Category: studies about retractions

Cell, Nature, Science boycott: What was Randy Schekman’s tenure at PNAS like?

Randy Schekman, via eLife
Randy Schekman, via eLife

By now, Retraction Watch readers may have heard about new Nobel laureate Randy Schekman’s pledge to boycott Cell, Nature, and Science — sometimes referred to the “glamour journals” — because they damage and distort science. Schekman has used the bully pulpit of the Nobels to spark a conversation that science dearly needs to have about the cult of the impact factor.

The argument isn’t airtight. Schekman — now editor of eLife, an open access journal — says that open access journals are a better way to go, although he doesn’t really connect mode of publishing with the quality of what’s published. Others have pointed out that the move will punish junior members of his lab while likely having no effect on the career of someone who has published dozens of studies in the three journals he’s criticizing, and has, well, won a Nobel.

All that aside, it was Schekman’s reference to retractions that, not surprisingly, caught our eye: Continue reading Cell, Nature, Science boycott: What was Randy Schekman’s tenure at PNAS like?

Weekend reads: Stapel as an object lesson, peer review’s flaws, and salami slicing

booksIt’s been another busy week at Retraction Watch. Here’s a sampling of scientific publishing and misconduct news from around the web: Continue reading Weekend reads: Stapel as an object lesson, peer review’s flaws, and salami slicing

Should scientific misconduct be handled by the police? It’s fraud week at Nature and Nature Medicine

naturemed1213It’s really hard to get papers retracted, police might be best-equipped to handle scientific misconduct investigations, and there’s finally software that will identify likely image manipulation.

Those are three highlights from a number of pieces that have appeared in Nature and Nature Medicine in the past few weeks. Not surprisingly, there are common threads, so join us as we follow the bouncing ball. Continue reading Should scientific misconduct be handled by the police? It’s fraud week at Nature and Nature Medicine

“Why Growing Retractions Are (Mostly) a Good Sign”: New study makes the case

Daniele Fanelli
Daniele Fanelli

Retraction Watch readers will no doubt be familiar with the fact that retraction rates are rising, but one of the unanswered questions has been whether that increase is due to more misconduct, greater awareness, or some combination of the two.

In a new paper in PLOS Medicine, Daniele Fanelli, who has studied misconduct and related issues, tries to sift through the evidence. Noting that the number of corrections has stayed constant since 1980, Fanelli writes that: Continue reading “Why Growing Retractions Are (Mostly) a Good Sign”: New study makes the case

Weekend reads: China’s scientific publishing black market, how to blow the whistle, and more

booksIt’s been a busy week here at Retraction Watch, with breaking news about hotly debated papers from Nature and about GMOs, but there have been interesting stories about retractions and scientific misconduct elsewhere, too. Here’s a sampling:
Continue reading Weekend reads: China’s scientific publishing black market, how to blow the whistle, and more

P values: Scientific journals’ top ten plagiarism euphemisms

labtimes1113The other day, we nominated a phrase in a retraction notice for the prize “of most-extra-syllables-used-to-say-the-word-plagiarism” because a journal decided to call the act “inclusion of significant passages of unattributed material from other authors.”

That lovely phrase can now be added to our list of best euphemisms for plagiarism, which we highlight in our most recent column for LabTimes. There, you’ll find such gems as “unattributed overlap,” “a significant originality issue,” an “approach,” and an “administrative error.”

As we write: Continue reading P values: Scientific journals’ top ten plagiarism euphemisms

Want to report a case of plagiarism? Here’s how

ethics and behaviorIf you’ve come across a case of plagiarism and want to report it to the proper authorities, a new article in the journal Ethics & Behavior would be a good place to start.

Mark Fox, a professor of management and entrepreneurship at Indiana University, and Jeffrey Beall, a librarian at the University of Colorado, Denver, known for Beall’s List of questionable publishers, teamed up for the article. As they write in their abstract: Continue reading Want to report a case of plagiarism? Here’s how

Doing the right thing: Scientists reward authors who report their own errors, says study

scientificreportsWe’ve always like to highlight cases in which scientists do the right thing and retract problematic papers themselves, rather than being forced to by editors and publishers. Apparently, according to a new paper by economists and management scholars, scientists reward that sort of behavior, too.

The study by Benjamin Jones of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and the National Bureau of Economic Research and colleagues, “The Retraction Penalty: Evidence from the Web of Science,” was published yesterday in Scientific Reports, a Nature Publishing Group title.

The authors lay out what they do: Continue reading Doing the right thing: Scientists reward authors who report their own errors, says study

Do authors who retract papers end up cited less often? Depends how eminent you are

matthew
St. Matthew, by Frans Hals, via Wikimedia

A picture of the downstream effects of retractions is starting to emerge.

In a new working paper, economists at the University of Maryland, the University of Rochester, and Northwestern University focused on work by teams of scientists. Their main findings: Continue reading Do authors who retract papers end up cited less often? Depends how eminent you are