OpenPsych


OpenPsych is a publisher of three open-access scientific journals on behavioural genetics, psychology, and quantitative research in sociology. The websites describe themselves as open peer reviewed journals, but the qualifications and biases of the reviewers have been disputed. OpenPsych has been described as a "pseudoscience factory-farm" and "academically dodgy".

History

The OpenPsych journals Open Differential Psychology, Open Behavioral Genetics, and Open Quantitative Sociology & Political Science were set up by Emil O.W. Kirkegaard and Davide Piffer in March 2014. Members of the "review teams" include Gerhard Meisenberg, Heiner Rindermann, Peter Frost, John Fuerst, Kenya Kura, Bryan J. Pesta, Noah Carl and Meng Hu.

Criticism

The quality of peer review at OpenPsych has been disputed. Reviewers "are not required to hold advanced academic qualifications", nor need to specialise in what they review. For example, Kirkegaard reviews papers submissions to two of the journals, but has only a BA in linguistics, claiming he is entirely "self-taught". Most of the reviewers are also authors of articles in the same group of journals.
OpenPsych has also published articles supporting scientific racism, and several members of its editorial board hold far-right political views and have attended the controversial London Conference on Intelligence. The Southern Poverty Law Center, in an article discussing proponents of scientific racism including Emil Kirkegaard, describes OpenPsych as a "pseudojournal". Kirkegaard is regarded by the Centre for Analysis of Radical Right to be a "figure on the radical right fringe".

Controversies

OKCupid

In May 2016, Kirkegaard with Julius Daugbjerg Bjerrekær published a paper in Open Differential Psychology that includes the data of nearly 70,000 OkCupid users, such as their intimate sexual details. The publication was widely criticised at the time and been described as "without a doubt one of the most grossly unprofessional, unethical and reprehensible data releases." Although Kirkegaard claims the data is public, this is disputed by others who point out the data is restricted to logged-in users only:
Kirkegaard uploaded the OkCupid data to the Open Science Framework, but this was later removed after OkCupid filed a Digital Millennium Copyright Act complaint.

Noah Carl

In April 2019, Noah Carl who reviews submissions for Open Quantitative Sociology & Political Science was dismissed as a research fellow at St Edmund’s College, Cambridge University because of his controversial association with OpenPsych, that included collaborating with a number of individuals who are known to hold racist and far-right political views: