Technology is changing every aspect of our lives including how we study, experiment, and communicate. With its impacts on our communication and growth, technology is changing the landscape of the online research publication industry. Today, we can learn at a greater pace and share our learnings with others even faster.
If that wasn’t enough, the popularity of digital libraries has made research a bliss for researchers. Can you imagine the time you save when you don’t have to sift through tens of studies to reach the one relevant to your work? All you need to do now is to type the query and search using keywords.
Ask any researcher who has been working in the industry for more than a couple of decades and he will tell you how easy researching has become since the invasion of technology in academia and research industries. It’s not just reading past research, technology has changed every aspect of scientific research from ideation to collaboration and gathering data to submission. Heck, it has even added to the fields in every field of science; for example, health technology, agricultural technology, and the likes.
Study and Research
The most significant impact technology has made on the field of research and publications is by making research material accessible across borders and regions of origin. Today, the research and development industries work globally. A researcher in Europe can easily access work and ideas from a theorist in the Americas and other regions.
Previously, knowledge traveled slowly between regions and continents. People had to attend the institute and the teacher in person to learn new theories and concepts. Oftentimes, people brought these books with them making this knowledge transfer easier. Yet, this migration of books, journals, and resources was only as fast as the snail mail that carried them.
However, the advent of technology triggered a fast transfer of knowledge. Today, no published finding and development takes longer than a few seconds to reach readers in all corners of the world. This accessibility has allowed researchers from all parts of the world to learn and deepen their knowledge, building a foundation for ideation and development of better solutions.
Networking
No doubt, researchers can access new concepts and developments easily, nowadays. At the same time, they find it easy to share their thoughts and perspectives on different developments. Technology has made it easy for researchers to be loud about their interests and pursuits. They can share their ideas and inspirations.
In the end, based on these interests, they can connect with people of similar interests. The best part is that they don’t have to travel across oceans to meet and share their ideas. They can learn and connect with the experts from the ease of their homes. They can brainstorm ideas, critique others’ work, and get working feedback for their development. All these shared activities pave the way for efficient scientific knowledge creation.
Collaborating
With shared ideas and brainstorming across borders, researchers develop new theories and solutions efficiently. Interestingly, putting these theories to work is also easier than it was before. From enlisting colleagues for a research project to applying for relevant grants, technology has helped researchers in every resource-gathering endeavor.
Today, scholars from different countries work together to change the scientific landscape. They use team management tools and share ideas through encrypted channels. Mostly, these people are safeguarded against data theft and copyright issues because of the advanced software solutions for information security.
Not only that, but the real-time sharing of information allows for efficient progress of the research. The team can detect setbacks and work collectively to eliminate them as they arise. They can also incorporate major findings to change their hypothesis or to build new ones. In short, these projects can run smoothly over the digital interface like it would have done in person.
Submitting
Technology impacts every aspect of the research process, and that includes research paper and proposal submissions. So, whether you are developing your research question or have already concluded the findings, this technology will help you reach the right people to propel your work forward.
Make use of it to find the right grants and research funds so your research can see the light of the day. Or use AI-assisted data handling tools to find the perfect online research publication for your work. Once you have selected the right venue for your research, you will again rely on the same devices and gadgets to submit your paper or proposal and wait for a reply.
Communication and Feedback
While some journals prefer to publish only printed versions and then broadcast these periodicals on their websites as well, most modern journals are published online. Publishing journals online has become a necessity for most publications because this channel is more accessible and easy for readers.
As these readers mostly prefer to read the journals online, they tend to provide feedback via the same channel. Consequently, these researchers have to keep an eye on the reviews and comments from the readers in online forums and communities. Here, the technology adds a nuance of difficulty to the lives of these researchers who now have to remain in touch with the subject matter not only in the online world but also in the offline world.
Reviewing
While communicating and collaborating across screens have been around for some years in the research industry, people are only recently waking up to the idea of digital peer review. These are open reviews where both the reviewer and the researcher know about each other from the digitally published information. The reviews are only made by the experts in the field to maintain the quality of the reviewing process.
Note that this idea is not in common practice. However, online research publication are slowly moving towards accepting it to speed up their publishing process.
Wrapping Up
The research industry was influenced by technological developments in many ways. Today, researchers can investigate past studies effortlessly from their homes or offices. They don’t rely on libraries much because more of the scientific and research material is published online. Collaboration has become easy for all the involved parties and data collection has sped up with digital tools.
A recent development is happening in the reviewing process. Most online research publication are working towards open reviewing where subject matter experts will review and comment on published research. This process will be in stark contrast with the traditional peer-review method where publishing was only accomplished when the peers had reviewed the research.
