A journal has retracted a 45-year-old case study over concerns that the authors had failed to obtain proper informed consent from the family they’d described. The article, “Stickler syndrome report of a second Australian family,” appeared in Pediatric Radiology, a Springer Nature title, in 1975. The first author was Kazimierz Kozlowski, a prominent radiologist who … Continue reading Why did a journal suddenly retract a 45-year-old paper over lack of informed consent?
A paper on how the Koran anticipated the discovery of the Higgs Boson — aka the “God particle” — has been hit with an expression of concern. The article, “God particles in the perspective of The AlQuran Surah Yunus: 61 and modern science,” appeared in the Journal of Physics: Conference Series, which in 2017 published … Continue reading A physics paper claimed the Koran had predicted the discovery of the Higgs Boson. Now it has an expression of concern.
Science represents perhaps the single greatest accomplishment of humankind. Of all human institutions, organisations and establishments, science has proven an effective tool for driving progress. It is inherently self-correcting, and tolerates — and even demands — skepticism, challenge and self-critique. Few human institutions can make a similar claim. However, there is increasing recognition and concern that … Continue reading Better (publishing) background checks: A way toward greater integrity in science
Date of Change Field Change Reason 7/13/2020 Reasons add: Transfer of Copyright/Ownership To indicate when a retraction is made solely for a change in copyright or ownership of material. Commonly seen when books/journals change or when copyright reverts back to the authors. Does NOT refer to disputes/violations in ownership or copyright. 10/2/2020 Reasons Removed “Prior” … Continue reading Retraction Watch Database User Guide Appendix D: Changes
Before we present this week’s Weekend Reads, a question: Do you enjoy our weekly roundup? If so, we could really use your help. Would you consider a tax-deductible donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: The retraction of a controversial paper on race and police … Continue reading Weekend reads: A paper mill; ‘science needs to clean its own house;’ is the COVID-19 retraction rate ‘exceptionally high?’
Zoologists are up in arms that a leading taxonomy journal is being called out for excessive self-citation and being denied an Impact Factor. Last week, Clarivate announced that it was suppressing 33 journals from its Journal Citation Report, which would mean no Impact Factor for those journals, because of high levels of self-citation that distorted … Continue reading Indexer “obviously made a mistake” in sanctioning taxonomy journal, says editor
Before we present this week’s Weekend Reads, a question: Do you enjoy our weekly roundup? If so, we could really use your help. Would you consider a tax-deductible donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? Thanks in advance. The week at Retraction Watch featured: the retraction of a paper that editors called “deeply offensive … Continue reading Weekend reads: Sexism in a medical textbook; proof Reviewer 2 is a jerk; COVID-19 and research misconduct
Over the objection of all of the authors, a journal has retracted an article on a homeopathic approach to penis enlargement and virility after deciding that the putative remedy wasn’t potent enough for the task at hand. The paper, “Effects of chronic treatment with the eNOS stimulator Impaza on penis length and sexual behaviors in … Continue reading Coming up short: Journal retracts penis enlargement paper after realizing it was homeopathy
More than 70% of the citations in one journal were to other papers in that journal. Another published a single paper that cited nearly 200 other articles in the journal. Now, Clarivate, the company behind the Impact Factor, is taking steps to fight such behavior, suppressing 33 journals from their indexing service and subjecting 15 … Continue reading Major indexing service sounds alarm on self-citations by nearly 50 journals
An Elsevier journal plans to issue a retraction notice this week about a widely criticized 2012 paper claiming to find links between skin color, aggression, and sexuality. Earlier this month, we reported that the journal, Personality and Individual Differences (PAID), would retract the study “Do pigmentation and the melanocortin system modulate aggression and sexuality in … Continue reading Journal calls 2012 paper “deeply offensive to particular minorities”