Mistakes happen in research papers. But corrections often don’t – Stat (Ambar Castillo | January 2023)
Even amongst experienced, careful and ethical researchers, mistakes happen. Even when researchers identify the problem themselves and promptly alert the publisher, journals can take years to take appropriate action. Like institutions when one of its researchers is found to have committed research misconduct, publishers have structural and deep conflicts of interest. A positive and unblemished reputation correlates to more subscriptions and more advertising/sponsorship dollars. Publicly retracting a paper, or even admitting it has problems, can damage that reputation. As such, there is an incentive for publishers to move slowly. This piece published in Stat looks at this unsatisfactory state of affairs.