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Journals and publishers are increasingly using artificial intelligence (AI) to screen submissions for potential misconduct, including plagiarism and data or image manipulation. While using AI can enhance the integrity of published manuscripts, it can also increase the risk of false/unsubstantiated allegations. Ambiguities related to journals' and publishers' responsibilities concerning fairness and transparency also raise ethical concerns. In this Topic Piece, we offer the following guidance: (1) All cases of suspected misconduct identified by AI tools should be carefully reviewed by humans to verify accuracy and ensure accountability; (2) Journals/publishers that use AI tools to detect misconduct should use only well-tested and reliable tools, remain vigilant concerning forms of misconduct that cannot be detected by these tools, and stay abreast of advancements in technology; (3) Journals/publishers should inform authors about irregularities identified by AI tools and give them a chance to respond before forwarding allegations to their institutions in accordance with Committee on Publication Ethics guidelines; (4) Journals/publishers that use AI tools to detect misconduct should screen all relevant submissions and not just random/purposefully selected submissions; and (5) Journals should inform authors about their definition of misconduct, their use of AI tools to detect misconduct, and their policies and procedures for responding to suspected cases of misconduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A questionnaire was prepared in advance of the 26th triennial conference of the International Academy of Legal Medicine (IALM) and sent to 474 email addresses included in the IALM mailing list. The questionnaire addressed three current challenges faced by the International Journal of Legal Medicine (IJLM): the publication of guidelines and validation studies in the field of legal medicine, the publication ethics of case reports, and the recruitment of new reviewers for the IJLM. The response rate was 20%. The survey results highlight the need for international guidelines in various areas of legal medicine. Some desired guidelines already exist. To provide visibility and knowledge of the existing national guidelines, the IJLM has launched a Topical Collection on Quality Assurance in Legal Medicine. This collection aims to inform readers about country-specific characteristics of legal medicine structures and the existing national guidelines.Around 80% of the participants stated that there are legal or ethical requirements for the publication of forensic case reports or case series. Various options for obtaining consent for publication are discussed. Eighty-six of the 97 participants indicated their willingness to review manuscripts for the IJLM. It is emphasized that the contributions of reviewers should be duly recognized and valued. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Journal editors instruct authors to describe human participant protections in original research reports. However, little is known about African biomedical journal authors' adherence to such journal editors' instructions. This study investigated changes in editors' instructions to authors and authors' reporting of research ethics information in selected African biomedical journals between 2008 and 2017. Twelve selected journal websites and online articles were reviewed in Eastern, Southern, and Western African [ESWA] countries. A pre-tested schema and a checklist were used to collect data from journal websites and articles published in 2008 and 2017, and the data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Half of the journals requested prospective authors to disclose ethics approval and related issues in their manuscripts between 2008 and 2017. There was a significant increase in instructions to authors regarding information on the protection of research participants within this period; more authors complied with these requirements in 2017 than in 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this open science era, psychology demands researchers be transparent in their research practices. In turn, researchers might ask if journal editors are being equally transparent in their editorial practices. Editor bias is when editors fail to be fair and impartial in their handling of articles. Editor bias can arise because of identity—who authors are—or because of content—what authors write. Proposed solutions to editor bias include masking author identity and increasing editor diversity. What is needed is greater transparency. By being more transparent, editors would be in a better position to encourage others to embrace open science. Public Significance Statement: Editors play an essential role in the article review process in psychology, but how they perform that important work is not accessible. Editors are vulnerable to being biased in their judgments by the identity of authors and the content of articles. This article offers suggestions on how to reduce the threat of editor bias and how to make editors more transparent to authors and readers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Open-access journals of Library and Information Science (LIS) have been a key medium for library professionals and academicians to publish their research results. The publication policy of the journals is a significant aspect for the authors, editors, reviewers, and publishers, which becomes guidelines to assist all the stakeholders' work under policies. Purpose: The study is conducted to find out the status of the publication policy and editorial policies of Open Access (OA) journals of Library and Information Science which are indexed by publishers from various countries in the SCOPUS, Web of Science, University Grant Commission (UGC) Care List, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), etc. The study was conducted to find out and assess the indexing of OA journals in the citation database and their countries, factors of publication and editorial policy, periodicity, archiving policy, publication fees, and ethical perspectives in the societal context. Design/methodology/approach: The study was initiated by the selection of 151 OA journals of library and information science that are indexed in the citation database, UGC Care List, DOAJ, etc., and after scrutinizing the websites, the database was worked out in an Excel sheet made for this purpose. This is needed because the policies differ from journal to journal, and researchers are often confused as to which one would be the best to follow for their research results. Findings: The USA has indexed the highest number of 21.38% of OA journals in the LIS database. It was found that 82.12% of OA journals preferred the "Double Blind Peer Review" review process; the CC-BY copyright licensing policy is adopted by 46.36% of OA journals; more than 88.74% of journals do not charge for article processing; and 93.37% of OA journals levied an article submission charge. 58.94% of OA journals have a plagiarism policy that ensures the purity and authenticity of the publications; however, it is very low and needs to be adopted for the integrity of the research. Practical implications: In order to conduct a study that was dispersed among all journals separately and make use of the material that was available to stakeholders-- researchers, librarians, academicians, etc.--the authors faced the issue of gathering all the necessary information in one location. The analysis of the LIS journals served as the study's sole foundation. Originality/value: In order to evaluate trends, kinds, and natures of policy patterns, this research shows how to analyze editorial and publication policies in a thorough and instructive manner. In order to support scientists, academics, and researchers in their work as they prepare research articles for journal publication, it is also necessary to develop inclusive policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Publication ethics aim to protect intellectual property rights, ensure the originality of research work, and avoid plagiarism, including self-plagiarism. This study employed bibliometric methods to systematically research the field of publication ethics from 1972–2022; 659 articles on publication ethics were identified. This study included 1336 authors from 762 institutions in 67 countries. Publication ethics in biomedical journals are receiving increasing attention. Misconduct in scientific publishing remains a prominent theme, indicating ongoing development in the field. The literature highlights current research trends and emphasizes the need for increased collaboration among countries, authors, and institutions to enhance the quality and efficiency of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scholarly community is now dealing with a serious issue with predatory journals. It might be difficult for authors to identify predatory publications apart from reputable ones. The purpose of this study is to investigate the academic staff members of the Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, University of Jaffna, Sri Lanka on awareness of predatory publications and open access. The research methodology used in this study to gauge participants' knowledge of "open access" and "predatory publishing" was a questionnaire survey. Data collection involved the use of a pretested questionnaire. The permanent academic staff members affiliated with the Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce, university of Jaffna comprised the study's population. A link to an online survey was shared with every one of the faculty's fifty-two academic staff members. The response rate of the study was 67.30 %. MS Excel was used for the data analysis to describe the data in frequencies, percentages and rank orders of responses. Socio demographic details shows that, highest number of respondents are female (57.14%), completed master/MPhil (51.42%), senior lecturer (57.14%) and interested in marketing (28.57%) as their research discipline. Respondents expressed their priority order for the factors considered to select journal to submit manuscript for publications, journal indexing is the highest priority. All the respondents have an idea about the open access publishing system. Respondents are expected to publish in open access journals because of high visibility, increasing citation number, prestigious journals and fast publication process in a frequency order. The result of the survey shows that, 97.15% of the respondents are knowledgeable about predatory publishing. Majority of the respondents are characterized, the predatory journals are, no insufficient peer review process, and Beall's list of predatory journals used by the high number of respondents to differentiate legitimate journals from predatory journals. More than half of the respondents are satisfied with the services provided by the library to avoid publishing in predatory journals. Responses are summarized for each of the 8 statements about the impact of publishing in predatory journals. Almost all the statements are agreed by the respondents other than the statement of "Articles published in predatory journals are poor in quality". Highest agreement found for the statement 3 which is "Predatory publications are not considered for any academic reward" in which 14out of 35 were strongly agreed and followed by the statement 2 "many researchers published articles due to lack of awareness about predatory publication" (13 out of 35). Finally respondents are suggested to organize more awareness session on open access publishing and journal selection to avoid predatory publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study reports on a novel phenomenon observed in scholarly publications. Some research articles unrelated to the field of artificial intelligence (AI)–generated content (AIGC) contain phrases such as 'As an AI language model ...' The authors conceptualize this phenomenon as 'AIGC footprints.' To provide early evidence, they conducted a small-scale sample investigation by collecting twenty-five articles. These articles were published by authors from countries in Central Asia, South Asia, and Africa. Among these authors, there were assistant professors, doctoral and master's students. Single authors and single affiliations were more common. Analysis of the article content revealed that some authors utilized ChatGPT for literature reviews or idea generation. The twenty-five articles with AIGC footprints were published in eighteen different academic journals. The emergence of AIGC footprints reflects the potential challenges faced by scholarly publishing and higher education. The authors also provide several recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Health sciences librarians often lack knowledge of the motivations behind faculty publishing behavior. This study establishes some understanding of their choices through interviews with academic health sciences faculty members. Knowledge of the concepts of open access was lacking, as was the differences between open access and predatory publishing. Faculty had varied opinions on publication without robust peer review, its ethical implications, manuscript quality, and trust in scientific publishing. Evidence from this study suggests that librarians must take an active role in shaping the future of scholarly communication through education, advocacy, and a commitment to moving science forward equitably and ethically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Predatory journals offer the promise of prompt publication to those willing to pay the article submission or processing fee. However, these journals do not offer rigorous peer review. Studies have shown that a substantial share of corresponding authors in predatory journals come from South Asia, particularly India. This scoping review aims to assess what is known about the reasons why healthcare researchers working in South Asia publish in predatory journals. 66 reports (14 editorials, 20 letters, 5 research reports, 10 opinion articles, 14 reviews, 2 commentaries and 1 news report) were included in the data charting and analysis. The analysis of the reports identified three main reasons that made South Asian healthcare researchers publish in predatory journals: pressure to publish, lack of research support, and pseudo benefits. The review shows that predatory publishing in South Asia is a complex phenomenon. Combating predatory publications requires a holistic strategy that supersedes merely blacklisting these journals or listing criteria for journals that do meet academic standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been a widespread increase in research on the topic of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in both predatory and non-predatory journals. It is important to understand the origin, content, funding, and reach of predatory articles to gauge the detrimental effects of such articles. In this study, the authors, therefore, investigated 210 randomly selected predatory articles with COVID-19-based research published online between February 2020 and February 2021 in journals included in Cabells' Predatory Reports. Their research shows that although India is still among the major contributors of articles published in predatory journals, predatory publishing should no longer be regarded as only a problem in the developing world. The authors also found funded research and articles reporting dangerous treatments with no clinical trials and small sample sizes with unconvincing or misleading scientific evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Doctoral students in clinical, counseling, and school psychology programs often collaborate with faculty on research projects in their training as scientist-practitioners. Yet, the determination of publications' credit and order of authorship on resulting manuscripts continues to be a major concern and challenging process for professional psychologists and student collaborators. This article describes the use of case-based learning and semi-structured interview approaches to instruct first-year clinical psychology doctoral students in publication ethics during a research seminar. The instructor models ethical decision-making with 1) a discussion of four cases from his own professional experiences and 2) a description of the Authorship Eligibility Assessment form, which he developed for use with junior researchers. The authors advocate for more educational strategies to supplement the APA standards in teaching the ethics of the publication process. Implications in terms of graduate student development and research collaborations in the field of professional psychology were discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ascribing authorship of scientific publications to artificial intelligence is a complex and controversial issue. However, it is a challenging and uncertain problem that, given the growing development of artificial intelligence-based technologies that go beyond the performance of purely technical tasks and even contribute to the development