There are a number of places to find open access articles. These are a sample of some of the more common sources for open access journals and articles:
You can read more about open access scholarship at the links below:
When we talk about open access scholarship, what do we mean? Open access means that anybody is able to access the article, regardless of their institutional affiliation or purchasing ability. Traditional scholarship is usually only accessible either via an institutional log-in, journal subscription, or through direct single-article purchase.
Open access scholarship is part of a broader movement within higher education to make access to information more equitable. The arguments for open access differ. For some, the argument is that public funds often support research, so the results should be made publicly available. For others, the argument is that journals, usually, do not pay researchers for their articles, but rather, researchers pay to have their articles published, so they don't believe that journals should profit off the articles. There are many compelling reasons to support open access. Choosing to publish an article as open access usually increases the publication fees for the author(s).
Some journals publish only "closed" scholarship while others are dedicated to open access publication. The third type are considered "hybrid journals" - they publish both open access articles (with an article publication charge) and those that require a subscription, institutional access, or an individual payment to access.
Articles being published in a hybrid journal can cause confusion in the database. In some cases, it can make it appear as though YU provides access to articles that it, in fact, doesn't. This is because our Discovery search engine has open access indexing that makes open access articles discoverable for you! The algorithm isn't perfect, however, and articles published with "closed access" in a hybrid journal, which may be picked up by the open access algorithm, may appear in your Discovery search results. If this happens, please email svansickle@yorkvilleu.ca or another member of the library team.