Open science practices in medical and nutrition journals

This study aims to evaluate the frequency and type of endorsement of reporting guidelines and other transparency and reproducibility practices among scientific journals in the fields of medicine and nutrition. A cross-sectional, observational, and descriptive design will be used, based on the analysis of editorial policies publicly available on journal websites. The sample will include all peer-reviewed journals classified in Q1 and Q2 of the Journal Citation Reports (JCR), within the categories Nutrition & Dietetics and Medicine, General & Internal. Data will be collected using a standardized extraction form by two independent reviewers and will include general journal characteristics and the presence and type of endorsement of practices such as reporting guidelines (e.g., CONSORT and PRISMA), data sharing, protocol registration, authorship transparency, ethical requirements, and other open science practices. The expected results include a comprehensive mapping of editorial policies, identifying the most and least frequently endorsed practices. The study will also compare journals in medicine and nutrition and explore whether journal characteristics are associated with greater endorsement of transparency and reproducibility practices. Overall, the findings are expected to highlight gaps and support improvements in editorial policies related to open science.