Introduction: Open Science (OS) is a movement within the field of science to enable the free
accessibility of honestly generated and truthful scientific research possessing the capabilities of
reproducibility and re-use with the input of and benefit for all stakeholders of science.
Purpose: The purpose of this masters dissertation it to investigate the ethical benefits and
implications of OS and its impact on scientific research and the nature of scholarly communication
and publishing with regards to its position within the open access (OA) movement and relation to
research ethics.
Method: Qualitative desk research in the form of a thematic analysis to analyse semantic and latent
themes within data with specific keywords, sourced from the CityLibrary search tool, the Library and
Information Science and Technologies Abstract (LISTA) database and Web of Science database.
Findings: There are numerous benefits of OS built on the cornerstone of openness of the entire
research lifecycle. From it stems ethical principles of transparency, reproducibility and collaborative
research efforts. But these ethical benefits and their processes themselves pose ethical implications
such as privacy, authorship and bias, as well as practical implications such as the development and
implementation of infrastructures and policies and who will carry the burden of cost.
Conclusion: OS has the potential to enact a culture change with scientific research, but not without
addressing key barriers to change. More research is needed to decipher the workings of suggested
OS practices in their role to benefit research dissemination and usher in the second scientific
revolution.