Reliance on journal rankings is undermining academic integrity

Person very low on ground under a limbo to illustrate the University of Liverpool against making redundancies based on research grant income and citation impact scores.

Global metrics experts attack Liverpool redundancy criteria

Authors of Leiden Manifesto and Hong Kong principles say plans to use grant income and citation scores to make redundancies is threat to responsible use of metrics around globe

By Anna McKie

26 February

Measuring quality with metrics ignores transformative mentoring

Metrics rarely reflect how students have addressed their weaknesses, which is itself the most rewarding part of university teaching, says Megan Argo

By Megan Argo

2 January

Call to remove ‘hyper-authored’ papers from research metrics

Web of Science study says articles with more than 100 authors or involving dozens of countries can artificially boost citation impact

By Simon Baker

11 December

Italian academic turned minister signals shift away from metrics

Lorenzo Fioramonti wants to ‘put his ideas to the test’ and end the country’s brain drain

By Jack Grove

20 November

Reader's comments (2)

#1 Submitted by Dmitry Skryabin on May 21, 2021 - 8:42am

Cancel or devalue the journal impact factors, and it would make such a positive impact on the academic community.

#2 Submitted by msl_csp on May 21, 2021 - 9:45am

Sadly, not much new here. Humans are adept at optimising any system to get the maximum reward so I cannot see any prospect of a change at present. As was said when I was a student many years ago, "you find out what they want and give it to them". The messages coming from management and the system at large are often the wrong ones and so encourage these behaviours, which are not that new really but now more corrosive because of the speed of online publication.

Reliance on journal rankings is undermining academic integrity

Careers can depend on publishing in higher-quartile journals, but the statistics are too easily gamed, says Jakša Cvitanić

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Global metrics experts attack Liverpool redundancy criteria

Measuring quality with metrics ignores transformative mentoring

Call to remove ‘hyper-authored’ papers from research metrics

Italian academic turned minister signals shift away from metrics

Reader's comments (2)

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Reliance on journal rankings is undermining academic integrity

Careers can depend on publishing in higher-quartile journals, but the statistics are too easily gamed, says Jakša Cvitanić

Register to continue

Subscribe

Related articles

Global metrics experts attack Liverpool redundancy criteria

Measuring quality with metrics ignores transformative mentoring

Call to remove ‘hyper-authored’ papers from research metrics

Italian academic turned minister signals shift away from metrics

Reader's comments (2)

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