Category: honesty in scholarly affairs

Can deforestation stop indigenous groups starving?

One should be careful with translation when plagiarising published texts

Keith S. Taber


The mastering of the art of deforestation is what enables the inhabitants of the Amazon not to die of hunger.


Marcos Aurélio Gomes da Silva, Federal University of Juiz de Fora, Brazil

I have been reading some papers in a journal that I believed, on the basis of its misleading title and website details, was an example of a poor-quality 'predatory' journal. That is, a journal which encourages submissions simply to be able to charge a publication fee, without doing the proper job of editorial scrutiny. I wanted to test this initial evaluation by looking at the quality of some of the work published.

One of the papers I decided to read, partly because the topic looked of particular interest, was 'The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples'.

Image by 139904 from Pixabay 

It is important to learn and teach about the science of indigenous populations

Indigenous science is a very important topic for science education. In part this is because of the bias in many textbook accounts of science. There are examples of European scientists being seen as discovers of organisms, processes and so on, that had been long known by indigenous peoples. It is not even that the European's re-discovered them as much as that they were informed by people who were not seen to count as serious epistemic agents. Species were often named after the person who could afford to employ collectors (often paid a pittance) to go and find specimens. This is like a more serious case of the PhD supervisor claiming the student's work as the student worked for them!

Indigenous cultures often encompass knowledge and technologies that have worked effectively, and sustainable, for millennia but which do not count as proper science because they are not framed in terms of the accepted processes of science (being passed on orally and by example, rather than being reported in Nature or Science). Of course the situation is more nuanced that that – often indigenous cultures do not (need to) make the discriminations between science, technology, myth, ritual, art, and so forth that have allowed 'modern' science to be established as a distinct tradition and set of practices.

But science education that ignores indigenous contributions to formal science and seems to dismiss cultural traditions and ecological knowledge offers both a distorted account of science's history, and an inherent message about differential cultural worth to children.

That is a rather brief introduction to a massive topic, but perhaps indicates why I was keen to look at the paper in the so-called 'Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice' on 'The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples' (da Silva, 2019)

Sloppy production values

"The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples" had moved from submission to acceptance in 4 days, and had been published just over a week later.

Not a lot of time for a careful peer review process

This 'opinion article' was barely more than one page (I wondered if perhaps the journal charges authors by the word – but it seems to charge authors $999 per article), and was a mess. For example, consider the two paragraphs reproduced below: the first starts in lower case, and ends with the unexplained 'sentence', "art of dewatering: cassava"; and the second is announced as being about development (well, 'devel- opment' actually) which seems to be considered the opposite of fermentation, but then moves straight to 'deworming' which is said to be needed due to the toxic nature of some plants, and ends up explaining that deforestation is essential for the survival of indigenous people (rather contrary to the widespread view that deforestation is destroying their traditional home and culture).

The closing three paragraphs of the article left me very confused:

"In this sense, we  [sic – this is a single authored paper] will examine the example of the cassava root in more detail so that we can then briefly refer to other products and processes. The last section will address some of the political implications of our perspective.

In Brazil, manioc (Manihot esculenta) is known under different names in several regions. In the south of the country, it is also called "aipim", in central Brazil, "maniva", "manaíba", "uaipi", and in the north, "macaxeira" or "carim".

In this essay, we intend to show that, to a certain extent, companies,
a process of invention of the Indian Indians of South America, and
still are considerable, as businesses, until today, millions of people and institutions benefit in the Western world. We seek to provide information from a few examples regarding chemical practices and biochemical procedures for the transformation of substances that
are unknown in Europe."

da Silva, 2019, p.2

My first reading of that last paragraph made me wonder if this was just the introduction to a much longer essay that had been truncated. But then I suspected it seemed to be meant as a kind of conclusion. If so, the promised brief references to 'other products and processes' seem to have been omitted after the listing of alternative names in the paragraph about manioc (cassava), whilst the 'political implications' seemed to refer to the garbled final paragraph ("…to a certain extent, companies, a process of invention of the Indian Indians of South America, and still are considerable, as businesses…").

