The Problems with Publication

In the latest issue of the journal Science, the editorial raised the issue of impact factors as it relates to publication of new research and how it has become a bit of a problem (Simons, 2008). Along the same lines, a recent article published online in the journal PLoS Medicine criticizes the current practices of scientific publication which the authors view as serving to “provide a distorted view of the reality of scientific data that are generated in the laboratory and clinic” (Young, Ioannidis, & Al-Ubaydli, 2008).

The article by Simons looks at the concept of impact factor of journals. The factor is obtained each year by Thomson Reuters which calculates the number of citations to articles in a particular journal in the two prior years. This number is then divided by the number of articles published by the journal in those years to arrive at the impact factor. Simons acknowledges that such a calculation can be manipulated. He points out that review articles are often cited many more times than original research articles and therefore many journals have begun to include more reviews in their publications. It becomes problematic because this may seem like a measure of quality which it is not. It is for this reason, amongst others, that Young et al. criticize the current publishing practices. Young et al. also directly attack the impact factor system stating, “They powerfully discriminate against submission to most journals, restricting acceptable outlets for publication”.

These two articles (and there are many more upon looking) attempt to bring light to this system where free publication of solid research may never get past the lab simply because it may not play into the system of raising circulation and publication rates. These two articles (as do many others) view this as inherently wrong and revisions must somehow be made to address this.

Simons notes that some journals are attempting to lead the way such as PLoS One which, “evaluates papers only for technical accuracy and not subjectively for their potential impact in a field”. However, Young et al. note that, “perhaps unjustifiably, most articles published in online journals remain rarely accessed” and they note that online publisher BioMed Central which has published thousands of articles has only 73 which have been accessed 10,000 times through their website. Even with their peer-review process, fast publication, open-access to the public and high visibility on the internet. On the issue of impact factors, of all the journals BMC publishes, the highest impact factor is for their journal Genome Biology with an impact factor of 6.59 (BMC, 2008). This is in stark contrast to other journals such as CA: Cancer Journal for Clinicians which touts an amazing 69 impact factor. Other well known journals and their impact factors are – NEJM (52), Cell (29), Nature (28), Science (26) and Lancet (28).

The question is, we recognize a problem yet since such practices are tied in with the economical stability of the publishers making it unlikely they will change this anytime soon, what can we as researchers or practitioners do? Some have made suggestions and other have implemented some changes. For instance, some journals now include sections for research which fails to reject the null hypothesis and some journals publish studies surrounding on those type of articles. Increasing advocacy for online, open-access publication has grown within the scientific community and many researchers are attracted as they retain the copyright for their work, the publication is fairly expedient and their work is open to a wider audience. This, however, has yet to truly make a large dent in the current publication machine.

References:

Biomed Central (2008) Most viewed articles in past year. Retrieved October 14, 2008 from http://www.biomedcentral.com/mostviewedbyyear/.

Young, N., Ioannisdis, J. & Al-Ubaydli, O. (2008). Why Current Publication Practices May Distort Science. PLoS Medicine, 5(10), e201.

Simons, K. (2008). The misused impact factor. Science, 322, 165.

~ by Cory on October 20, 2008.