Productivity patterns, collaboration and scientific careers of authors with retracted publications in clinical medicine

Qin Zhang and Hui-Zhen Fu ()
Additional contact information
Qin Zhang: Zhejiang University
Hui-Zhen Fu: Zhejiang University

Scientometrics, 2022, vol. 127, issue 4, No 10, 1883-1901

Abstract: Abstract Problematic publications and scientific misconduct have raised global concern, in which the authors have played a key role. Since research misconduct occurs more frequently in the clinical medicine field, we took this field as an example to explore productivity patterns, collaboration, and scientific careers of authors at the individual level. The application of Lotka’s law (C = 0.883, n = 3.597) showed a loose collaboration network and a predominant aggregation of authors with multiple retracted publications. Most authors were retracted only once while a small group of authors had most retracted publications. Authors with most retractions appeared to have stable collaboration with certain individuals. The occurrences of falsification and ethical issues increased with the higher involvement of authors with multiple retracted publications. Two typical publication patterns of retractions in different stages of scientific career have been found: (1) committing scientific misconduct in the early career, mainly for promotion, and (2) participating in scientific misconduct when mature in the career, most due to neglecting the duty as a supervisor. The team culture, regulations, publication policies, and joint efforts by the scientific community have a direct influence on the occurrences of scientific misconduct. Conclusions are made with a focus on the need for more actions to prevent scientific misconduct and to strengthen scientific norms and integrity.

Keywords: Bibliometrics; Retracted articles; Scientific misconduct; Scientific ethics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11192-021-04252-y Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:scient:v:127:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1007_s11192-021-04252-y

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11192

DOI: 10.1007/s11192-021-04252-y

Access Statistics for this article

Scientometrics is currently edited by Wolfgang Glänzel

More articles in Scientometrics from Springer, Akadémiai Kiadó
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().