KEY TAKEAWAYS

• A recent analysis revealed ~20,000 scientific authors publishing impossibly high numbers of articles.
• High-volume publishing in the pursuit of inflated metrics represents a threat to research integrity.

We have reported previously on the rising numbers of highly prolific scientific authors. Dalmeet Singh Chawla recently highlighted this issue in Chemical & Engineering News, discussing findings that ~20,000 scientists from Stanford’s top 2% list publish an “implausibly high” number of papers. Singh Chawla explored the implications of high-volume publishing on research integrity, as well as potential solutions.

Study findings

The study, published in Accountability in Research, examined the publication patterns of ~200,000 researchers spanning 22 distinct disciplines, from Stanford University’s list of top 2% scientists (based on citation metrics). It found that:

• around 10% (20,000 scientists) produced an impossibly high volume of publications
• some scientists published hundreds of studies per year, with hundreds or even thousands of new co-authors
• approximately 1,000 were early-career scientists with ≤10 years’ academic experience.

Impact on research integrity

Analysis authors, Simone Pilia and Peter Mora, blame the surprising number of hyperprolific authors on a culture that rewards publication quantity through high scores on metrics. They suggest that this not only compromises research quality but leads to some scientists, “particularly the younger ones”, feeling pressured. Pilia and Mora linked the incentive to churn out large quantities of publications with “unethical practices” such as the inclusion of co-authors who have not made adequate contributions to the research. Based on their findings, Pilia and Mora warn that normalising high-volume publishing poses a significant threat to the fundamental academic process.

“Normalising high-volume publishing poses a significant threat to the fundamental academic process.”

A divisive solution?

Pilia and Mora propose adjusting metrics for scientists exceeding publication and co-authorship thresholds. However, according to Singh Chawla, information scientist Ludo Waltman fears that such adjustments would make research evaluation too complex and confusing. He proposes that research assessment should focus less on metrics and more on a wider range of research activities.

The reliability of metrics for research evaluation is an ongoing topic of discussion within the scientific community, and this latest research serves as a reminder for authors to keep research integrity at the heart of their publication decisions.

————————————————–

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The increasing trend of artificially boosting citation metrics is an illegitimate, yet lucrative business.
• Several research teams are striving to identify and prevent these fraudulent practices, but the methods used are becoming alarmingly sophisticated.

Fraudulent publication tactics, from fake data to paper mills, pose a significant threat to the integrity of academic research. Now, increasing rates of citation manipulation are the latest trend to spark concerns among researchers. In a recent Nature News article, Dalmeet Singh Chawla looks at the scale of the threat and efforts to expose unscrupulous practices.

Spot the red flags

Computer scientist Yasir Zaki is among those at the forefront of investigations. As he explained to Singh Chawla, there are some key warning signs to look out for if citation manipulation is suspected:

• a steep rise in citations shortly after publication
• citations deriving from limited sources
• a sudden, large increase in citations.

The scale of the problem

While in the past, citation manipulation was a more ‘low-tech’ practice, with ‘citation rings’ citing each other’s work, we are presented with a very different picture today. Zaki’s team ran an undercover operation exposing a black market industry that sells citations via paper mills. Further work by the group found that fake preprints were a key method used to artificially bolster citation counts. In another demonstration of how easy ‘citation gaming’ has become in the digital age, a different group were able to list papers on Google Scholar that had been ‘authored’ by a cat and then cite these in fake papers they posted on ResearchGate.

Solutions in sight?

While the scale of this industry is sobering, Singh Chawla shone a light on efforts to tackle the issue:

• A tool by Guillaume Cabanac (University of Toulouse) detects unusual phrasing indicative of fake research papers. Cabanac reports that many of these papers also contain suspicious citations.
• Cyril Labbé’s group (Grenoble Alpes University) is developing a tool to flag unusual citation patterns.
• Zaki’s team suggest a new metric (the citation-concentration index) that identifies authors with citations derived from limited sources.

However, as fraudsters come up with new and nuanced ways to ‘game’ the system, the scientific community must remain vigilant.

————————————————–

In a recent investigation published in Nature, Ioannidis and colleagues found more than 9000 authors who published more than 72 papers in any one calendar year (between 2000 and 2016) – the equivalent of a paper every five days.

The group found that many of these authors (86%) were part of large international teams publishing in the field of physics. After excluding authors in physics (and those with names affected by disambiguation issues within the database used), a total of 265 authors were found to be ‘hyperprolific’. These authors were based across 37 countries, with the highest number (n=50) in the United States, and many were working in the medical or life sciences.

When asked how they became so productive, common themes were identified in authors’ responses, such as ‘hard work’, ‘extensive collaboration’ and ‘sleeping only a few hours per day’. However, when the researchers emailed 81 hyperprolific authors and asked whether they fulfilled the ICMJE criteria for authorship,70% of the 27 responders revealed that they did not meet at least 1 criterion more than 25% of the time.

While the researchers acknowledge that “hyperprolific authors might include some of the most energetic and excellent scientists”, they also flag that this phenomenon may arise from today’s ‘publish or perish’ pressures, the practice of awarding authorship for seniority, and the differing authorship norms across fields and teams. They suggest that adjusting widely used citation and impact metrics, for example by reducing author credit as the number of co-authors increases, may help to curb unwarranted authorship.

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

——————————————————–

Summary by Louise Niven, DPhil from Aspire Scientific

——————————————————–

With thanks to our sponsors, Aspire Scientific Ltd and NetworkPharma Ltd