Abstract:
The study investigated Usage of open access journals by academicians in Ethiopian selected public
higher learning institutions. Wolaita Sodo University and Haramaya University were the selected
universities among thirty five Ethiopian public higher learning institutions. Questionnaire was used
to collect data from academic staffs that were randomly selected using stratified simple random
sampling from a population of academicians having academic rank above assistance lecturers in the
two universities. Also semi structured interview involving respondents among librarians was
conducted. Descriptive statistics (frequencies, percentages, mean and standard deviation) and
inferential statistics (T-test, one way ANOVA and Ordinary least square model) were used for data
analysis. Data was interpreted and discussed with support of appropriate statistics and in relation to
the information in the literature review. The findings of this study revealed that majority of the
respondents have awareness about open access journals and most of them used open access journals
to access scholarly information rather than disseminate their research output. Majority of the
respondents were informed about open access journals informally through colleagues rather than
institutionalized organs such as libraries especially in WSU respondents. The findings of this study
also revealed that the academicians in public universities involved in this study rated social
influence, Internet self-efficiency, facilitating conditions, perceptions and performance expectation of
open access journals as strong determinants of their decisions to use open access journals. From the
finding and general comment obtained from respondents many respondents highly welcomed the idea
of open access publishing, OA policy, and the establishment of advanced institutional repositories as
a way of improving the accessing and dissemination of research output originating from their
respective universities. The study concluded that even though less publishing in open access journals
by many academicians in the public universities in Ethiopia, the fact that majority of the respondents
was expectant of publishing in such outlet in future implies good prospects for future development of
open access journal usage in such universities. To the end, researcher recommended that
implementing developed Framework thoroughly will lead to enhanced use of open access journals by
academicians from local and worldwide disseminated research outputs.
