bims-skolko Biomed News
on Scholarly communication
Issue of 2023–06–18
twenty-one papers selected by
Thomas Krichel, Open Library Society
  1. Citation Cartels in Medical and Dental Journals.
  2. Evolution of retracted publications in the medical sciences: Citations analysis, bibliometrics, and altmetrics trends.
  3. Inverse publication reporting bias favouring null, negative results.
  4. Analysis of peer reviewers' response to invitations by gender and geographical region: cohort study of manuscripts reviewed at 21 biomedical journals before and during covid-19 pandemic.
  5. Outsider bias: how your name influences the peer review process.
  6. Strategies for Developing Journal Peer Reviewers: A Scoping Review.
  7. Erosion of Peer Review and Quality Assurance Privilege.
  8. Open peer review: pros and cons.
  9. "It is becoming increasingly difficult to find reviewers"-myths and facts about peer review.
  10. Let's be fair. What about an AI editor?
  11. Unlocking the potential of AI in overcoming language barriers in academic publishing.
  12. New Challenges in Scientific Publications: Referencing, Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT.
  13. This editorial about AI in publishing was definitely written by a human.
  14. Artificial intelligence-ChatGPT and Scientific Publishing.
  15. Artificial Intelligence and Scientific Publishing.
  16. ChatGPT, artificial intelligence and scientific writing: What authors, peer reviewers and editors should know?
  17. Opinion: Common Errors, Omissions, and Presentation Problems in the Conduct and Reporting of Animal-based Research.
  18. Eat Coat, Eat! Writing style and Indian Dermatology journals - Time to rethink?
  19. Inclusive Language in Scientific Writing.
  20. Open(ing) Access: Top Health Publication Availability to Researchers in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.
  21. Predatory Journals Are Unfortunately Here to Stay : The Predator Effect. Understanding the Past, Present and Future of Deceptive Academic Journals. By Simon Linacre; Ann Arbor, MI: Against the Grain (Media), LLC; 2022; ISBN 9781941269572; 69 pages; $14.99 (paperback; also available as open access e-book).
  1. J Coll Physicians Surg Pak. 2023 Jun;33(6): 700-701
    Citation Cartels in Medical and Dental Journals.
    Syed Jaffar Abbas Zaidi, Muhammad Taqi.
      Citation cartels are groups of researchers who excessively cite each other's work to artificially inflate their citation counts and enhance their reputation. The practice of the citation cartel involves journals agreeing to cite each other's publications to boost their own impact factors. The citation cartel has been criticised for distorting the impact factors of participating journals and undermining the integrity of the scientific process. Citation cartels can take many forms, including reciprocal citing, where researchers agree to cite each other's work in exchange for citations. Citation cartels often involve a small group of researchers who are closely connected and who may be deliberately hiding their activities. To combat citation cartels, journals should use software tools to identify patterns of suspicious citing behaviour and should implement policies that encourage transparency and discourage self-citation. Journals should be held accountable for unethical citation practices, and researchers should carefully evaluate before submission. Key Words: Citation, Citation index, Self-citation, Impact factor.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.29271/jcpsp.2023.06.700
  2. Account Res. 2023 Jun 16. 1-16
    Evolution of retracted publications in the medical sciences: Citations analysis, bibliometrics, and altmetrics trends.
    Shahnaz Khademizadeh, Farshid Danesh, Samira Esmaeili, Brady Lund, Karen Santos-d'Amorim.
      We investigated reasons for retraction, pre-and post-retraction citations and Altmetrics indicators of retracted publications in the medical sciences from 2016 to 2020. Data were retrieved from Scopus (n = 840). The Retraction Watch database was used to identify the reasons for retraction and the time that elapsed from publication to retraction. The findings showed that intentional errors were the most prevalent reasons for retraction. China (438), the United States (130), and India (51) have the largest share of retractions. These retracted publications were cited 5,659 times in other research publications, of which 1,559 citations occurred after the retraction, which should raise concern. These retracted papers were also shared in online platforms, mainly on Twitter and by members of the general public. We recommend that the early detection of retracted papers may help to reduce the rate of citation and sharing of these publications, and minimize their negative impact.
    Keywords:  Retractions; post-retraction citations; research integrity; scientific misconduct
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2023.2223996
  3. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2023 Jun 14. pii: bmjebm-2023-112292. [Epub ahead of print]
    Inverse publication reporting bias favouring null, negative results.
    John P A Ioannidis.