I suspected that the author, based in Brazil, probably did not have English as a first language, perhaps explaining the odd phrasing and incoherent prose. But this paper is published in a (supposed) research journal which should mean that the submission was read by an editor, and then evaluated by peer reviewers, and only published once the editor was convinced it met quality standards. Instead it is a short, garbled, and in places incoherent, essay.

Plagiarism?

But there is worse.

da Silva's article, with the identifed sources (none of which are acknowledged) highlighted. (The paper is published with a licence that allows reproduction.)

I found a paper in the Portuguese language journal Química Nova called 'A química dos povos indígenas da América do Sul (The chemistry of indigenous people of Southamerica)' (Soentgen &  Hilbert, 2016).  This seems to be on a very similar topic to the short article I had been trying to make sense of – but it is a much more extensive paper. The abstract is in English, and seems to be the same as the opening of da Silva's 2019 paper (see the Table below).

That is plagiarism – intellectual theft. Da Silva does not even cite the 2016 paper as a source.

I do not read Portuguese, and I know that Google Translate is unlikely to capture the nuances of a scholarly paper. But it is a pretty good tool for getting a basic idea of what a text is about. The start of the 2016 paper seemed quite similar to the close of da Silva's 2019 article, except for the final sentence – which seems very similar to a sentence found elsewhere in the 'New Chemistry' article.

This same paper seemed to be the source of the odd claims about "deworming" and the desirability of deforestation in da Silva's 2019 piece. The reference to the "opposite process" (there, poisoning) makes sense in the context of the 2016 paper, as there it follows from a discussion of the use of curare in modern medicine – something borrowed from the indigenous peoples of the Amazon.

In da Silva's article the 'opposite process' becomes 'development', and this now follows a discussion of fermentation- which makes little sense. The substitution of 'deworming' and 'deforestation' as alternatives for 'poisoning' ('desenvenenamento') convert the original text into something quite surreal.

So, in the same short passage:

  • desenvenenamento (poisoning) becomes development (desenvolvimento)
  • desenvenenamento (poisoning) becomes deworming (vermifugação – or deparasitamento)
  • desenvenenamento (poisoning) becomes deforestation (desmatamento)

I also spotted other 'similarities' between passages in da Silva's 2019 article and the earlier publication (see the figure above and table below). However, it did not seem that da Silva had copied all of his article from Soentgena and Hilbert.

Rather I found another publication by Pinto (possibly from 2008) which seemed to be the source of other parts of da Silva's 2019 paper. This article is published on the web, but does not seem to be a formal publication (in an academic journal or similar outlet), but rather material prepared to support a taught course. However, I found the same text incorporated in a later extensive journal review article co-written by Pinto (Almeida, Martinez & Pinto, 2017).

This still left a section of da Silva's 2019 paper which did not seem to orignate in these two sources. I found a third Portuguese language source (Cardoso, Lobo-santos, Coelho, Ayres & Martins, 2017) which seemed to have been plagiarised as the basis of this remaining section of the article.

As this point I had found three published sources, predating da Silva's 2019 work, which – when allowing for some variation in translation into English – seemed to be the basis of effectively the whole of da Silva's article (see the table and figure).

Actually, I also found another publication which was even closer to, indeed virtually identical to, da Silva's article in the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice. It seems that not content with submitting the plagiarised material as an 'opinion article' there, da Silva had also sent the same text as a 'short communication' to a completely different journal.

(Read 'A failure of peer review: A copy of a copy – or plagiarism taken to the extreme')

Incredible coincidence? Sloppy cheating? Or a failed attempt to scam the scammers?

Although da Silva cited six references in his paper, these did not include Cardoso et al. (2017), Pinto (2008)/Almeida et al. (2017) or Soentgena & Hilbert (2016). Of course there is a theoretical possibility that the similarities I found were coincidences, and the odd errors were not translation issues but just mistakes by da Silva. (Mistakes that no one at the journal seems to have spotted.) It would be a very unlikely possibility. So unlikely that such an explanation seems 'beyond belief'.

