Researcher alleges group stole thesis data presented at conference

A researcher in India has asked a journal to amend a retraction “for major errors in data” because, he says, the data weren’t wrong – they were stolen.

The October 2023 paper, “Prediction of Weaning Outcome from Mechanical Ventilation Using Ultrasound Assessment of Parasternal Intercostal Muscle Thickness,” was originally published in the Indian Journal of Critical Care Medicine (IJCCM). The journal is published by JP Medical, and is indexed in Clarviate’s Web of Science. 

The undated retraction statement says the authors “wish to withdraw the article . . . due to major errors in data.” The DOI no longer links to the article, and the full text is no longer available online. 

In a letter to the editor published Nov. 30, 2024 in IJCCM, researcher Sundara Kannan alleged the authors stole his data. 

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‘Foolish mistake’: Guest editor loses three articles published in his own special issues

An Elsevier journal has pulled three articles after the publisher determined an author had been “involved in the peer review and decision making” as managing guest editor of the special issues in which they appeared. 

The author, botany researcher Vijay Kumar of Lovely Professional University in Punjab, India, told Retraction Watch his apparent involvement in assigning reviewers was “purely unintentional” and a “foolish mistake.” 

Two of the articles appeared in a special issue section of the South African Journal of Botany in 2022. They were:

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More than three decades after misconduct ruling, researcher’s IQ test paper is retracted

A psychology journal has retracted an article on IQ tests nearly 50 years after publication — and more than 35 years after an investigation found the lead author had fabricated data in several other studies. 

Stephen Breuning, a former assistant professor of child psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh, gained notoriety after a 1987 National Institute of Mental Health report found that he “knowingly, willfully, and repeatedly engaged in misleading and deceptive practices in reporting results of research.” The report concluded Breuning had “engaged in serious scientific misconduct” by fabricating results in 10 articles funded by NIMH grants. 

Five of Breuning’s articles published in the 1980s have been retracted; three in the 1980s, one in 2022, and another in 2023. Retraction Watch reported on one of them, “Effects of methylphenidate on the fixed-ratio performance of mentally retarded children,” published in 1983 in Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior (now published by Elsevier) and retracted in 2022. 

The newly retracted article predates those papers. Published in 1978 in the Journal of School Psychology,  “Effects of individualized incentives on norm-referenced IQ test performance of high school students in special education classes,” found record albums, sporting event tickets, portable radios, and other incentives boosted scores on IQ tests. 

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Weekend reads: Retraction counts by country; ‘zombie facts;’ false allegations fell president

Dear RW readers, can you spare $25?

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 450. There are more than 50,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 300 titles. And have you seen our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions lately — or our list of top 10 most highly cited retracted papers? What about The Retraction Watch Mass Resignations List — or our list of nearly 100 papers with evidence they were written by ChatGPT?

Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):

Continue reading Weekend reads: Retraction counts by country; ‘zombie facts;’ false allegations fell president

Who you calling ‘bignose’? Shark paper corrected after species mix-up

Bignose shark
NWFblogs/Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

A case of mistaken identity among sharks has led to a correction that changed, among other content, an article’s title, its abstract and the discussion section. 

The paper, published in February 2024 in Environmental Biology of Fishes, was originally titled “Expanded vertical niche for two species of pelagic sharks: depth range extension for the dusky shark Carcharhinus obscurus and novel twilight zone occurrence by the silky shark Carcharhinus falciformi.” 

But after re-examining the data, the authors concluded: “the dusky shark from the published paper was misidentified, and instead, it is most likely a bignose shark,” according to an October 2024 correction to the article.

Continue reading Who you calling ‘bignose’? Shark paper corrected after species mix-up

Pair of management papers retracted for similarities to earlier work

Two management journals from the same publisher have retracted a pair of articles for taking “models, samples, and results” from each other and earlier work. 

A tip from an anonymous account sent in November to Retraction Watch, sleuth Elisabeth Bik, and others called out duplications in the papers. Bik then posted the two articles on PubPeer in November 2024, noting several identical sets of tables between the papers, despite the works investigating survey data on different topics from different populations — intention to leave among employees from the hospitality sector, and resistance to change among managers at private organizations.

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Sage slaps more than 100 papers from one journal with expressions of concern

The Sage journal American Surgeon has issued a mass expression of concern for 116 articles. 

The expression of concern states the journal “was made aware” of “concerning author activity” on the articles.

Sage is no stranger to mass editorial actions. In 2023, the publisher pulled large tranches of papers at least three times, and last year it retracted over 450 papers from a journal the company had acquired from IOS Press. The publisher was one of the first to begin retracting papers in bulk, primarily to combat manipulated peer review. 

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‘Still angry’: Chemist finds his name on a study he didn’t write

Last October, Martin McPhillie, a lecturer in organic chemistry at the UK’s University of Leeds, received an email alert from his institution about a new article bearing his name. 

The article, “Docking Study of Licensed Non-Viral Drugs to Obtain Ebola Virus Inhibitors,” appeared in the Journal of Biochemical Technology, a title of Istanbul, Turkey-based Deniz Publication. The journal is not indexed in Clarivate’s Web of Science database. 

The study was within McPhillie’s area of expertise, and aligned with work he and the other listed coauthors had previously published. But he knew the new study wasn’t his. 

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Weekend reads: ‘Lack of informed consent’ in DNA data; protecting the ‘prey’ of predatory journals; another ivermectin-COVID-19 retraction

Dear RW readers, can you spare $25?

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 450. There are more than 50,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 300 titles. And have you seen our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions lately — or our list of top 10 most highly cited retracted papers? What about The Retraction Watch Mass Resignations List — or our list of nearly 100 papers with evidence they were written by ChatGPT?

Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):

Continue reading Weekend reads: ‘Lack of informed consent’ in DNA data; protecting the ‘prey’ of predatory journals; another ivermectin-COVID-19 retraction

The 14 universities with publication metrics researchers say are too good to be true

Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences

More than a dozen universities have used “questionable authorship practices” to inflate their publication metrics, authors of a new study say. One university even saw an increase in published articles of nearly 1,500% in the last four years. 

The study, published January 5 in Quantitative Science Studies, “intends to serve as a starting point for broader discussions on balancing the pressures of global competition with maintaining ethical standards in research productivity and authorship practice,” study authors Lokman Meho and Elie Akl, researchers at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon, told Retraction Watch. 

Continue reading The 14 universities with publication metrics researchers say are too good to be true