Academic publications can be withdrawn for a number of reasons, often because of serious ethical problems with the publication or with the research project upon which the publication was based. The continued citation of retracted work is a serious concern. It can lead to dodgy work, whacky theories and the work of charlatans and cheats distorting and compromising clinical and other professional practice in ways that can be dangerous or at least unsafe. Publications need to do a better job of flagging if an output has been retracted. Research institutions need to include in professional development and resource materials that it is a component of responsible citation to exclude work that has been retracted. Editors and peer reviewers should be on the look out for work that has been retracted keep creeping into a reference list.
We investigate the citation frequency of retracted scientific papers in science. For the period of five years before and after retraction, we counted the citations to papers in a sample of over 3,000 retracted, and a matched sample of another 3,000 non-retracted papers. Retraction led to a decrease in average annual citation frequency from about 5 before, to 2 citations after retraction. In contrast, for non-retracted control papers the citation counts were 4, and 5, respectively. Put differently, we found only a limited effect of retraction: retraction decreased citation frequency only by about 60%, as compared to non-retracted papers. Thus, retracted papers often live on. For effective self-correction the scientific enterprise needs to be more effective in removing retracted papers from the scientific record. We discuss recent proposals to do so.
Kühberger A, Streit D, Scherndl T (2022) Self-correction in science: The effect of retraction on the frequency of citations. PLoS ONE 17(12): e0277814. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0277814
Publisher (Open Access): https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0277814
Self-correction in science: The effect of retraction on the frequency of citations
We investigate the citation frequency of retracted scientific papers in science. For the period of five years before and after retraction, we counted the citations to papers in a sample of over 3,000 retracted, and a matched sample of another 3,000 non-retracted papers. Retraction led to a decrease…