Rockin the tabloids

Rick Gerkin points me to this opinion piece from a couple years ago by biologist Randy Schekman, titled “How journals like Nature, Cell and Science are damaging science” and subtitled “The incentives offered by top journals distort science, just as big bonuses distort banking.” Here’s Schekman:

The prevailing structures of personal reputation and career advancement [in biology] mean the biggest rewards often follow the flashiest work, not the best. . . .

We all know what distorting incentives have done to finance and banking. The incentives my colleagues face are not huge bonuses, but the professional rewards that accompany publication in prestigious journals – chiefly Nature, Cell and Science.

These luxury journals are supposed to be the epitome of quality, publishing only the best research. Because funding and appointment panels often use place of publication as a proxy for quality of science, appearing in these titles often leads to grants and professorships. But the big journals’ reputations are only partly warranted. . . .

These journals aggressively curate their brands, in ways more conducive to selling subscriptions than to stimulating the most important research. Like fashion designers who create limited-edition handbags or suits, they know scarcity stokes demand, so they artificially restrict the number of papers they accept. . . .

A paper can become highly cited because it is good science – or because it is eye-catching, provocative or wrong. Luxury-journal editors know this, so they accept papers that will make waves because they explore sexy subjects or make challenging claims. . . . It builds bubbles in fashionable fields where researchers can make the bold claims these journals want . . .

In extreme cases, the lure of the luxury journal can encourage the cutting of corners, and contribute to the escalating number of papers that are retracted as flawed or fraudulent. . . .

Sharif don’t like it.

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