It seems that little, if anything, of da Silva's text was his own, and that his attempt to publish an article based on cutting sections from other people's work and compiling them (without any apparent logical ordering) into a new peice might have fared better if he too had taken advantage of Google Translate (which had done a pretty good job of helping me identify the Portuguese sources which da Silva seemed to have been 'borrowed' for his English language article). In cutting and pasting odd paragraphs from different sources da Silva had lost the coherence of the original works leading to odd juxtapositions and strangely incomplete sections of text. None of this seems to have been noticed by the journal editor or peer reviewers.

Or, perhaps, I am doing da Silva an injustice.

Perhaps he too was suspicious of the quality standards at this journal, and did a quick 'cut and paste' article, introducing some obvious sloppy errors (surely translating the same word,'desenvenenamento', incorrectly in three different ways in the same paragraph was meant as some kind of clue), just to see how rigorous the editing, peer review and production standards are?

Given that the article was accepted and published in less than a fortnight, perhaps the plan backfired and poor da Silva found he had a rather unfortunate publication to his name before he had a chance to withdraw the paper. Unfortunate? If only because this level of plagiarism would surely be a sacking offence in most academic institutions.

Previously published materialEnglish translation (Google Translate)The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples (2019)
Marcos Aurélio Gomes da Silva
The contribution of non-European cultures to science and technology, primarily to chemistry, has gained very little attentions until now.[Original was in English]The contribution of non-European cultures to science and technology, primarily to chemistry, has gained very little attentions until now.
Especially the high technological intelligence and inventiveness of South American native populations shall be put into a different light by our contribution.Especially, the high technological intelligence and inventiveness of South American native populations shall be put into a different light by our contribution.
The purpose of this essay is to show that mainly in the area of chemical practices the indigenous competence was considerable and has led to inventions profitable nowadays to millions of people in the western world and especially to the pharmacy corporations.The purpose of this study was to show that mainly in the area of chemical practices; the indigenous competence was considerable and has led to inventions profitable nowadays to millions of people in the western world and especially to the pharmacy corporations.
We would like to illustrate this assumption by giving some examples of chemical practices of transformation of substances, mainly those unknown in the Old World.We would like to illustrate this assumption by giving some examples of chemical practices of transformation of substances, mainly those unknown in the old world.
The indigenous capacity to gain and to transform substances shall be shown here by the manufacture of poisons, such as curare or the extraction of toxic substances of plants, like during the fabrication of manioc flower.The indigenous capacity to gain and to transform substances shall be shown here by the manufacture of poisons, such as curare or the extraction of toxic substances of plants, like during the fabrication of manioc flower.
We shall mention as well other processes of multi-stage transformations and the discovery and the use of highly effective natural substances by Amazonian native populations, such as, for example, rubber, ichthyotoxic substances or psychoactive drugs.
We shall mention as well other processes of multi-stage transformations and the discovery and the use of highly effective natural substances by Amazonian native populations, such as, for example, rubber, ichthyotoxic substances or psychoactive drugs.
Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1141
A partir disso, os povos indígenas da América do Sul não parecem ter contribuído para a química e a tecnologia moderna.From this, the indigenous peoples of South America do not seem to have contributed to modern chemistry and technology.The indigenous peoples of South America do not seem to have contributed to modern chemistry and technology.