of aspects such as the incorporation of scientific research information published in languages other than English, also contributing to potential insights in research, is becoming unavoidable when considering scientific publishing. This paper aims to add to this discussion by arguing that, although this is a challenging and even controversial position, it is inevitable and even ethically desirable to accept artificial intelligence, if it subsidizes sufficiently, as a (co-)author of any scientific publication. It is a matter of starting to think about how this attribution can be controlled and achieved with increasing respect for the ethics of scientific publication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of the research project \"Summa cum fraude - Scientific Misconduct and an Attempt at Counteroffensive\" at Saarland University, an interview was conducted with Ivan Oransky. Oransky is a co-founder of the Retraction Watch database and the Retraction Watch blog, which address scientific misconduct and the retraction of published articles. In the interview, he discusses scientific misconduct, such as data manipulation and peer review processes, as well as plagiarism. He emphasizes the importance of clear retraction notices and sanctions for misconduct. Oransky sees a role for libraries and librarians in ensuring the quality of data and research. The number of retracted scientific articles has dramatically increased in the last 25 years. In 2021, over 3800 retractions were recorded, compared to about 40 in 2000. The retraction rate is currently at 0.08%, while it was at 0.04% four or five years ago. There is a clear upward trend, and some publishers even report hundreds of retractions at once. The Retraction Watch database and blog provide information on this issue and are used by many people. There are various reasons for retractions, such as fake reviews, legal issues, or authorship questions. Guidelines like those of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) can help reduce the number of retractions and improve the integrity of scientific publications. It is important to communicate transparently about retractions to bring about long-term changes. There are already approaches such as registered reports and the disclosure of peer reviews that can improve scientific practice. However, the challenge remains of how best to handle allegations against scientific publications and ensure that they are taken seriously and addressed. It requires better infrastructure and collaboration between researchers, publishers, and other service providers to track and systematically document reports of questionable publications. [Extracted from the article]

Key points: Our policy and implementation successfully identified references from predatory publishers, which authors without hesitation agreed to remove before publication.Higher predatory reference patterns emerged among authors in low‐income countries, those with non‐English primary languages, and sole authorship.After a year of implementing our policy, the editors changed our policy and workflow to better handle references from predatory publishers cited in literature reviews and meta‐analyses.Editorial responsibility is discussed, particularly concerning support for authors from lower‐ and middle‐income countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research quality and publication of journals in any field are crucial because they show the development in the field. This study aimed to examine the research and publication ethics policies of the professional journals that continue to publish in the field of veterinary sciences and reveal the current situation. In this study, journals publishing in the field of veterinary sciences were searched through DergiPark, Web of Science database, and their websites. The features of these journals, the indexes in which they are indexed, statements about research-publication ethics, and the national and international academic institutions were gathered under appropriate headings. The obtained data were analyzed using descriptive statistical techniques such as frequency and percentage. Moreover, 11.5% (n = 3) of the veterinary journals in Türkiye were indexed in SCI-E, 3.8% (n = 1) were indexed in E-SCI, 57.7% (n = 15) were university journals, 42.3% (n = 11) published two issues per year, and 57.7% (n = 15) of journals had publication languages as Turkish and English. Therefore, the number and quality of publications in journals in veterinary sciences have increased in recent years. They comply with "national peer-reviewed journal" criteria and the COPE and ICMJE criteria, wherein the TR index, one of the most comprehensive scanning platforms in Türkiye, has also adopted their principles in several parameters. However, there is no common standard for journals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we discuss ethical issues related to using and disclosing artificial intelligence (AI) tools, such as ChatGPT and other systems based on large language models (LLMs), to write or edit scholarly manuscripts. Some journals, such as Science, have banned the use of LLMs because of the ethical problems they raise concerning responsible authorship. We argue that this is not a reasonable response to the moral conundrums created by the use of LLMs because bans are unenforceable and would encourage undisclosed use of LLMs. Furthermore, LLMs can be useful in writing, reviewing and editing text, and promote equity in science. Others have argued that LLMs should be mentioned in the acknowledgments since they do not meet all the authorship criteria. We argue that naming LLMs as authors or mentioning them in the acknowledgments are both inappropriate forms of recognition because LLMs do not have free will and therefore cannot be held morally or legally responsible for what they do. Tools in general, and software in particular, are usually cited in-text, followed by being mentioned in the references. We provide suggestions to improve APA Style for referencing ChatGPT to specifically indicate the contributor who used LLMs (because interactions are stored on personal user accounts), the used version and model (because the same version could use different language models and generate dissimilar responses, e.g., ChatGPT May 12 Version GPT3.5 or GPT4), and the time of usage (because LLMs evolve fast and generate dissimilar responses over time). We recommend that researchers who use LLMs: (1) disclose their use in the introduction or methods section to transparently describe details such as used prompts and note which parts of the text are affected, (2) use in-text citations and references (to recognize their used applications and improve findability and indexing), and (3) record and submit their relevant interactions with LLMs as supplementary material or appendices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) has presented several opportunities to ease human work. AI applications are available for almost every domain of life. A new technology, Chat Generative Pre-Trained Transformer (ChatGPT), was introduced by OpenAI in November 2022, and has become a topic of discussion across the world. ChatGPT-3 has brought many opportunities, as well as ethical and privacy considerations. ChatGPT is a large language model (LLM) which has been trained on the events that happened until 2021. The use of AI and its assisted technologies in scientific writing is against research and publication ethics. Therefore, policies and guidelines need to be developed over the use of such tools in scientific writing. The main objective of the present study was to highlight the use of AI and AI assisted technologies such as the ChatGPT and other chatbots in the scientific writing and in the research domain resulting in bias, spread of inaccurate information and plagiarism. Methodology: Experiments were designed to test the accuracy of ChatGPT when used in research and academic writing. Results: The information provided by ChatGPT was inaccurate and may have far-reaching implications in the field of medical science and engineering. Critical thinking should be encouraged among researchers to raise awareness about the associated privacy and ethical risks. Conclusions: Regulations for ethical and privacy concerns related to the use of ChatGPT in academics and research need to be developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Evidence syntheses cite retracted publications. However, citation is not necessarily endorsement, as authors may be criticizing or refuting its findings. We investigated