A Study of Research Data Practices of Highly Ranked Journals Contributing to Sustainable Development Goals

All the countries are making efforts to attain the United Nations Sustainable Development Goalsby 2030. To foster reproducibility and promote the sustainability of research and scholarly communication, many institutions, publishers/journals have been adopting research data policies to support Open Science initiatives. Authors are being encouraged to share their research data to publish articles thus, scholarly journals are playing a vital role in such a process. The present study analyses the research data policies of the journals supporting Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To understand how the journals are following the data sharing policies, 12 top journals were selected supporting each goal. Information available on their website regarding research data policy, research data, and data availability are used and analyzed in this study. The results of the study show that only two journals follow ten or more research data policy features out of 12 features discussed in the study. However, nine journals are following eight or more than eight research data policyfeatures. The researchers designed a short questionnaire to collect the insights of authors under the study about research data-sharing practices followed in their articles published in the selected journals during the years 2021 and 2022. From the feedback of the authors, it is evident that researchers understand the value of sharing research data, but simplification of procedures in curation and sharing is crucial. Further, the results indicate that, there is a need for rigorous research data literacy to motivate authors to store, curate, and share research data to support Open Science.