Em contraponto, existem algumas referências e observações feitas por cronistas e viajantes do período colonial a respeito da transformação, manipulação e uso de substâncias que exigem certo conhecimento químico como,6 por exemplo: as bebidas fermentadas, os corantes (pau-brasil, urucum), e os venenos (curare e timbó).In contrast, there are some references and observations made by chroniclers and travelers from the colonial period about the transformation, manipulation and use of substances that require certain chemical knowledge,6 for example: fermented beverages, dyes (pau-brasil, annatto), and poisons (curare and timbó).
In contrast, there are some references and observations made by chroniclers and travelers from the colonial period regarding the transformation, manipulation and use of substances that require certain chemical knowledge, such as fermented beverages, dyes (pigeon peas, Urucum), and the poisons (Curare and Timbó).
Mesmo assim, estas populações acabam sendo identificadas como "selvagens primitivos" que ainda necessitam de amparo da civilização moderna para que possam desenvolver-se.Even so, these populations end up being identified as "primitive savages" who still need the support of modern civilization so that they can develop.Even so, these populations end up being identified as "primitive savages" who still need the support of modern civilization in order for them to develop.
(Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1141)
A pintura corporal dos índios brasileiros foi uma das primeiras coisas que chamou a atenção do colonizador português.The body painting of Brazilian Indians was one of the first things that caught the attention of the Portuguese colonizer.  Body painting of the Brazilian Indians was one of the first things that caught the attention of the Portuguese colonizer.  
Pero Vaz de Caminha, em sua famosa carta ao rei D.
Manoel I, já falava de uns "pequenos ouriços que os índios traziam nas mãos e da nudeza colorida das índias.		Pero Vaz de Caminha, in his famous letter to King D. Manoel I, already spoke of "small hedgehogs that the Indians carried in their hands and the colorful nudity of the Indians.Pero Vaz de Caminha, in his famous letter to King D. Manoel I, already talked about little hedgehogs that the Indians carried in their hands.
Traziam alguns deles ouriços verdes, de árvores, que na cor, quase queriam parecer de castanheiros; apenas que eram mais e mais pequenos.They brought some of them green hedgehogs, from trees, which in color, almost they wanted to look like chestnut trees; only that they were smaller and smaller.They brought some of them green hedgehogs, trees, who in color almost wanted to appear of chestnut trees; just that they were more and more small.
E os mesmos eram cheios de grãos vermelhos, pequenos, que, esmagados entre os dedos, faziam tintura muito vermelha, da que eles andavam tintos; e quando se mais molhavam mais vermelhos ficavam"And they were full of small, red grains, which, crushed between the fingers, made a very red tincture, from which they were red; and when they got more wet the redder they turned"And the same were filled with red, small [sic], which, crushed between the fingers, made very red dye from the [sic] that they walked red [sic]; and when the more they wet the more red they stayed.
(Pinto, 2008: pp1.1-2; also Almeida, Martinez & Pinto, 2017)
Os índios do Alto Xingú pintam a pele do corpo com desenhos de animais, pássaros e peixes.The Indians of Alto Xingu paint the skin of their bodies with drawings of animals, birds and fish.The Indians of Alto Xingú paint thebody [sic] skin with animal drawings, birds and fish.
 Estes desenhos, além de servirem para identificar o grupo social ao qual pertencem, são uma
maneira de uní-los aos espíritos, aos quais creditam sua felicidade.		These drawings, in addition to serving to identify the social group to which they belong, are a way to unite them with the spirits, to whom they credit their happiness.These drawings besides serving to identify the social group at thewhich [sic] they belong, are a way of unite them with the spirits, to whom they credit their happiness.
A tinta usada por esses índios é preparada com sementes de urucu, que se colhe nos meses de maio e junho.The ink used by these Indians is prepared with annatto seeds, which are harvested in May and June.The ink used by these Indians is prepared with urucu seeds , which is collected in the monthsof [sic] May and June.
As sementes são raladas em peneiras finas e fervidas em água para formar uma pasta.The seeds are grated into fine sieves and boiled in water to form a paste.The seeds are grated in fine [sic] and boiledwater [sic] to form a paste.
