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“Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu

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Re: “Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

#71

Post by pfortuny »

SMAAART wrote: post #61
ilamont wrote: post #15

A senior editor at a top-tier medical journal told me >5 years ago that they have hired staff dedicated to scrutinizing papers from two countries that have poor reputations when it comes to submissions. It's not just prestige and the career boost; in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals.

> in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals. Meaning the authors get paid the more they publish? How? Per paper or career advancements-->> higher salary?

This is for example an incentive for tenured professors in Spain to do research: if you get (Maths here) 5 JCR papers in 6 years of which (this is one of the criteria, there are more) three are in the top tercile, then you get a bonus of 120€/month from that point on (this can be obtained only every 6 years).

That has been a good incentive to date (I insist, this is maths and there are very few possibilities for cheating in my field, but of course there are instances), as I see it, because this way you incentivate academic professors to really do research (otherwise one can have a truly leisurely life in Spanish public universities once one gets tenure, without any repercussions).

Re: “Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

#72

Post by d0mine »

SMAAART wrote: post #61
ilamont wrote: post #15

A senior editor at a top-tier medical journal told me >5 years ago that they have hired staff dedicated to scrutinizing papers from two countries that have poor reputations when it comes to submissions. It's not just prestige and the career boost; in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals.

> in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals. Meaning the authors get paid the more they publish? How? Per paper or career advancements-->> higher salary?

Scientists in all countries have an incentive to publish in top journals (science is a global affair. "publish or perish" is universal).

Re: “Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

#73

Post by im3w1l »

amelius wrote: post #55
im3w1l wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> getting your paper approved means that you convinced at least three PhD students with a published paper This is a recursive definition of scientist "A scientist(t=n) is someone approved by scientists(t=n-1)". If you have a good initial condition maybe it can work for a while, but it seems that time may be coming to an end. > Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will…

> This is a recursive definition of scientist "A scientist(t=n) is someone approved by scientists(t=n-1)". You're simply reformulating what peer means in peer-review. What other way would you suggest? Layman-review?

I had a couple approaches in mind, but I think I got carried away in the moment when I wrote that comment. A radical overhaul may do more harm then good.

Re: “Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

#78

Post by asdff »

SMAAART wrote: post #61
ilamont wrote: post #15

A senior editor at a top-tier medical journal told me >5 years ago that they have hired staff dedicated to scrutinizing papers from two countries that have poor reputations when it comes to submissions. It's not just prestige and the career boost; in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals.

> in some countries there are monetary incentives associated with publishing in the top journals. Meaning the authors get paid the more they publish? How? Per paper or career advancements-->> higher salary?

Meaning if you want to be a professor in an ivy league you need to have published in Science or Nature

Re: “Is there a heuristic we might use to identify and flag questionable papers?”

#80

Post by asdff »

a_bonobo wrote: post #30

Why are these questionable papers? Academics are forced to publish as many papers as possible. The system pushes their own to go for the smallest publishable unit, people will find a way to optimise for that, and who are we to blame them for that? They're underpaid, overworked researchers trying to guess what the opaque and brutal funding system wants from them. Is there outright fraud, or are they just dull/pointles…

Not every paper is to be some grand work. Sometimes you get a result and literally want to move on with your life. Maybe you want to focus more on another project. Maybe you want to finally defend your thesis or be done with this post doc tenure and uproot yourself. Maybe the grant only funded a year of work. Feature creep is a real thing with research papers. A paper shouldn't take years to publish, if it does you should publish the earlier findings and just cite that in your later paper so those ideas can get out there as soon as possible, instead of sitting in your draft for potentially years.
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