were extremely generous in recommending many of these resources and deserve thanks. In particular, Emily Farran, who shared a working draft of her paper.
Do you have experience following open science practices within your research and have any resources to share? If so please do let us let us know/tag us in on Twitter/X @MHRIncubator