Com esta pasta são feitas bolas que são envolvidas em folhas, e guardadas durante todo o ano para as
cerimônias de tatuagem.		This paste is used to make balls that are wrapped in sheets, and kept throughout the year for the
tattoo ceremonies.		With this paste balls are made which, involved in sheets, are stored throughout the year for the tattoo ceremonies.
A tinta extraída do urucu também é usada para tingir os cabelos e na confecção de máscaras faciais.The dye extracted from the annatto is also used to dye hair and make facial masks.The ink extracted from Urucu is also used dyeing hair and making tion [sic] of facial masks.
(Pinto, 2008: p.4; also Almeida, Martinez & Pinto, 2017)
O urucu é usado modernamente para colorir manteiga, margarina, queijos, doces e pescado defumado, e o seu corante principal – a bixina – em filtros solares.  
Annatto is used in modern times to color butter, margarine, cheeses, sweets and smoked fish, and its main coloring – bixin – in sunscreens.Urucu is used coloring page [sic] butter, margarine, cheeses, sweets andsmoked [sic] fish, and its colorant main – bixina – in solar filters.
(Pinto, 2008: p.4; also Almeida, Martinez & Pinto, 2017)
Assim, foram identificados possíveis conteúdos de Química que poderiam estar relacionados com a preparação do Tarubá, como misturas, separação de misturas e processos de fermentação.  Thus, possible contents of Chemistry were identified that could be related to the preparation of Tarubá, such as mixtures, separation of mixtures and fermentation processes.  it was possible to identify possible contents of Chemistry that could be related to the preparation of Tarubá, such as mixtures, separation of mixtures and fermentation processes.
O processo de preparação da bebida feita da mandioca ralada, envolve a separação da mistura entre o sólido da massa da mandioca e o líquido do tucupi, feito através do processo de filtração com o tipiti, instrumento tradicional indígena.The process of preparing a drink made from grated cassava involves separating the mixture between the solid of the cassava mass and the liquid from the tucupi, made through the filtration process with tipiti, a traditional indigenous instrument.The process of preparation of the beverage made from grated cassava involves the separation of the mixture between the solid of the cassava mass and the liquid of the tucupi, made through the filtration process with the tipiti, a traditional Indian instrument.
A massa é peneirada, assada e colocada em repouso por três dias, quando ocorre o processo de fermentação, em que o açúcar, contido na mandioca, é processado pelos microrganismos e transformado em outras substâncias, como álcool e gases.The dough is sifted, baked and put to rest for three days, when the fermentation process takes place, in which the sugar, contained in the cassava, is processed by microorganisms and transformed into other substances, such as alcohol and gases.The dough is sieved, roasted and put to rest for three days, when the fermentation process occurs, in which the sugar contained in cassava is processed by microorganisms and transformed into other substances such as alcohol and gas.
Após esse período, se adicionam água e açúcar à massa coada, estando a bebida pronta para ser consumida.After this period, water and sugar are added to the strained mass, and the drink is ready to be consumed.After this period, water and sugar are added to the batter, and the beverage is ready to be consumed.
(Cardoso, Lobo-santos, Coelho, Ayres, Martins, 2017).
art of dewatering: cassava
Agora gostaríamos de voltar a atenção para o processo oposto, o desenvenenamento.  Now we would like to turn our attention to the opposite process, the poisoning.  Now we would like to turn our attention to the opposite process, the devel- opment [sic].  
Ainda que não exija técnicas tão sofisticadas quanto a produção de substâncias, o desenvenenamento é um proce- dimento fundamental para as pessoas que vivem e queiram sobreviver na floresta tropical amazônica, tendo em vista que muitas plantas de lá produzem veneno em virtude de seu metabolismo secundário.Although it does not require such sophisticated techniques as the production of substances, poisoning is a fundamental procedure for people who live and want to survive in the Amazon rainforest, considering that many plants there produce poison due to their secondary metabolism.Although it does not require techniques as sophisticated as the production of substances, the deworming is a fundamental procedure for the people who live and want to survive in the rainforest Amazon, since many plants of there produce poison by virtue of its secondary metabolism.