      
    Keywords:  Evidence-Based Practice; Information Science; Publishing
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjebm-2023-112292
  4. BMJ. 2023 06 13. 381 e075719
    Analysis of peer reviewers' response to invitations by gender and geographical region: cohort study of manuscripts reviewed at 21 biomedical journals before and during covid-19 pandemic.
    Khaoula Ben Messaoud, Sara Schroter, Mark Richards, Angèle Gayet-Ageron.
       OBJECTIVES: To describe gender and geographical inequalities in invitations to review and the response to these invitations and to assess whether inequalities increased during the covid-19 pandemic.
    DESIGN: Retrospective cohort study.
    SETTING: 19 specialist medical journals and two large general medical journals from BMJ Publishing Group.
    POPULATION: Reviewers invited to review manuscripts submitted between 1 January 2018 and 31 May 2021. The cohort was followed up to 28 February 2022.
    MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Reviewer's agreement to review.
    RESULTS: A total of 257 025 reviewers were invited (38.6% (88 454/228 869) women), and 90 467 (35.2%) agreed to review. Invited reviewers were mainly (217 682; 84.7%) affiliated with high income countries: Europe (122 414; 47.6%), North America (66 931; 26.0%), Africa (25 735; 10.0%), Asia (22 693; 8.8%), Oceania (16 175; 6.3%), and South America (3076; 1.2%). Independent factors associated with agreement to review were gender (odds ratio 0.89, 95% confidence interval 0.87 to 0.92, for women compared with men), geographical affiliation (2.89, 2.73 to 3.06, for Asia; 3.32, 2.94 to 3.75 for South America; 1.35, 1.27 to 1.43, for Oceania; and 0.35, 0.33 to 0.37, for Africa compared with Europe), and country income (0.47, 0.45 to 0.49, for upper middle income; 5.12, 4.67 to 5.61, for lower middle income; and 4.66, 3.79 to 5.73, for low income compared with high income country). Agreement was also independently associated with editor's gender (0.96, 0.93 to 0.99, for women compared with men), last author's geographical affiliation (0.80, 0.78 to 0.83, for Asia; 0.89, 0.85 to 0.94, for Oceania compared with Europe), impact factor (1.78, 1.27 to 2.50, for >10 compared with <5), and type of peer review process (0.52, 0.35 to 0.77, for open compared with anonymised). During the first and second phases of the pandemic, agreement was lower than in the pre-pandemic period (P<0.001). The interaction between time periods and covid-19 related topic and reviewer's gender was non-significant. However, significant interaction was found between time periods and covid-19 related topic and reviewer's geographical affiliation.
    CONCLUSIONS: To reduce bias and improve diversity, editors need to identify and implement effective strategies and continually evaluate progress against these to ensure that more women and researchers from upper middle income and low income countries are involved in review.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2023-075719
  5. Postgrad Med J. 2023 Jun 15. 99(1172): 514-515
    Outsider bias: how your name influences the peer review process.
    Sawsan Abdel-Razig, Halah Ibrahim.
      
    Keywords:  Education and training; Ethics; Statistics & research methods
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1136/pmj-2022-142046
  6. Nurs Educ Perspect. 2023 Jun 14.
    Strategies for Developing Journal Peer Reviewers: A Scoping Review.
    Elizabeth A Gazza, April D Matthias, Jeff Griffin, Katie Chick.
       AIM: This scoping review examined development strategies for preparing reviewers to critically appraise the content of manuscripts submitted to peer-reviewed journals.
    BACKGROUND: The journal peer review process is the crux of building the science of nursing education to inform teaching and learning.
    METHOD: Using the Joanna Briggs Institute procedure for scoping reviews, five databases were searched for articles published in English in peer-reviewed health sciences journals between 2012 and 2022 that included strategies for developing journal peer reviewers.
    RESULTS: Of the 44 articles included in the review, a majority were commentaries (52%) published by medicine (61%), followed by nursing (9%) and multidisciplinary journals (9%). Reviewer development strategies aligned with three themes: pedagogical approaches, resources, and personal practices.
    CONCLUSION: Although multiple disciplines addressed peer reviewer development, a comprehensive and effective approach was not reported in the reviewed literature. The findings can inform a multilevel reviewer development program led by academic nurse educators.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/01.NEP.0000000000001155
  7. JAMA Surg. 2023 Jun 14.
    Erosion of Peer Review and Quality Assurance Privilege.
    Vikas Mehta, Melinda S Sharkey.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1001/jamasurg.2023.1583
  8. Radiol Med. 2023 Jun 12.
    Open peer review: pros and cons.
