Can we trust “guidelines on how to write a scientific paper”? We analysed 71 “Write a Scientific Paper” guidelines that were widely used and cited for years as best practices.

 https://doi.org/10.1080/10875301.2026.2622096

Facts:
▪️ 555 citations
▪️ 48 papers carry an editorial expression of concern
▪️ 30 (42%) have been retracted!

#AcademicPublishing #ResearchIntegrity #Retractions #ScholarlyCommunication #Bibliometrics #PublicationEthics #PeerReview

"Until now, someone wanting to submit to arXiv for the first time only needed an email address affiliated with a reputable academic or research institution, such as a university. But a rule instituted on 21 January now requires first-time posters to be endorsed by an established arXiv author in their own field. People who have previously posted in the same disciplinary section of arXiv do not need an endorsement.
The move is an attempt to clamp down on a rising tide of fraudulent submissions, says University of Amsterdam astronomer Ralph Wijers, chair of the arXiv editorial council. A large fraction, he says, are generated with artificial intelligence (AI). The new rule is “mostly to try and discourage very junior, unskilled people from trying to get something started by sending some rubbish to arXiv,” he says."

https://www.science.org/content/article/arxiv-preprint-server-clamps-down-ai-slop

#arXiv #AIslop #PublicationEthics #PrePrints #AIinAcademia

"For more than a century, scientific journals have been the pipes through which knowledge of the natural world flows into our culture. Now they’re being clogged with AI slop."

- Ross Andersen at The Atlantic

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/2026/01/ai-slop-science-publishing/685704/

#TheAtlanticMagazine #RossAndersen #AIslop #AIethics #AIresearch #SciComm #JournalPublishing #JournalEditing #PublicationEthics #ResearchIntegrity #ScienceEditing #ScientificMisconduct #ScienceFraud #AIinAcademia #AcademiaIA

@marcell_o @ChrisMayLA6

Here's a tentative explanation :
(1) Academics are trained to think that publishing our research in certain journals is seen by other academics as "more impactful" and "better". So, when we have some result to publish we tend to submit it to specific, "high reputation" journals.

(2) A lot of these journals (for example: "Nature" or "Cell") belong to for-profit editors like Nature Publishing group, Elsevier etc.

(3) The for-profit editors set up a very profitable system where authors / their university pay to publish AND pay to access the articles, the public also pays to read, while authors provide not only the contents but also the added value of publication - peer-reviewing - for free.

(4) By the way, this has been originally setup by Robert Maxwell, who is, guess what??, the father of Ghislaine Maxwell (source]

(5) Many researchers do not seem to realise that this is an exploitative system based on smokes and mirrors (the quality of an article is unrelated to the "reputation" of the journal it's published in, and that "reputation" is not quantifiable anyway) so they keep publishing in these journals and some of them still use the journal names for hiring and promotion.

(6) Some journals are non-profit and propose good alternatives to the for-profit system (e.g. "eLife"); however many researchers avoid publishing there because they think it won't be useful to their CV. Some universities or funding organisations say that they do not care about the reputation system (DORA agreements) but the researchers still seem fixated on it.

(7) Some other journals are also non-profit (society journals like Journal of Neuroscience) but they still somehow make huge profits and their CEO / employees get paid a lot, so they don't actually seem that different to the for-profit..

(8) in summary, researchers want to publish in the for-profit journals because they think that these journals have better reputation and they increase our chances of getting jobs and funding. Many researchers believe in this "reputation" story and are either not aware of the exploitative aspects or do not really care about it. Alternatives are not perfect and have been mostly neglected...

Disclaimer: this is just my point of view for the field of #Neuroscience

What to do about it? That's probably for another post.. But personally I try not to publish in for-profit journals, and I prioritize reviewing for non-profit ones.

#AcademicChatter #PublicationEthics #Elsevier #Maxwell

I'd not heard of Fengkai Group before I saw their LinkedIn advert. They're offering paid positions to be a guest editor for special issues in SCI- and Ei Compendex-indexed journals (the latter is Elsevier's engineering index). That's weird, I thought.

Csaba Szabo has heard of them: he commented on his guest post on Leonid Schneider's blog about uncovering paper mill activity, at https://forbetterscience.com/2025/05/19/a-sting-inside-a-papermill/#comment-762891, to note the worrying approach Fengkai made to him in May.

Christopher Tang got in similar email in June: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/lets-stand-up-against-unethical-research-behavior-christopher-tang-eur3c

More than 20 of my LinkedIn connections follow Fengkai Group and several are connected to the LinkedIn account that posted the advert.

We all need to be careful not to legitimise questionable organisations by associating with them.

#PublicationEthics #GuestEditors #SpecialIssues #JournalPublishing #PaperMills #AcademicPublishing

A rare insight into COPE's Facilitation & Integrity Subcommittee: they helped guide a journal into engaging with an Austrian investigation, leading to a retraction.

It's usually unsung work, much of it done by volunteers from COPE council.

https://retractionwatch.com/2025/12/11/copes-involvement-leads-to-retraction-of-paper-on-homeopathy-for-lung-cancer/

#CommitteeOnPublicationEthics #Retractions #PublicationEthics #Homeopathy

Here's a blog post by @serhii & @Maryna_Nazarovets that I commissioned, lightly edited, and made a figure for, on how university journals can avoid having too narrow networks.

https://blog.doaj.org/2025/12/04/editorial-endogamy-and-endogeny-challenges-on-the-path-to-doaj/

#JournalPublishing #JournalEditing #PublicationEthics #InstitutionalPublishing #UniversityPresses #UniversityJournals #Endogamy #Endogeny #Nepotism

I recently joined Science Integrity Alliance as Editorial Lead. REACH is the alliance's quarterly magazine for research integrity and open science and just published its second issue.

https://www.sci-integrity.com/reach-october-december-2025

I can't take credit for this fantastic edition (other than a quick proofread) - that's down to Luciana Machado and the editorial committee, including Daniel Ucko and Maryam Sayab - but I'll be contributing to both this and our forums at https://www.sci-integrity.com/groups. These include our open Integrity Café and our HIKE Forum (Hub for Integrity and Knowledge Exchange) for contributors and subscribers to discuss resources and approaches to integrity with invited experts.

If there are any projects, products, or news related to scientific integrity that you'd like us to cover, please get in touch.

#ResearchIntegrity #PublicationEthics #ResponsibleResearch #OpenScience #OpenScholarship #ScientificIntegrity #ScienceIntegrity #ScienceEditing #SciComm #ScienceIntegrityAlliance

“In my opinion, metric-based recognition without integrity screening can inadvertently legitimize problematic practices. That risk is particularly acute in environments where publication is tied to career progression but where research funding, infrastructure, and oversight remain weak. These conditions can – and often do – fuel paper mills, coercive citation policies, and other unethical behaviors.”

Maryam Sayab spoke to Frederik Joelving for Retraction Watch on Clarivate's involvement in Iraqi research awards being granted to individuals with known integrity concerns.

https://retractionwatch.com/2025/10/31/exclusive-clarivate-web-of-science-involved-dubious-awards-iraq/

#Bibliometrics #Scientometrics #Citations #Retractions #ResearchIntegrity #PublicationEthics #Iraq #MENA #RetractionWatch