Afinal, a forma que muitas espécies de plantas possuem para evitar a mordida de insetos é a produção de recursos químicos defensivos.After all, the way that many plant species have to avoid insect bites is the production of defensive chemical resources.After all, the way that many plant species have to avoid insect bite is the production of defensive chemical resources.
Quem quer sobreviver na floresta tropical precisa saber como neu- tralizar ou afastar essas substâncias tóxicas produzidas pelas próprias plantas.Anyone who wants to survive in the rainforest needs to know how to neutralize or remove these toxic substances produced by the plants themselves.Whoever wants to survive in the rainforest needs to know how to neutralize or ward off these toxic substances produced by the plants themselves.
O domínio da arte do desenvenenamento é o que possibilita os habitantes da Amazônia a não morrerem de fome. Mastering the art of poisoning is what makes it possible for the inhabitants of the Amazon not to starve.The mastering of the art of deforestation is what enables the inhabitants of the Amazon not to die of hunger.
(Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1145)
Nesse sentido, examinaremos o exemplo da raiz de mandioca de maneira mais detalhada para então, na sequência, fazermos referência sumária a outros produtos e processos.  In this sense, we will examine the cassava root example in more detail and then, in the sequence, make a brief reference to other products and processes.In this sense, we will examine the example of the cassava root in more detail so that we can then briefly refer to other products and processes.  
A última seção tratará de algumas implicações políticas de nossa perspectiva.
The last section will deal with some policy implications from our perspective.The last section will address some of the political implications of our perspective.
No Brasil, a mandioca (Manihot esculenta) é conhecida sob diversos nomes em diversas regiões.In Brazil, cassava (Manihot esculenta) is known under several names in different regions.In Brazil, manioc (Manihot esculenta) is known under different names in several regions.
No sul do país, ela também se chama "aipim", no Brasil central, "maniva", "manaíba", "uaipi", e no norte, "macaxeira" ou "carim".In the south of the country, it is also called "casino" [sic], in central Brazil, "maniva", "manaíba", "uaipi", and in the north, "macaxeira" or "carim".In the south of the country, it is also called "aipim", in central Brazil, "maniva", "manaíba", "uaipi", and in the north, "macaxeira" or "carim".
(Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1145)
Neste ensaio, pretendemos mostrar que, no que concerne ao conhecimento relativo às práticas químicas, a criatividade e a inteli- gência técnica dos povos indígenas da América do Sul, são compe- tências consideráveis até os dias de hoje.  
Os povos ameríndios, em especial os da bacia amazônica, desenvolveram práticas que levaram a invenções das quais, até hoje, milhões de pessoas se beneficiam.		In this essay, we intend to show that, with regard to knowledge related to chemical practices, creativity and technical intelligence of the indigenous peoples of South America are considerable competences to this day.  
The Amerindian peoples, especially those from the Amazon basin, developed practices that led to inventions from which, to this day, millions of people benefit.		In this essay, we intend to show that, to a certain extent, companies,
a process of invention of the Indian Indians of South America, and
still are considerable, as businesses, until today, millions of people and institutions benefit in the Western world.
(Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1141)
Gostaríamos de documentar essas afirmações com alguns exemplos, limitando-nos a apresentar apenas produtos feitos a partir de substâncias que eram inteiramente desconhecidos na Europa.We would like to document these claims with a few examples, limiting ourselves to presenting only products made from substances that were entirely unknown in Europe.We seek to provide information from a few examples regarding chemical practices and biochemical procedures for the transformation of substances that
are [sic!] unknown in Europe.
(Soentgena & Hilbert, 2016: 1142)
Text of da Silva's 2019 article (in its published sequence) is juxtaposed against material that seems to have been used as unacknowledged sources (paragraphs have been broken up to aid comparisons).

