Register your project and make your research visible

When you preregister your research, you provide details about your research plan and register it in a data repository or a public platform before you conduct your study. Preregistration is a part of Open Science.

Why should you preregister your research?

• Avoid unnecessary duplication of research by being able to see if similar studies are being planned/conducted or have been conducted.
• Create partnerships by being able to see other researchers who are planning and conducting studies in your subject area.
• Counteract publication bias by allowing studies that do not show the desired results to be visible regardless of whether they will finally be published or not.
• Preregistration makes deviations from the original research plan visible and prevents the hypothesis from being changed and adapted afterwards to the results.

Clinical trials

With regard to clinical trials, several research funding bodies such as the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) require that preregistration is done. Also, the International Committee of Medical Journals Editors (ICMJE) require that clinical trials are registered before they commence so that the results from the studies can be considered for publication in journals.

MDU has an account in the Clinical Trials Registry database. FSI (The Division of Research, Collaboration and Innovation support) can provide you with more information and assist you with registration in the Clinical Trials Registry

Literature reviews

Literature reviews such as systematic reviews and scoping reviews should be based on a pre-established study protocol. To assist you in the design of this please have a look at Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) and Reporting standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses (ROSES).

Data repository and platforms for preregistration

Prospero

In Prospero, you can register study protocols for systematic reviews, rapid reviews, and umbrella reviews, in healthcare, care, and medicine.

Open Science Framework (OSF)

Open Science Framework is an archive for preprints, datasets, and research outputs. Here you can search for already registered projects or register your own. You can register outputs on OSF for different types of studies, including literature reviews. You can also register studies with an embargo period, i.e. that the output won’t be visible before a specific time.

Figshare

Figshare is an archive for preprints, datasets, and research outputs. Here you can search for already registered projects or register your own. You can register research outputs on Figshare for different types of studies, including literature reviews.

Registered reports

A registered report is a type of journalistic article where the data collection methods and proposed ways of analysing the data are preregistered and peer-reviewed before the study is conducted.

Open Science Framework has compiled a list of which journals it is possible to publish reports, see link to the right on this page for further reading.

Why should you publish your research output as a registered report?

As well as the advantages listed above the following can also be added:

• The study is subjected to a peer-review already before it has been conducted and thereby can be improved based on the comments from the reviewers.
• If your report has been accepted by the journal it implies that in most cases the final study will be accepted for publishing regardless of the outcome of the study.
• The registered report is a publication and can be recognised as such and added to your CV.