Network
NW 12. Open Research in Education
Title
Openness as a professional negotiation: How are Open Research Agendas advancing across Europe?
Abstract
As in many other research domains, educational research in Europe is increasingly shaped by policies and recommendations promoting openness, collaboration, transparency and reuse (Dai et al., 2018; De-Filippo et al., 2023). Yet, the translation of Open Research agendas into practice is uneven across national and disciplinary contexts, particularly where research practices are situated, relational and ethically charged. This Special Call asks how Open Research agendas are enacted across European educational research contexts and, crucially, what lies between policy ambitions and everyday practices. We further propose understanding this space as one of professional negotiation, where openness intersects with disciplinary cultures, ethical responsibilities, infrastructures, institutional support, skills, incentives and researchers’ professional conditions and agency.
The Call
Since early debates on electronic publishing and Open Access, openness has expanded towards a broader transformation of research processes (United Nations, 2021). European and international policies increasingly promote transparency, accessibility, collaboration and reuse as principles of responsible research (Owen et al., 2012; Dai et al., 2018). Open Research now encompasses publications, data, methods, software, peer review, metrics and participatory research, becoming established in research policy and discourse (van Der Zee & Reich, 2018; Svecnik & Krammer, 2026).
Yet policy consolidation does not imply uniform implementation (Pampel & Dallmeier-Tiessen, 2013). Open Research advances unevenly across countries, institutions and disciplines. While Open Access publishing has become increasingly mainstream, other practices require substantial transformations of researchers’ everyday work. Disciplinary norms, infrastructures, professional socialisation, institutional support and career incentives shape these developments (De-Filippo et al., 2023; Nicholas et al., 2017).
Open Research Data offers a revealing case. Although data sharing promises transparency, reproducibility and reuse, research data cannot simply be made open by default (Raffaghelli & Manca, 2022). Data practices differ across domains and methodologies, while data publication remains less established than Open Access publishing (Borgman, 2018). Researchers must negotiate consent, privacy, ownership, documentation, infrastructures, skills and responsibilities. Even researchers endorsing openness may restrict data sharing and reuse, suggesting that openness constitutes a situated professional negotiation rather than an individual disposition (Littlejohn et al., 2026).
These tensions are particularly relevant to educational research, a heterogeneous field encompassing diverse disciplinary traditions, methodologies and epistemologies (Deleye et al., 2025). Educational data are often relational, context-dependent and sensitive, especially when involving children, vulnerable populations and institutional settings (Logan et al., 2024). Opening educational research consequently raises epistemological, ethical, organisational and professional questions (Steltenpohl et al., 2024). Moreover, Open Science may challenge epistemic pluralism when particular standards become dominant (Leonelli, 2022), while potentially fostering more inclusive understandings of scientific practice.
This Special Call invites empirical, comparative, conceptual, infrastructural and policy-oriented contributions examining how Open Research agendas are translated into educational research across European contexts. We particularly welcome presentations addressing:
• National and cross-national Open Research policies, strategies and their implementation in educational research;
• Institutional and disciplinary adoption, mainstreaming, resistance and uneven development of openness;
• Researchers’ engagement with Open Access, Open Research Data, open methods, peer review and supporting infrastructures;
• Professional learning, skills, incentives, research assessment and institutional conditions facilitating or constraining openness;
• Ethical, epistemological and methodological tensions, including situated experiences, practices and professional negotiations around openness.
The call seeks to understand not merely whether Open Research is advancing in European educational research, but how, where and under which conditions openness becomes possible as research practice. Particular attention is given to the uneven development of Open Research agendas and the relationship between policy expectations and situated research cultures.
Authors presenting on this topic at ECER 2027 are invited to submit their papers to JORE – Journal of Open Research in Education, associated with Network 12.
Contact Person(s)
Juliana E. Raffaghelli, University of Padua – juliana.raffaghelli(at)unipd.it ; Erich Svecnik, erich.svecnik(at)iqs.gv.at
References
Borgman, C. L. (2018). Open data, grey data, and stewardship: Universities at the privacy frontier. Berkeley Technology Law Journal, 33(2), 365–412. https://doi.org/10.15779/Z38B56D489
Dai, Q., Shin, E., & Smith, C. (2018). Open and inclusive collaboration in science. OECDScience, Technology and Industry Policy Papers, 7, 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1787/2dbff737-en
De-Filippo, D., Lascurain-Sánchez, M.-L., & Sánchez, F. (2023). Mapping open science at Spanish universities. Analysis of higher education systems. Profesional de la Información, 32(4). https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2023.jul.06
Deleye, M., Carmona, C., Ciolan, L., Dovigo, F., Figueiredo, M., Grell, P., Schindler, C. & Honerød Hoveid, M. (2025). Mapping European educational research: Insights from topic modelling of ECER abstracts. European Educational Research Journal, 24(5), 614-638. doi: 10.1177/1474904251346817
Leonelli S. Open Science and Epistemic Diversity: Friends or Foes? Philosophy of Science. 2022;89(5):991-1001. https://doi.org/10.1017/psa.2022.45
Littlejohn, A., Durán Del Fierro, F., Kennedy, E., & Chisholm, L. (2026).Professional work in an era of FAIR data sharing: Vulnerabilities, negotiations and sacrifice.Journal of Workplace Learning, 38(6), 529–545. https://doi.org/10.1108/JWL-07-2025-0241
Logan, J.A.R., Hayward, A.L., Swanz, L.E. et al. Education researchers’ beliefs and barriers towards data sharing. Qual Quant 59, 4061–4075 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-025-02188-6
Owen, R., Macnaghten, P., & Stilgoe, J. (2012). Responsible research and innovation: From science in society to science for society, with society. Science and Public Policy, 39(6), 751–760. https://doi.org/10.1093/scipol/scs093
Pampel, H., & Dallmeier-Tiessen, S. (2013).Open Research Data: From Vision to Practice. In S. Bartling & S. Friesike (Eds.), Opening Science: The Evolving Guide on How the Internet is Changing Research, Collaboration and Scholarly Publishing (pp. 213–224). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-00026-8_2
Raffaghelli, J. E., & Manca, S. (2023). Exploring the social activity of open research data on ResearchGate: Implications for the data literacy of researchers. Online Information Review, 47(1), 197–217. https://doi.org/10.1108/OIR-05-2021-0255
Steltenpohl, C. N., Lustick, H., Meyer, M. S., Lee, L. E., Stegenga, S. M., Reyes, L. S., & Renbarger, R. L. (2023). Rethinking Transparency and Rigor from a Qualitative Open Science Perspective. Journal of Trial & Error, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.36850/mr7
Svecnik, E., Krammer, G. Open Data in educational research: Possibilities, challenges, and reflections. Z f Bildungsforsch (2026). https://doi.org/10.1007/s35834-026-00565-1
Van Der Zee, T. & Reich, J. (2018). Open Education Science. AERA Open, 4(3), 2332858418787466. https://doi.org/10.1177/2332858418787466
United Nations (2021). UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science. Paris: UNESCO. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000379949.locale=en