    Francesco Sardanelli, Anna Colarieti.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s11547-023-01660-3
  9. J Comp Physiol A Neuroethol Sens Neural Behav Physiol. 2023 Jun 15.
    "It is becoming increasingly difficult to find reviewers"-myths and facts about peer review.
    Günther K H Zupanc.
      A frequent complaint of editors of scientific journals is that it has become increasingly difficult to find reviewers for evaluating submitted manuscripts. Such claims are, most commonly, based on anecdotal evidence. To gain more insight grounded on empirical evidence, editorial data of manuscripts submitted for publication to the Journal of Comparative Physiology A between 2014 and 2021 were analyzed. No evidence was found that more invitations were necessary over time to get manuscripts reviewed; that the reviewer's response time after invitation increased; that the number of reviewers who completed their reports, relative to the number of reviewers who had agreed to review a manuscript, decreased; and that the recommendation behavior of reviewers changed. The only significant trend observed was among reviewers who completed their reports later than agreed. The average number of days that these reviewers submitted their evaluations roughly doubled over the period analyzed. By contrast, neither the proportion of late vs. early reviews, nor the time for completing the reviews among the punctual reviewers, changed. Comparison with editorial data from other journals suggests that journals that serve a smaller community of readers and authors, and whose editors themselves contact potential reviewers, perform better in terms of reviewer recruitment and performance than journals that receive large numbers of submissions and use editorial assistants for sending invitations to potential reviewers.
    Keywords:  Editor; Invited reviewer; Peer review; Research evaluation; Reviewer fatigue; Scientific publishing
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s00359-023-01642-w
  10. Account Res. 2023 Jun 15. 1-2
    Let's be fair. What about an AI editor?
    Xiaoxu Ling, Siyuan Yan.
      Much of the current attention on artificial intelligence (AI)-based natural language processing (NLP) systems has focused on research ethics and integrity but neglects their roles in the editorial and peer-reviewing process. We argue that the academic community needs to develop and apply a consistent end-to-end policy on the ethics and integrity of NLP in academic publishing: standards such as drafting requirements and disclosure criteria imposed on potential contributors should be consistently applied to the editorial and peer review process in academic publications.
    Keywords:  AI; ChatGPT; NLP; editorial policy; research ethics
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2023.2223997
  11. J Plast Reconstr Aesthet Surg. 2023 May 19. pii: S1748-6815(23)00289-9. [Epub ahead of print]83 298-300
    Unlocking the potential of AI in overcoming language barriers in academic publishing.
    Jose E Telich-Tarriba.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bjps.2023.05.035
  12. Zdr Varst. 2023 Sep;62(3): 109-112
    New Challenges in Scientific Publications: Referencing, Artificial Intelligence and ChatGPT.
    Igor Švab, Zalika Klemenc-Ketiš, Saša Zupanič.
      The COVID-19 pandemic has led to a surge in scientific publications, some of which have bypassed the usual peer-review processes, leading to an increase in unsupported claims being referenced. Therefore, the need for references in scientific articles is increasingly being questioned. The practice of relying solely on quantitative measures, such as impact factor, is also considered inadequate by many experts. This can lead to researchers choosing research ideas that are likely to generate favourable metrics instead of interesting and important topics. Evaluating the quality and scientific value of articles requires a rethinking of current approaches, with a move away from purely quantitative methods. Artificial intelligence (AI)-based tools are making scientific writing easier and less time-consuming, which is likely to further increase the number of scientific publications, potentially leading to higher quality articles. AI tools for searching, analysing, synthesizing, evaluating and writing scientific literature are increasingly being developed. These tools deeply analyse the content of articles, consider their scientific impact, and prioritize the retrieved literature based on this information, presenting it in simple visual graphs. They also help authors to quickly and easily analyse and synthesize knowledge from the literature, prepare summaries of key information, aid in organizing references, and improve manuscript language. The language model ChatGPT has already greatly changed the way people communicate with computers, bringing it closer to human communication. However, while AI tools are helpful, they must be used carefully and ethically. In summary, AI has already changed the way we write articles, and its use in scientific publishing will continue to enhance and streamline the process.
    Keywords:  Artificial intelligence; ChatGPT; Peer review; Referencing; Research assessment; Scientific articles
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.2478/sjph-2023-0015
  13. Can Urol Assoc J. 2023 Jun;17(6): 151-152
    This editorial about AI in publishing was definitely written by a human.
