Fixing the insidious trend to quantity and unethical practices over quality in scientific publications

Fixing the insidious trend to quantity and unethical practices over quality in scientific publications | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Social Sciences - Article Fixing the insidious trend to quantity and unethical practices over quality in scientific publications Simone Pilia, Peter Mora This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-4557958/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Since the advent of online research metrics, which began with Web of Science in 19971, these metrics have been increasingly used to rank researchers and universities2. Over the last two decades, the easy access to research metrics has greatly benefited the academic community and beyond by providing quantitative measures for ranking researchers, universities and departments3,4,5,6,7,8. However, this accessibility, accompanied by a ten-dency to quantitatively evaluate research quality, has also shifted the focus towards practices aimed at enhancing research metrics rather than pursuing high-quality, poten-tially path-breaking research9,10,11,12,13. This trend threatens to degrade global research advancement and invalidate rankings. Here, we demonstrate that an accelerating num-ber of researchers – on the order of 10% or 20,000 researchers on Stanford’s Top 2%14 researchers - are achieving implausibly high-publication and new co-author rates, with many producing tens to hundreds of papers per year, and gaining hundreds to thou-sands of new co-authors annually. Based on an analysis of statistics from Stanford’s top 2% list and Nobel Laureates, we propose a method to renormalise research metrics to better reflect research quality. Our renormalised metrics aim to remove the existing incentive to prioritize quantity or resort to unethical practices to boost their metrics. Scientific community and society/Scientific community Scientific community and society/Scientific community/Publishing Full Text Additional Declarations There is NO Competing Interest. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. 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Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-4557958","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Social Sciences - Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":314629323,"identity":"0632436a-e4c5-4da9-862a-af5f8c4095cd","order_by":0,"name":"Simone Pilia","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAABCklEQVRIiWNgGAWjYDACZijNxs7YwPDhgByEx0OUFmbGBsYZB4yJ0IKsl5mHGC3y7dyJjwsqGPL4mJkbP9ucMUjcLnaA8cHbNgZ7/gbsWgwO8242nnGGoRjosGbpnBsGiTtnJzAbzm1jSJxxAIcWZt5t0rxABW1Av0jnfPiTuOF2AhtIJIEBhxb5ZpCWf2Atzb8tPhiAtLD/Bmqxl8ehheEwSEsDWEubNMMNsBY2ZqAWxg24HAbyC88xCZBf2ix7zhgY75yd2Cw555xE4kZcDus/u/ExT41Nnnx7++MbP44ZyG6XTj744U2Zjb0cLodBgEQCwl4GYDIAiuBVDwLIWkbBKBgFo2AUoAIAoh5V1bP0Gp4AAAAASUVORK5CYII=","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3805-9257","institution":"King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Simone","middleName":"","lastName":"Pilia","suffix":""},{"id":314629324,"identity":"45aeeafb-d040-4777-973f-c19a2d5ae38c","order_by":1,"name":"Peter Mora","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Peter","middleName":"","lastName":"Mora","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2024-06-10 12:16:11","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-4557958/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-4557958/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":58980738,"identity":"0c2d65cd-1384-420d-bbe5-3a6d71463961","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2024-06-25 02:14:41","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":1182662,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"Article File","description":"","filename":"manuscript.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-4557958/v1_covered_a633d13e-3753-4228-9522-6583b882b3e7.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"There is \u003cb\u003eNO\u003c/b\u003e Competing Interest.","formattedTitle":"Fixing the insidious trend to quantity and unethical practices over quality in scientific publications","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-4557958/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-4557958/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"Since the advent of online research metrics, which began with Web of Science in 19971, these metrics have been increasingly used to rank researchers and universities2. 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