Discovery and scholarly communication aspects of preprints: Sources for online information

Abstract

Preprints are not a 21st-century invention, but there has been a considerable uptick in the creation of preprint repositories and the attention to the role that preprints play in open science. Note, the definitions of preprint have evolved over time, lack consensus, and vary in terminology used across disciplines. For the purposes of this article, we will be referring to a preprint as a version of a manuscript that is self-archived and shared publicly before publication in a scholarly journal. The status of a preprint can exist at several points on the scholarly continuum including, but not limited to, an author’s early draft, a submitted manuscript under review, or an accepted manuscript.