    Michael Leveridge.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.5489/cuaj.8424
  14. J Eur Acad Dermatol Venereol. 2023 07;37(7): 1253-1254
    Artificial intelligence-ChatGPT and Scientific Publishing.
    Johannes Ring.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1111/jdv.19176
  15. J Assoc Nurses AIDS Care. 2023 Jun 16.
    Artificial Intelligence and Scientific Publishing.
    Michael V Relf.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/JNC.0000000000000418
  16. J R Coll Physicians Edinb. 2023 Jun 12. 14782715231181023
    ChatGPT, artificial intelligence and scientific writing: What authors, peer reviewers and editors should know?
    Durga Prasanna Misra, Kunal Chandwar.
      
    Keywords:  ChatGPT; artificial intelligence; information science; peer review; publications; scientific publication
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1177/14782715231181023
  17. J Am Assoc Lab Anim Sci. 2023 Jun 09.
    Opinion: Common Errors, Omissions, and Presentation Problems in the Conduct and Reporting of Animal-based Research.
    Linda A Toth, Naomi M Gades, Brianna N Gaskill, George DeMarco, Elizabeth A Tolley.
      As experienced authors, statisticians, editors, and scientists, we present the following comments to highlight some usages or omissions that are common in research manuscripts. Consideration of these comments will improve practices of data analysis and reporting.
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.30802/AALAS-JAALAS-23-000049
  18. Indian J Dermatol Venereol Leprol. 2023 May 03. pii: 10.25259/IJDVL_934_2022. [Epub ahead of print] 1-2
    Eat Coat, Eat! Writing style and Indian Dermatology journals - Time to rethink?
    Atreyo Chakraborty.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.25259/IJDVL_934_2022
  19. Nurs Res. 2023 Jun 12.
    Inclusive Language in Scientific Writing.
    Rita H Pickler, Deborah Chyun, Nalini Jairath.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1097/NNR.0000000000000675
  20. Ann Glob Health. 2023 ;89(1): 40
    Open(ing) Access: Top Health Publication Availability to Researchers in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.
    John L Kilgallon, Saumya Khanna, Tanujit Dey, Timothy R Smith, Kavitha Ranganathan.
       Introduction: Improving access to information for health professionals and researchers in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is under-prioritized. This study examines publication policies that affect authors and readers from LMICs.
    Methods: We used the SHERPA RoMEO database and publicly available publishing protocols to evaluate open access (OA) policies, article processing charges (APCs), subscription costs, and availability of health literature relevant to authors and readers in LMICs. Categorical variables were summarized using frequencies with percentages. Continuous variables were reported with median and interquartile range (IQR). Hypothesis testing procedures were performed using Wilcoxon rank sum tests, Wilcoxon rank sum exact tests, and Kruskal-Wallis test.
    Results: A total of 55 journals were included; 6 (11%) were Gold OA (access to readers and large charge for authors), 2 (3.6%) were subscription (charge for readers and small/no charge for authors), 4 (7.3%) were delayed OA (reader access with no charge after embargo), and 43 (78%) were hybrid (author's choice). There was no significant difference between median APC for life sciences, medical, and surgical journals ($4,850 [$3,500-$8,900] vs. $4,592 [$3,500-$5,000] vs. $3,550 [$3,200-$3,860]; p = 0.054). The median US individual subscription costs (USD/Year) were significantly different for life sciences, medical, and surgical journals ($259 [$209-$282] vs. $365 [$212-$744] vs. $455 [$365-$573]; p = 0.038), and similar for international readers. A total of seventeen journals (42%) had a subscription price that was higher for international readers than for US readers.
    Conclusions: Most journals offer hybrid access services. Authors may be forced to choose between high cost with greater reach through OA and low cost with less reach publishing under the subscription model under current policies. International readers face higher costs. Such hindrances may be mitigated by a greater awareness and liberal utilization of OA policies.
    Keywords:  Global Health; LMICs; Open Access; Publishing; Surgery
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.5334/aogh.3904
  21. Acad Psychiatry. 2023 Jun 12.
    Predatory Journals Are Unfortunately Here to Stay : The Predator Effect. Understanding the Past, Present and Future of Deceptive Academic Journals. By Simon Linacre; Ann Arbor, MI: Against the Grain (Media), LLC; 2022; ISBN 9781941269572; 69 pages; $14.99 (paperback; also available as open access e-book).
    Richard Balon.
      
    DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1007/s40596-023-01806-5
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