Fraser, Nicholas. “The Evolving Role of Preprints in the Dissemination of COVID-19 Research and Their Impact on the Science Communication Landscape.” PLOS Biology, Public Library of Science, 2 Apr. 2021, journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article/figure?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.3000959.t002. Accessed 25 Feb. 2025.
Abstract Overview
“The world continues to face a life-threatening viral pandemic. The virus underlying the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2
(SARS-CoV-2), has caused over 98 million confirmed cases and 2.2 million deaths since
January 2020. Although the most recent respiratory viral pandemic swept the globe only a
decade ago, the way science operates and responds to current events has experienced a
cultural shift in the interim. The scientific community has responded rapidly to the COVID-19
pandemic, releasing over 125,000 COVID-19–related scientific articles within 10 months of
the first confirmed case, of which more than 30,000 were hosted by preprint servers. We
focused our analysis on bioRxiv and medRxiv, 2 growing preprint servers for biomedical
research, investigating the attributes of COVID-19 preprints, their access and usage rates,
as well as characteristics of their propagation on online platforms. Our data provide evi
dence for increased scientific and public engagement with preprints related to COVID-19
(COVID-19 preprints are accessed more, cited more, and shared more on various online
platforms than non-COVID-19 preprints), as well as changes in the use of preprints by jour
nalists and policymakers. We also find evidence for changes in preprinting and publishing
behavior: COVID-19 preprints are shorter and reviewed faster. Our results highlight the
unprecedented role of preprints and preprint servers in the dissemination of COVID-19 science and the impact of the pandemic on the scientific communication landscape.”