the sentiment of these citations—whether they were critical or supportive—and associations with the methodological quality of the evidence synthesis, reason for the retraction, and time between publication and retraction. Methods: Using a sample of 286 evidence syntheses containing 324 citations to retracted publications in the field of pharmacy, we used AMSTAR-2 to assess methodological quality. We used scite.ai and a human screener to determine citation sentiment. We conducted a Pearson’s chi-square test to assess associations between citation sentiment, methodological quality, and reason for retraction, and one-way ANOVAs to investigate association between time, methodological quality, and citation sentiment. Results: Almost 70% of the evidence syntheses in our sample were of critically low quality. We found that these critically low-quality evidence syntheses were more associated with positive statements while high-quality evidence syntheses were more associated with negative citation of retracted publications. In our sample of 324 citations, 20.4% of citations to retracted publications noted that the publication had been retracted. Conclusion: The association between high-quality evidence syntheses and recognition of a publication’s retracted status may indicate that best practices are sufficient. However, the volume of critically low-quality evidence syntheses ultimately perpetuates the citation of retracted publications with no indication of their retracted status. Strengthening journal requirements around the quality of evidence syntheses may lessen the inappropriate citation of retracted publications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores retracted journal articles in the engineering literature indexed in Scopus in order to determine how easy it is for non-expert users to identify retracted publications and interpret the reasons for retractions. The authors also analyzed citations both pre- and post-retraction to compare the methods Scopus uses to alert readers to the retracted status of an article. The results show that the current practice is inconsistent and the methods Scopus uses for indicating retraction status are equally inefficient in preventing the accumulation of post-retraction citations. Engineering librarians can use these results to educate engineering students and researchers on retraction-related topics and scholarly communication practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research community has been continuously investigating the issue of predatory journals. With the rapid development of technology and the world, online publishing has also accelerated, making it crucial to publish and disseminate scientific results as quickly as possible due to the "publish-or-perish" phenomenon. The number of open-access, online-only journals is increasing each year. Predatory publishers and journals have taken advantage of this trend by engaging in profit-driven, unethical practices. This article discusses how the predator phenomenon affects those involved in scientific communication. The research aims to address the following questions: What are the detrimental impacts of predatory journals on individuals involved in scientific communication? What causes researchers to publish in predatory journals? What is the relationship between publication pressure and publishing in predator journals? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: When authorship disputes arise in academic publishing, research institutions may be asked to investigate the circumstances. We evaluated the association between the prevalence of misattributed authorship and trust in the institution involved. Methods: We measured trust using a newly validated Opinion on the Institution's Research and Publication Values (OIRPV) scale (range 1–4). Mayer and Davies' Organizational Trust for Management Instrument served as control. Association between publication misconduct, gender, institution type, policies, and OIRPV-derived Trust Scores were evaluated. Results: A total of 197 responses were analyzed. Increased reporting of authorship misconduct, such as gift authorship, author displacement within the authors' order on the byline, and ghost authorship, were associated with low Trust Scores (P<0.001). Respondents from institutions whose administration had made known (declared or published) their policy on authorship in academic publications awarded the highest Trust Scores (median 3.06, interquartile range 2.25 to 3.56). Only 17.8% favored their administration as the best authority to investigate authorship dispute honestly. Of those who did not list the administration as their preferred option for resolving disputes, 58.6% (95/162) provided a Trust Score <2.5, which conveys mistrust in the institution. Conclusions: Increased reporting of publication misconducts such as gift authorship, author displacement within the order of the authors' byline, and ghost authorship was associated with lower Trust Scores in the research institutions. Institutions that made their policies known were awarded the highest Trust Scores. Our results question whether the research institutions' administrations are the appropriate authority for clarifying author disputes in all cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Journals have been described as "duty bearers" of upholding fundamental ethical principles that are essential for maintaining the ethical integrity of newly generated and disseminated knowledge. To play our part, we evaluated diversity and inclusion in the leadership and management of global and international health journals. We developed Journal Diversity Index (JDI) to measure three parameters of diversity and representation (gender, geographic, socioeconomic status). Relevant information regarding editorial board members of systematically screened journals was sequentially extracted and job titles were categorized into five editorial roles. Chi-squared test was utilized to study associations between gender and geographic distribution of editors along with the Medline indexing of the journal and its impact factor. Out of 43 journals included, 62.7% were published from two high-income countries. Women comprised 44% of the total editors. Among all the editorial board members, we did not find any information suggesting the representation of non-binary and transgender individuals. Furthermore, 68.2% of editors were based in high-income countries with 67.3% of the editors belonging to the Global North. This disparity in geographic region and socioeconomic level was observed across all five editorial roles. Among all women editors, more than 70% worked in non-Medline and non-impact factor journals. Only two journals scored "excellent" on JDI. Despite the continuous evolution of the definition of global health ethics, marginalized individuals, and their perspectives remain underrepresented in this field. Thus, we call for swift action regarding the decentralization and redistribution of global and international health journal editorial boards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence suggests a limited contribution to the total research output in leading obstetrics and gynaecology journals by researchers from the developing world. Editorial bias, quality of scientific research produced and language barriers have been attributed as possible causes for this phenomenon. The aim of this study was to understand the prevalence of editorial board members based out of low and lower-middle income countries in leading journals in the field of obstetrics and gynaecology. The top 21 journals in the field of obstetrics and gynaecology were selected based on their impact factor, SCImago ranking and literature search. The composition of the editorial boards of these journals was studied based on World Bank Income Criteria to understand the representation status of researchers from low and lower-middle income countries. A total of 1315 board members make up the editorial composition of leading obstetrics and gynaecology journals. The majority of these editors belong to high-income countries (n = 1148; 87.3%). Low (n = 6; 0.45%) and lower-middle income (n = 55; 4.18%) countries make up for a very minuscule proportion of editorial board members. Only a meagre 9 out of 21 journals have editorial board members from these countries (42.85%). Low and low-middle countries have poor representation in the editorial boards of leading obstetrics and gynaecology journals. Poor representation in research from these countries has grave consequences for a large proportion of the global population and multidisciplinary collaborative efforts must be taken to rapidly change this statistic with immediate effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cowan's (2024), King's (2024), and Thurston and Noor's (2024) commentaries on my article (Sharpe, 2024) find us in agreement on many matters relating to editor transparency and bias. Where we disagree is in the extent of change required and the rationale behind undertaking that change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the issue of inappropriate authorship in academic publishing, including disputes, plagiarism, and mistrust in institutions. The authors question the effectiveness of a proposed numerical calculation for authorship based on perceived contributions, as it may not address coercive authorship or the influence of institutions. They argue that authorship disputes are indicative of larger problems and should not be dismissed as mere disagreements. The article emphasizes the need for institutions to actively address and prevent authorship disputes through clear policies and equitable resolution processes. [Extracted from the article]

