Journal Article: “Examining Linguistic Shifts Between Preprints and Publications” & Preprint Similarity Search Application Now Available
The article linked below was recently published by PLOS Biology.
Title
Examining Linguistic Shifts Between Preprints and Publications
Authors
David N. Nicholson
Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
Vincent Rubinetti
Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
University of Colorado School of Medicine
Dongbo Hu
Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
Marvin Thielk
Elsevier
Lawrence E. Hunter
University of Colorado School of Medicine
Casey S. Greene
Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
University of Colorado School of Medicine
Source
PLOS Biology
20(2): e3001470.
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001470
Abstract
Preprints allow researchers to make their findings available to the scientific community before they have undergone peer review. Studies on preprints within bioRxiv have been largely focused on article metadata and how often these preprints are downloaded, cited, published, and discussed online. A missing element that has yet to be examined is the language contained within the bioRxiv preprint repository. We sought to compare and contrast linguistic features within bioRxiv preprints to published biomedical text as a whole as this is an excellent opportunity to examine how peer review changes these documents. The most prevalent features that changed appear to be associated with typesetting and mentions of supporting information sections or additional files. In addition to text comparison, we created document embeddings derived from a preprint-trained word2vec model. We found that these embeddings are able to parse out different scientific approaches and concepts, link unannotated preprint–peer-reviewed article pairs, and identify journals that publish linguistically similar papers to a given preprint. We also used these embeddings to examine factors associated with the time elapsed between the posting of a first preprint and the appearance of a peer-reviewed publication. We found that preprints with more versions posted and more textual changes took longer to publish.
Lastly, we constructed a web application that allows users to identify which journals and articles that are most linguistically similar to a bioRxiv or medRxiv preprint as well as observe where the preprint would be positioned within a published article landscape.
Direct to Full Text Article
Filed under: Elsevier, Journal Articles, News, Open Access, Patrons and Users, PLOS

About Gary Price
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.