abstract
- © 2017, University of La Laguna. All rights reserved.Introduction: scientific knowledge is essential for development; open access journals and online social networks are potential enablers for its access. The objective of this research was to analyze to what extend open access journal are using social media tools as communication channels. Method: from a quantitative approach, 3,448 open access journals indexed on Scopus. Results and conclusions: A) 14.4% of journals has at least one online social network profile linked with its official Website; B) there is a significant difference between the proportion of first quartile journals (Q1) using online social networks and the rest of journals (Q2, Q3 and Q4). First quartile journals also report a larger number of social followers. These results allow us to identify an important opportunity area around using online social networks and open access journals as scientific knowledge disseminator tools.