Public participation and survivor research in mental health are widely recognized as vital to the field. At the same time, contributions of patient collaborators can present unique challenges to determining authorship. Using an unresolved dispute around research contributions to the American Psychiatric Association's Psychiatric Services journal, authorship and contribution are addressed. Recommendations are suggested to prevent dilemmas and achieve responsible research credit inclusion, especially among researchers with different backgrounds and asymmetric power relations. Researchers and publishers can prepare proactively for conflict through consensus on authorship criteria, prior agreements around author inclusion, arrangement for third party dispute resolution, transparency in communication and contracts, notification to prospective publications of pending disputes, a contributor-guarantor model of contribution, journal editor "expressions of concern" when authorship disputes go unresolved, and expectation of conflict as generative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Predatory journals, with low standards of publication, means flawed or fraudulent research can compromise future research. Often called 'predatory' or 'deceptive' publishers, both these terms have an implication that the editors and publishers behind them have a motivation to deceive or con authors. However, the motivations remain an assumption because little is known about the individuals behind these journals. This research intended to use qualitative, in-depth interviews to find out more about the individuals behind predatory journals. By engaging with them directly, we hoped to gain an understanding of how they see themselves in the publishing landscape, what value they add and how they achieve these aims. Emails received by the authors were mined for contact information of suspected predatory journals. Over the course of a year, 2552 emails were sent inviting respondents to an interview, for which there would be a small monetary compensation. Despite sending 2552 emails, only three responses were received, and all three did not schedule an interview when prompted. Two of the three requested that a translator be present. A significant percentage of the emails (36.2 per cent) bounced back, indicating the contact information was not valid. While the information gained was limited, it would appear many are aware of the dubious nature of their journal and do not wish further scrutiny by being contacted. Others may lack the English-language skills necessary to be engaged in basic written communication, let alone the more complex language and grammar of scientific publishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay seeks to provide further critique and clarity to the peer review process and the ways in which management of peer review is evolving. These changes occur within a context of massive growth in the knowledge production process: global trends, information technologies, and policies that encourage more people globally to take part in the research process. Associated with these global changes are stressors on the peer review process and particularly questions about who gets to be a peer reviewer and who has the right to produce knowledge under these processes. Less a formal review and analysis of peer review across LIS, this essay takes the form of an autoethnograpic narrative that that seeks to draw upon the researcher’s personal observations, experience, and reflections to critically examine changes to the peer review system that are taking place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper aims to detect publication contributions of editorial board members (EBMs) to academic journal ranking as exemplified by Russian LIS serials divided into three groups according to their authority. To reveal the EBMs' contribution in each group, papers by EBMs in their parent journals as well as other sources were studied with comparative analyses of EBMs' papers in parent journals and papers by other authors in the same journals. The Russian Science Citation Index (RSCI) was used for collecting indicators that reflect journal ranks and scholarly output of EBMs. We found no relationship between journal ranking and a share of EBMs' papers in a parent journal. Citation analyses of EBMs' papers as well as citations of parent journals made by EBMs from other sources reveals a significant effect of EBMs on the rank of top-tiered and low-tiered journals pointing at active participation of EBMs in the development of parent journals. Zero or even negative impact of EBMs' papers on the journal rank is registered in the middle-tiered group implying formalistic engagement of researchers to join the editorial boards, lack of interest in the journal work, or possible violation of the publication ethics by publishing poorly cited or uncited papers in parent journals due to less strict peer-review processes. The paper adds to a better understanding of the nature of journal ranking, particularly, impact factors, as well as performance of EBMs in the field of LIS publications. The ethics and possible conflict of interests related to publishing in parent journals are discussed. The results of the study can be useful for revising journal policy or editorial board composition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores academic freedom as it relates to scholarly publishing. While most discussions of academic freedom as a human right focus on threats to individuals' personal safety and careers, we open this out to include the 'soft repression' that it is possible to encounter during the publication process, and its potential impact on the scholarly record. An overview is given of some of the ethical issues encountered by editors and publishers working with authors experiencing academic, intellectual, or political repression – for example, the manifestation of these issues in authorship, metadata, transparency and reproducibility, research ethics, and competing interests. We go on to formulate suggestions on managing such conflicts while upholding academic freedoms and the integrity of the scholarly record. