Abstract:
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the rush to scientific and political judgments on the merits of hydroxychloroquine was fuelled by dubious papers which may have been published because the authors were not independent from the practices of the journals in which they appeared. This 5example leads us to consider a new type of illegitimate publishing entity, “self-promotion journals” which could be deployed to serve the instrumentalisation of productivity-based metrics, with a ripple effect on decisions about promotion, tenure, and grant funding.

Disciplines
Medicine and Health Sciences, Bioethics and Medical Ethics

Tags
Bibliometrics, Conflicts of interest, Editor Hydroxychloroquine, Research intergrity

Locher, C., Moher, D., Cristea, I., & Florian, N. (2020). Publication by association: the Covid-19 pandemic reveals relationships between authors and editors. Metaarxiv.  https://doi.org/10.31222/osf.io/64u3s
Publication (CC): https://osf.io/preprints/metaarxiv/64u3s/