This journal is a fully open access journal, which means all articles are published as Gold Open Access under a Creative Commons licence. This enables anyone to access and redistribute the content and, depending upon the licence, re-use the content in new or derivative works with attribution. The terms of re-use for Gold Open Access content are stated in the copyright line of the article.
The Creative Commons licences offered by this journal for Gold Open Access articles are CC BY, CC BY-NC-SA, and CC BY-NC-ND.
Open Access Funding
Multiple funding routes for Gold Open Access publication are available to authors publishing in this journal:
- If the corresponding author of a research article is affiliated with an institution with which Cambridge University Press has an open access publishing agreement, in the majority of cases this will cover the full costs of publication (specific terms and conditions vary) and Cambridge will liaise directly with the institution to determine eligibility and secure this funding. Authors can use our eligibility checker to see if their institution has an active agreement.
- The Cambridge Open Equity Initiative (COEI) funds Gold Open Access publishing for authors from over 100 low- and middle-income countries, covering over 5,000 institutions. Eligibility is automatically established during the publication process and no Gold Open Access fees will be charged if the corresponding author of a research article is based in one of these countries.
- If the research behind the article was funded by a grant or arrangement with a funding body that supports the payment of article processing charges (APCs), authors are asked to pay an APC out of those funds. Please check the fees and pricing page for details of this journal’s charges, and our central APC page for further information such as APC refund policies.
- Authors from low- and middle-income countries who are not covered by an institutional open access agreement or the Cambridge Open Equity Initiative may be eligible for support under the Research4Life scheme. Corresponding authors of research articles based in 'Group A’ countries will automatically have APC costs waived entirely, and authors based in ‘Group B’ countries will automatically receive a 50% discount on an article’s APC.
- This journal also grants waivers on a discretionary basis, for authors who do not have funds available to pay an APC and are not covered by the options above. Authors must request a waiver at or before submission, before an article enters editorial consideration, by filling out a waiver request form.
Please note that the decision whether to accept a paper for publication will rest solely with the Editor, and without reference to the funding situation of the authors. The Editor, editorial board members, and reviewers will have no involvement with the billing of APCs and cannot grant discretionary waivers.
Article type waivers
No open access publishing fees will be charged for Editorial content, Epidemiology for Clinical Psychopharmacology papers, Epidemiology for Behavioural Neurosciences papers, or Contemporary Outsider Art papers.
Other routes to open access
Under this journal’s Green Open Access policy, authors can make pre-published versions of their articles available in institutional or other repositories, or on their personal or departmental websites, under certain conditions. This allows authors to comply with the open access mandates of many funders and institutions before the final article is published as Gold Open Access. For more information, please see Cambridge University Press’s Green Open Access policy page, where you can download a spreadsheet with full details about which versions of articles authors can post online, and where and when authors can post them.
If you have open access questions which are not answered by our policy pages and resources, please contact openresearch@cambridge.org.
Social Sharing
This journal participates in Cambridge Core Share, an initiative that allows a read-only version of a final published PDF (the Version of Record) to be shared and easily accessed by anyone. Core Share links, and Core Share PDFs containing the links, can be freely shared on social media sites and scholarly collaboration networks to enhance both the impact and discoverability of research.
Preprint policy
A preprint is an early version of an article prior to the version accepted for publication in a journal. This journal allows preprints to be posted anywhere at any time, including before submission to the journal. For more information, see the Cambridge University Press preprint policy.
Benefits of open access with Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences:
- Visibility: Articles are freely available online immediately upon publication, giving the potential for increased exposure and dissemination.
- Accessibility: Gold open access allows all readers with internet access around the world to access published research without having to pay for a subscription.
- Quality: All submissions will be fully peer-reviewed, with acceptance decisions being made by an international Editorial Board independently of the Publisher.
There are many stakeholders in the publication of research: the researchers, the users and the funders. Different stakeholders have different views but many accept the fact that if you want, for example, validation, proper copyediting, presentation, sustainability, functionality (usability, reference linking, usage information, discoverability, etc), then all this has to be paid for. Traditionally this payment has been made via subscriptions. In open access publishing, the payment is made up-front, via article processing charges (APCs). APCs can be seen as a fairer payment mechanism, provided that the costs on which the charges are based reflect accurately the services offered, and provided that the acceptance process is based on peer review, rather than financial considerations.
Open access can therefore provide an opportunity to relate costs more directly to the means of publication, and it can provide a mechanism for publication that preserves the best aspects of traditional publishing whilst offering greater ease of use and more liberal copyright and ownership. Moreover, APCs mean that costs are not being met by an ever-decreasing number of libraries that are willing to subscribe, and that the costs of publication are therefore being shared more fairly, while at the same time maximizing dissemination.
Finally, publishing is competitive: authors compete for journal space, publishers compete for papers and for library budgets. Open access and APCs are a viable alternative for those authors who want to bring closer together the decisions about where to publish and how to pay, decisions that are divorced in the traditional subscription-based model.