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to explore the publishing policies and submission guidelines of 110 academic journals covered in the Taiwan Social Sciences Citation Index (TSSCI) during 2018 and 2019. Using document analysis, information regarding academic ethics and copyright are analyzed. The results indicate that most of the journals emphasize manuscript originality. In addition, about 40% of journals clearly indicates that authors are obliged to avoid plagiarism and provide proper and accurate citation. Less than 30% of journals specifically state the obligations and responsibilities of scholarly authors. More than 40% of journals set up regulations for co-authorship. Less than 30% of journals clearly state that authors need to make a conflict-of-interest disclosure. Still a few journals use vague or imprecise legal terms in their policies. Based on the results, this study further provides practical advice in academic publishing. Specific suggestions include providing complete submission instructions and revising them in a timely manner, reviewing journal publishing ethics and operating policy to keep in line with international practices, and formulating regulations in response to the various scholarship and journal publishing movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Peer review underpins the integrity of the scientific archive and has done so for over 350 years. Over the past ten years or so, this integrity has come under pressure due to the introduction of predatory publishers and journals. Papers in predatory journals have, typically, not gone through robust peer review, if any at all. If these papers enter the scientific archive, its integrity will deteriorate. Moreover, legitimate journals will cite papers from predatory journals, which further dilutes the integrity of the scientific archive. The scholarly community has struggled to address the problems brought about by predatory publishers and journals. In this paper, we propose an approach, which draws on the fine art world. They use the concept of a catalogue raisonné to list all the validated work by a given artist and, by extension, identify fakes. A scholarly version will have some differences to the art discipline, but the central idea is the same. A publisher is analyzed, through a peer reviewed paper. This catalogue can be used by authors, and other stakeholders (e.g. librarians, promotion panels and hiring committees), to make more informed decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Editors rely on peer reviewers' comments and insight as they make decisions about submitted manuscripts. This article describes what reviewers need to consider when accepting a peer review assignment and the essential elements they should include in their peer review. What reviewers need to consider when accepting a peer review assignment—and the essential elements they should include in their review. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Retraction is a mechanism for alerting readers to unreliable material and other problems in the published scientific and scholarly record. Retracted publications generally remain visible and searchable, but the intention of retraction is to mark them as "removed" from the citable record of scholarship. However, in practice, some retracted articles continue to be treated by researchers and the public as valid content as they are often unaware of the retraction. Research over the past decade has identified a number of factors contributing to the unintentional spread of retracted research. The goal of the Reducing the Inadvertent Spread of Retracted Science: Shaping a Research and Implementation Agenda (RISRS) project was to develop an actionable agenda for reducing the inadvertent spread of retracted science. This included identifying how retraction status could be more thoroughly disseminated, and determining what actions are feasible and relevant for particular stakeholders who play a role in the distribution of knowledge. Methods: These recommendations were developed as part of a year-long process that included a scoping review of empirical literature and successive rounds of stakeholder consultation, culminating in a three-part online workshop that brought together a diverse body of 65 stakeholders in October–November 2020 to engage in collaborative problem solving and dialogue. Stakeholders held roles such as publishers, editors, researchers, librarians, standards developers, funding program officers, and technologists and worked for institutions such as universities, governmental agencies, funding organizations, publishing houses, libraries, standards organizations, and technology providers. Workshop discussions were seeded by materials derived from stakeholder interviews (N = 47) and short original discussion pieces contributed by stakeholders. The online workshop resulted in a set of recommendations to address the complexities of retracted research throughout the scholarly communications ecosystem. Results: The RISRS recommendations are: (1) Develop a systematic cross-industry approach to ensure the public availability of consistent, standardized, interoperable, and timely information about retractions; (2) Recommend a taxonomy of retraction categories/classifications and corresponding retraction metadata that can be adopted by all stakeholders; (3) Develop best practices for coordinating the retraction process to enable timely, fair, unbiased outcomes; and (4) Educate stakeholders about pre- and post-publication stewardship, including retraction and correction of the scholarly record. Conclusions: Our stakeholder engagement study led to 4 recommendations to address inadvertent citation of retracted research, and formation of a working group to develop the Communication of Retractions, Removals, and Expressions of Concern (CORREC) Recommended Practice. Further work will be needed to determine how well retractions are currently documented, how retraction of code and datasets impacts related publications, and to identify if retraction metadata (fails to) propagate. Outcomes of all this work should lead to ensuring retracted papers are never cited without awareness of the retraction, and that, in public fora outside of science, retracted papers are not treated as valid scientific outputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between 2009 and 2012, Jeffrey Beall analyzed 18 publishers, which were publishing 1328 journals. He classified all but one of the publishers as predatory. In this paper we look again at these publishers to see what has changed since that initial analysis. We focus on the same 18 publishers so that we have a direct comparison with Beall's original analysis. One publisher has been acquired by Sage (the publisher no longer exists) and another has been acquired by Taylor & Francis (the publisher still retains its identity). Three of the publishers can no longer be found and, of the thirteen that remain, they now publish 1650 journals, an increase of 24.25% over the 1328 journals being published when Beall carried out his analysis. Other ways of carrying out this analysis, could put this increase as high as 50.14%. The increase in the number of journals being published, by fewer publishers, suggests that the problem of predatory publishing is getting worse, although this may be largely due to mega-predatory publishers which have dramatically increased the number of journals they now publish, when compared to ten years ago. Unlike Beall, rather than classifying the publishers as predatory (or not), we classify them into four categories, using data which is publicly available, rather than making a subjective decision. Two publishers are classified as category 1 (the most reputable). One journal is in category 2, four in category 3 and six in category 4. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Authorship criteria can be difficult to apply in complex situations, such as multicenter clinical trials, multidisciplinary research, or manuscripts reporting the results of several studies. Authors may need additional guidance to appropriately credit their colleagues even when using existing accepted author criteria and/or contributor taxonomies to guide their decisions. Definitions and explanations of authorship by various editorial groups such as International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, the Committee on Publication Ethics, the World Association of Medical Editors, and the Council of Science Editors emphasize intellectual input and accountability. Existing contributor taxonomies list additional activities that should be credited, but do not stand in for authorship criteria or confer authorship. The literature was searched for existing guidelines for authors that suggest how to apply accepted authorship criteria to activities listed in contributor taxonomies. No publication was identified that mapped specific authorship criteria to particular contributor taxonomies. Suggestions were developed to assist in differentiating activities that meet author criteria from other contributions outlined in two existing contributor taxonomies. The teams that conduct and publish medical and scientific research must decide who should be listed as an author on articles and other publications. Even though journal editors provide author guidelines, members of research teams can disagree about how to use them. Certain problems occur when studies are done by large groups of researchers or by experts who do different kinds of research. This paper suggests some ways to use the guidelines from major editorial groups like the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, the Committee on Publication Ethics, the World Association of Medical Editors, and the Council of Science Editors. The guidelines are compared and explained, and then a specific process is