Thursday, October 26, 2017

Fake peer reviews appear to be a problem in some fields

Scientific publishing is full of challenges, but fake peer reviews are an issue which as far as I am aware is not a significant problem in Economics, although it appears to be in some other fields.

E.g. here's a post from Retraction Watch:
Major publisher retracting more than 100 studies from cancer journal over fake peer reviews
"Springer is retracting 107 papers from one journal after discovering they had been accepted with fake peer reviews. Yes, 107.

"To submit a fake review, someone (often the author of a paper) either makes up an outside expert to review the paper, or suggests a real researcher — and in both cases, provides a fake email address that comes back to someone who will invariably give the paper a glowing review. In this case, Springer, the publisher of Tumor Biology through 2016, told us that an investigation produced “clear evidence” the reviews were submitted under the names of real researchers with faked emails. Some of the authors may have used a third-party editing service, which may have supplied the reviews. "

And this:
Can you spot a fake? New tool aims to help journals identify fake reviews
*************

Here's a related NY Times article:
Fraud Scandals Sap China’s Dream of Becoming a Science Superpower

"Having conquered world markets and challenged American political and military leadership, China has set its sights on becoming a global powerhouse in a different field: scientific research. It now has more laboratory scientists than any other country, outspends the entire European Union on research and development, and produces more scientific articles than any other nation except the United States.

"But in its rush to dominance, China has stood out in another, less boastful way. Since 2012, the country has retracted more scientific papers because of faked peer reviews than all other countries and territories put together, according to Retraction Watch, a blog that tracks and seeks to publicize retractions of research papers.
...
"In April, a scientific journal retracted 107 biology research papers, the vast majority of them written by Chinese authors, after evidence emerged that they had faked glowing reviews of their articles. Then, this summer, a Chinese gene scientist who had won celebrity status for breakthroughs once trumpeted as Nobel Prize-worthy was forced to retract his research when other scientists failed to replicate his results.

"At the same time, a government investigation highlighted the existence of a thriving online black market that sells everything from positive peer reviews to entire research articles."

No comments: