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Posting in a fake science journal: Don’t contribute anything to science

Posting in a fake scientific journal: Don't contribute anything to science - Photo 1.

Has been working for many review boards for professor titles of Australian, American and European universities, Prof. Nguyen Van Tuan – University of New South Wales, member of the National Council on Medicine and Health Australia and the Australian Academy of Medicine – say that the lack of training in academic ethics and scientific publication has led to many Vietnamese scientists publishing articles in fake scientific journals.

Confusing science

* How do you rate the fact that many Vietnamese authors publish articles in impersonated scientific journals?

– I call it “fake magazine”, because its nature is Internet stations that publish unorthodox information that pollutes science. About 10 years ago I warned about the state of bogus journals that clouded science, but at that time very few people cared. Up to now, the penetration of fake journals has been quite deep in Vietnam. Just by looking at a fake publishing station, I can count hundreds of articles from Vietnam in fake journals. Fake magazine is, of course, just for the money.

* In your opinion, why do they do it? so?

– I think of four reasons. The first is that it’s very easy to publish in fake journals. Anyone who writes anything, no matter how absurd, will still publish it in fake journals. Almost every article in the fake magazine has many errors not only in science but also in English. Of course, the fake magazines only need money, not interested in content.

Secondly, due to the pressure of scientific publication to meet the standards for recognition of the title of Professor, Associate Professor, people look to fake journals to have articles called “scientific articles”.

Third, due to low-quality research that cannot be published in mainstream journals, such studies become “prey” for fake journals. Fourth, there are also scientists who are inexperienced in research, do not know about publication ethics, and they choose fake journals to publish research results.

* So deliberately publishing in a fake journal to get scientific achievements is a violation of academic ethics?

– That’s right. The convention on scientific ethics (which should be taught to researchers) is not to be published in bogus journals. In my lab, any PhD student must take classes on scientific ethics and publication ethics before doing research. It is up to me to decide where they publish it, you may not send your manuscript without my approval. In Vietnam, it seems to me that there are no conventions or regulations at all.

Posting in a fake scientific journal: Don't contribute anything to science - Photo 2.

Need more quality quantity

* Many Vietnamese authors each year publish dozens of articles, even in many different fields. What does the professor think about this?

– I also see some people like that in Vietnam. They have no research group, no research lab, but each year publish 30 – 50 scientific articles. If you look closely at these articles, it will be easy to see that they are articles that take other people’s data or articles in fake journals or semi-official journals but of very low quality.

I think they only run after quantity and don’t care about quality. That’s a pity. No one judges a scientist by quantity, only by quality. An article in a major journal, such as the Lancet or JAMA, is worth more than 50 articles in medium journals.

In foreign countries, there are also authors who publish many (hundreds) scientific articles every year. Most of these people have large research labs, with dozens of graduate students and dozens of postdoctoral researchers, so they have authored names in many papers.

At the universities where I work, when considering promotion or appointment to professor positions, we only see 10-20 scientific articles because we don’t have time to read or go through hundreds of articles. Okay. Only 10-20 articles with quality assessments are enough for us to assess the candidate’s level and whether he is worthy of the professorship or not.

* In your opinion, how harmful is the pursuit of numbers? Practical experience in research and publication of him and his colleagues how?

– Reputable and serious research groups never run after numbers. They often pursue long-term studies (ie many years) to have data published in major journals such as Nature, Science, eLife, Cell, Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, BMJ…

My group only has 7 people, including 4 PhD students, each year only publishes about 10 articles, or in lucky years, 15 papers. Some articles take nearly 2 years to be published.

* What is the solution to limit the publication of articles in fake journals, sir?

– In my opinion, the first thing is that universities must immediately implement training programs on scientific ethics (including publication ethics) for all PhD students, lecturers and professors. The next thing is to change the criteria for recognizing the title of Professor, Assoc.

Get rid of the standard of 3 articles for PGS or 5 for GS, because that number doesn’t make any sense. It is necessary to define what is a “scientific article”, what is a “reputable journal”, what is a lead author and a co-author…

Prof. Nguyen Van Tuan: 4 standards

I am the chair of the committee for the Alexandre Yersin award (Swiss Medical Association – Vietnam) and the chair of the scientific committee for the Australian and New Zealand Osteoporosis Association. My experience is to evaluate the scientific quality of an article through 4 criteria: rigor and rigor in research methods, innovation and novelty in approach, importance of results. Research in the specialty, the prestige of the journal.

According to the journal reputation criteria, we evaluate the journal’s rank in the industry (not necessarily the impact factor index as many people think) and the reputation of the journal in the professional world. A lot (possibly 90 – 95%) of scientific papers are useless or false. Such articles only thicken an individual’s scientific background but do not contribute anything to science.

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