outlined for using these guidelines. Charts were made to show authors how to match possible contributions to some specific author guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Text recycling—commonly referred to as self-plagiarism—is an issue that is currently garnering considerable attention with regard to its acceptability as a practice and questions of when, where, and how much of it can be permissible. Although the problem of self-plagiarism or excessive text recycling can, in the opinion of some, be circumvented by paraphrasing and the reordering of text, the practice does not constitute a legitimate means to generate new and original text. A possible means to moderate the problem of text recycling that is strongly recommended is a declaration statement explicitly stating and identifying the use of recycled text. Further problems with text recycling relate to questions as to who is the progenitor of any recycled text in question and therefore who is the owner, in a moral sense, of the text under scrutiny in cases of changing sets of authors. This leads to concerns over insufficient author attribution. On the other hand, excessive attribution can result if a too conservative mindset is adopted. Due care and cognizance of excessive/insufficient attribution are necessary to avoid such problems as well as a recognition of the concept of text ownership as described herein. Such concerns are not limited to text recycling but are present also for other types of contributions to a publication covering both mundane physical contributions (e.g., supply of materials, organisms, or apparatuses) and the continuing deployment of previously espoused or established metaphysical contributions (e.g., ideas, hypotheses, strategies, or concepts or the instigation of projects). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the impact of an Increase in the average Number of Authors per Publication (INAP) on known ethical issues of authorship. For this purpose, the ten most common ethical issues associated with scholarly authorship are used to set up a taxonomy of existing issues and raise awareness among the community to take precautionary measures and adopt best practices to minimize the negative impact of INAP. We confirm that intense international, interdisciplinary and complex collaborations are necessary, and INAP is an expression of this trend. However, perverse incentives aimed to increase institutional and personal publication counts and egregious instances of guest or honorary authorship are problematic. We argue that whether INAP is due to increased complexity and scale of science, perverse incentives or undeserved authorship, it could negatively affect known ethical issues of authorship at some level. In the long run, INAP depreciates the value of authorship status and may disproportionately impact junior researchers and those who contribute to technical and routine tasks. We provide two suggestions that could reduce the long-term impact of INAP on the reward system of science. First, we suggest further refinement of the CRediT taxonomy including better integration into current systems of attribution and acknowledgement, and better harmony with major authorship guidelines such as those suggested by the ICMJE. Second, we propose adjustments to the academic recognition and promotion systems at an institutional level as well as the introduction of best practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, a multitude of scientific publications on health science are being developed that require correct bibliographic search in order to avoid the use and inclusion of retracted literature in them. The use of these articles could directly affect the consistency of the scientific studies and could affect clinical practice. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the capacity of the main scientific literature search engines, both general (Gooogle Scholar) and scientific (PubMed, EMBASE, SCOPUS, and Web of Science), used in health sciences in order to check their ability to detect and warn users of retracted articles in the searches carried out. The sample of retracted articles was obtained from RetractionWatch. The results showed that although Google Scholar was the search engine with the highest capacity to retrieve selected articles, it was the least effective, compared with scientific search engines, at providing information on the retraction of articles. The use of different scientific search engines to retrieve as many scientific articles as possible, as well as never using only a generic search engine, is highly recommended. This will reduce the possibility of including retracted articles and will avoid affecting the reliability of the scientific studies carried out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Honorary authorship refers to the practice of naming an individual who has made little or no contribution to a publication as an author. Honorary authorship inflates the output estimates of honorary authors and deflates the value of the work by authors who truly merit authorship. This manuscript presents the protocol for a systematic review that will assess the prevalence of five honorary authorship issues in health sciences. Methods: Surveys of authors of scientific publications in health sciences that assess prevalence estimates will be eligible. No selection criteria will be set for the time point for measuring outcomes, the setting, the language of the publication, and the publication status. Eligible manuscripts are searched from inception onwards in PubMed, Lens.org, and Dimensions.ai. Two calibrated authors will independently search, determine eligibility of manuscripts, and conduct data extraction. The quality of each review outcome for each eligible manuscript will be assessed with a 14-item checklist developed and piloted for this review. Data will be qualitatively synthesized and quantitative syntheses will be performed where feasible. Criteria for precluding quantitative syntheses were defined a priori. The pooled random effects double arcsine transformed summary event rates of five outcomes on honorary authorship issues with the pertinent 95% confidence intervals will be calculated if these criteria are met. Summary estimates will be displayed after back-transformation. Stata software (Stata Corporation, College Station, TX, USA) version 16 will be used for all statistical analyses. Statistical heterogeneity will be assessed using Tau2 and Chi2 tests and I2 to quantify inconsistency. Discussion: The outcomes of the planned systematic review will give insights in the magnitude of honorary authorship in health sciences and could direct new research studies to develop and implement strategies to address this problem. However, the validity of the outcomes could be influenced by low response rates, inadequate research design, weighting issues, and recall bias in the eligible surveys. Systematic review registration: This protocol was registered a priori in the Open Science Framework (OSF) link: https://osf.io/5nvar/. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citation is an essential practice in scientific publishing. However, it is mandatory that citing the sources in a scientific work is performed in a proper manner. Manipulating citations in research articles is one form of academic research misconduct that violates publication ethics. Citation manipulation simply occurs for the purpose of increasing the number of citations of a researcher or a journal. Unfortunately, there has been a growing trend for this type of misconduct recently and this has not received much attention from the science community. The most effective solution to prevent the growth of such unethical practices is for reputable journals to impose stricter rules on reference evaluation criteria in order to emphasize on the appropriateness of the citations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Journal editors are the main gatekeepers in scientific publishing. Yet there is a concern that they may receive preferential treatment when submitting manuscripts to their own journals. The prevalence of such self‐publishing is not known, nor the consequences for reliability and trustworthiness of published research. This study aimed to systematically review the literature on the prevalence of editors publishing in their own journals and to conduct a normative ethical analysis of this practice. A systematic review was performed using the following databases: Medline, PsycInfo, Scopus and Web of Science. Articles that provided primary data about editors publishing