The Glut of Academic Publishing: A Call for a New Culture

8.24.10 – This article will appear in the forthcoming fall issue of Academic Questions (vol. 23, no. 3). A short version of this paper appeared under the title “We Must Stop the Avalanche of Low-Quality Research” in the June 13, 2010 Chronicle of Higher Education.

Academic publishing has already reached a point where too much material of too little substance is being published, and this trend is continuing. The ostensible reason for academic publishing is to communicate useful information to academic peers. But of all papers published in the top scientific journals (i.e., those listed in the citation index ISI Web of Knowledge)—7,279 science and social science journals from 2002 through 2006—only 40.6 percent were cited at least once in the five years following publication.[1] More recent compilations with large databases indicate much the same proportions.[2] Moreover, evidence suggests that social science papers are cited at a significantly lower level. And it should be noted that this includes self-citations: deleting these might lower the number considerably. In 1981, the total number of journals was 74,000 and by 1990 that number had risen to 108,500.[3] By 2003, the total reached 172,000.[4] Yet, we regularly see the creation of new journals in our fields every year. While we have no citation statistics for the large group of lesser journals, it would be a reasonable assumption that they are cited at a much lower level than the 40.6 percent indicated above. And we believe it might be reasonable to ask if some of these journals should continue, or at least be purchased by libraries. This is one area where cost/benefit analysis seems to play no role. One academic at MIT opined that “[i]f the bottom 80% of the literature ‘just vanished,’ I doubt the scientific enterprise would suffer.”[5]

 
The huge expansion of academic publishing has seen a commensurate increase in the number of journals, issues, and pages produced, but with exponential increases in costs. For example, at the UCLA libraries the number of serials increased by 40 percent during the period 1980 to 2000, while annual subscription costs increased by 1200 percent to a staggering $5.8 million (see figure 1). Many university libraries have been forced to cancel a great number of subscriptions or otherwise reduce access to journals. One proposed solution has been to expand online journal production. We have grave misgivings about expanding modes of scholarly output, however, whether print or electronic. Too much literature already exists, much of it weak and redundant, and much of the latter we believe to be encouraged by the widespread de facto policy of academic reward based on bulk rather than on quality. This policy is unethical, is the root of many problems, and should be changed to one that encourages quality and discourages quantity. While our experience is more with science, engineering, medicine, social science, and management, it appears that the humanities have much the same problem. A recent study by Emory English professor Mark Bauerlein, for example, suggests that many articles and monographs in English literature are hardly used.[6]
 
We view this glut of unutilized and even inconsequential literature as mostly a function of reward systems in universities, research institutes, and funding agencies. Indeed, scholarly publishing may be more about promoting scholars than promoting scholarship.[7] There has long been the notion that “deans can’t read but they can count.” Once confined to research universities, this culture is now prevalent in most institutions requiring publication. Passing the problem to future generations, the urge to publish filters down to trainees such as graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. Just as faculty publications are counted as criteria for promotion, students and fellows need to publish to compete in securing their next positions. In some departments at one of our institutions (UCLA), it is actually mandated that a graduate student have two or even three first-author papers published or in press before the dissertation can be approved. The faculty member responsible for these students thus feels a double pressure to proliferate papers from his research group. And as any economist knows, production follows subsidy, the subsidy in this case being academic rewards. This issue has been addressed by several academics, including one of us.[8] 

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Tuesday

August 24th, 2010

Jimmy Kilpatrick

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