in own journals were included. We identified 15 studies meeting inclusion criteria. There was large variability of self‐publishing across fields, journals and editors, ranging from those who never published in their own journal to those publishing extensively in their own journal. Many studies suffered from serious methodological limitations. Nevertheless, our results show that there are settings where levels of self‐publication are very high. We recommend that editors‐in‐chief and associate editors who have considerable power in journals refrain from publishing research articles in their own journals. Journals should have clear processes in place about the treatment of articles submitted by editorial board members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present research attempts to identify the impact of retracted papers on previous or subsequent papers. We consider the 5693 retracted papers from 1975 to 2020 indexed in the Web of Science database based on bibliometric methods. We use HistCite, Excel, and SPSS software as technical means. The findings suggest a significant difference between the average number of retracted and unretracted papers when cited in retracted papers. Furthermore, there is a significant difference between the average number of unretracted and retracted papers citing retracted papers. The reasons for the retraction of an article may not be the previous retracted papers, yet unretracted papers may be retracted later because of referring to (many) retracted papers. It is deduced that proprietors of citation databases should carefully focus on these papers by checking references to each new paper citing previously retracted papers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientific journals are published by commercial, no-profit, or society publishers. Most of these publishers and journals are based on the West, with the resulting gap between North and South in research work and literature productivity. This situation has resulted in a falsely perceived doubt about the value and validity of the submissions to international journals from developing regions. However, a recent increase in scientific productivity resulting from some countries' investments made into research was associated with developing many emerging national or regional journals. These journals aim to overcome barriers facing authors from producing regions to get their scholarly work published. They also aim to increase the research capacity and foster a culture of South-South collaboration. However, emerging journals face many challenges including a lack of recognition on their grounds. In this personal paper, the challenges facing emerging journals are highlighted, and the proposed urgent need for "positive discrimination" for emerging journals by regional academia is argued. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qualitative fieldwork research on sensitive topics sometimes requires that interviewees be granted confidentiality and anonymity. When qualitative researchers later publish their findings, they must ensure that any statements obtained during fieldwork interviews cannot be traced back to the interviewees. Given these protections to interviewees, the integrity of the published findings cannot usually be verified or replicated by third parties, and the scholarly community must trust the word of qualitative researchers when they publish their results. This trust is fundamentally abused, however, when researchers publish articles reporting qualitative fieldwork data that they never collected. Using only publicly available information, I argue that a 2017 article in an Elsevier foreign policy and international relations journal presents anonymised fieldwork interviews that could not have occurred as described. As an exercise in post-publication peer review (PPPR), this paper examines the evidence that calls into question the reliability of the putative fieldwork quotations. I show further that the 2017 article is not a unique case. The anonymity and confidentiality protections common in some areas of research create an ethical problem: the protections necessary for obtaining research data can be used as a cover to hide substandard research practices as well as research misconduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scientific journals are published by commercial, no‑profit, or society publishers. Most of these publishers and journals are based on the West, with the resulting gap between North and South in research work and literature productivity. This situation has resulted in a falsely perceived doubt about the value and validity of the submissions to international journals from developing regions. However, a recent increase in scientific productivity resulting from some countries’ investments made into research was associated with developing many emerging national or regional journals. These journals aim to overcome barriers facing authors from producing regions to get their scholarly work published. They also aim to increase the research capacity and foster a culture of South‑South collaboration. However, emerging journals face many challenges including a lack of recognition on their grounds. In this personal paper, the challenges facing emerging journals are highlighted, and the proposed urgent need for “positive discrimination” for emerging journals by regional academia is argued. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A 10‐question survey was distributed by email to 382 academic professionals involved in biomedical research in order to evaluate their experience with honorific authorship, author displacement, and the perceived validity of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) requirements. 104 (27%) responded to the survey collected without identifiers. 92% (95/104) were physicians, and 75% (78/104) reported ≥11 publications as co‐authors. 68% (69/101) thought honorific authorship was commonly (>20% of the publications) practiced in their workplace and/or research environment. Honorific authorship was perceived as commonly awarded to superiors by 63% (65/104) and to peers by 50% (51/103). Only 36% (37/104) reported rarely (≤5 of the publications) or never being a co‐author in a manuscript in which honorific authorship was awarded. 33% (34/103) reported that they commonly experienced co‐authors being displaced from their appropriate rank in the sequence of authors due to honorific authorship. Only 31% (32/104) condemned honorific authorship and only 36% (37/104) agreed all four authorship criteria set by the ICMJE should be complied with. Those who condemned honorific authorship more commonly accepted complying with all four ICMJE criteria (18/32 vs. 19/72; p = 0.004). Increasing experience with author displacement was not associated with the condemnation of honorific authorship (p = 0.35). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To evaluate the prevalence and other characteristics of author self-citations in six Turkey-originated general otorhinolaryngology (ORL) journals of Turkish ORL literature. Methods: A total of 970 articles published in six Turkey-originated general ORL journals (ENT Updates, Journal of Ear Nose Throat and Head Neck Surgery, KBB-Forum, Praxis of Otorhinolaryngology, The Turkish Journal of Ear Nose and Throat, and Turkish Archives of Otorhinolaryngology) in 2016-2020 were analyzed for author self-citations. The association between author self-citations and journal types, study types, study topics, country of origin, and compatibility with the topic were also evaluated. Results: There were 265 author self-citations (0.273 per article) which corresponded to 1.36% of all citations. There was no significant difference between the journal types, study topics, and origin of the studies in terms of mean self-citation values per study, whereas case reports had significantly lower self-citations than review and original investigations. There were three citations (1.1%) that were irrelevant to the study topic. Conclusion: To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that investigated the practice of author self-citation in Turkish ORL literature. Author self-citation rate in the Turkish-originated general ORL journals was found remarkably lower than the medical literature, whereas the selfcitations were found compatible with the study topic to a very large extent. Members of the scientific community including authors, readers, and journal editors should be cautious regarding the unethical practices of self-citations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]