Works cited:
  • Almeida, M. R., Martinez, S. T &  Pinto, A. C.(2017) Química de Produtos Naturais: Plantas que Testemunham Histórias. Revista Virtual de Química, 9 (3), 1117-1153.
  • Cardoso, A.M.C., Lobo-santos, V., Coelho, A.C.S., Ayres, J.L., Martins, M.M.M.(2017) O Processo de preparação da bebida indígena tarubá como tema gerado para o ensino de química. 57th Congresso Brasileiro de Química. http://www.abq.org.br/cbq/2017/trabalhos/6/11577-25032.html
  • da Silva, M. A. G. (2019) The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples. Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 3 (1), pp.1-2
  • Pinto, A. C. (2008) Corantes naturais e culturas indígenas: http://www.luzimarteixeira.com.br/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/corantes-curiosidades.pdf
  • Soentgena, J. & Hilbert, K. (2016) A química dos povos indígenas da América do Sul. Química Nova, 39 (9), pp.1141-1150

Guiding the work of palliative care

Keith S. Taber

I recently heard from the journal 'Archives of Palliative Care' who claim to be able to "enhance the quality" of my work. As – to the best of my knowledge – palliative care is an area of medical work seeking to make life as comfortable as possible for the terminally ill, this is not a journal I've tended to read.
From Editorial Assistant– Archives of Palliative Care Call for paper: community engaged Dear Dr. Taber Keith S I enjoyed your recent paper with the title Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios. We would like to continue working in this area under your guidance. Would you please tell me whether you have any new manuscripts available in your area of site? Thank you for your time
I have written back to see how the journal feels I can contribute…as surely Sherline would not have written to me to tell me she had read my work and feels it is relevant to her journal unless that is indeed true?
Dear Sherline Thank you for your kind message. It was so good to hear that you enjoyed our article 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios'. It was quite a small piece of work arising from a larger collaborative project, but I was rather proud of it. It is always rewarding to hear that someone has found time to engage with the work and has got something useful from it. I was intrigued to learn that 'Archives of Palliative Care' is interested is working in this area under my guidance, as I do not think we would likely have considered the journal an obvious outlet for our work. I am not sure we have anything else worked up for submission at this time, but perhaps if you could tell me what aspects of 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios' you found especially relevant, and how you feel our work can best contribute to 'Archives of Palliative Care' then I could give some serious consideration to whether we might have anything yet to be worked up which it might be suitable. Best wishes

Keith

  The article Sherline enjoyed does include some comments of young people reflecting on whether they would be comfortable in entering medicine as a career (as one of a number of focal areas of scientific work discussed in the study), but that link seems a little tenuous to think our research fits in a journal on palliative care. But perhaps Sherline will get back to me and enlighten me.

Update:

Sherline has indeed got back to me: On 15/07/2021 11:39, Archives of Palliative Care wrote:
Dear Dr. Taber Keith S, Greetings!! Thank you for your immediate response towards our journal. The knowledge present in your published manuscript is so useful to future researchers . this was the reason we want to publish your manuscript in our journal. Awaiting for your response. Best Regards,
This response remains at a very general level, indeed the kind of repsonses that Sherline could have made even if she was not an honest person, and had not even read the article ('Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios') she had claimed to have enjoyed so much. So, I remain unconvinced, but await clarification of how my work is relevant.
Dear Sherline Thank you for your comments. It is obviously gratifying that you see so much of value in our work, and flattering that you want to publish a manuscript from me in your journal 'on spec' (that is, without even seeing what I might write). I imagine I could write something developing my thoughts further on this topic, but do you really feel that this would fit in your journal? (And would it not be a matter for referees to evaluate the relevance and quality of the work in peer review – or do you include invited papers?) Of course, I would like to contribute if that were viable, if I were to be persuaded that my work was relevant to your readers, but I am busy with other ongoing writing and despite your very kind evaluation of my recent work I would need some convincing that there really is a good fit with Archives of Palliative Care. Best wishes Keith
Sadly, whilst my initial response to the invitation was that this was an entirely incongruent request as anything I could write would not be relevant to the journal, as I composed this response I started to actually think about how I could devleop something building on the the publsihed work which might exlpore how young people might feel about going to work in palliative care medicine… Perhaps there would be a role for me in enticing submissions for dodgy journals?

Read about 'Secondary students' values and perceptions of science-related careers: responses to vignette-based scenarios'

Read about journals and poor academic practice

Read about more examples of illogical connections between published work and invitations from journals and conferences

Developing intellectual sophistication – but not in data services

Keith S. Taber

Dear Alka

Thank you for your email on the subject of 'Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn', a topic that is of some considerable interest to me. Indeed, amazingly, I have written on this very topic.

I understand you are trying to sell me some kind of data services – including 'Web Data Scraping' and 'Healthcare Data Mining' and even 'Medical billing' – which all sounds wonderful, even if I have no idea why I would want to make any use of (let alone pay you for) these services.

I was pleased to read that you provide "Data Scraping & Data Processing service provider with an immaculate track record of delivering services to clients in USA, Canada, Australia, UK and Europe."

I assume that 'data scraping' involves using machine algorithms to locate information on the web which can help locate and connect those who have common interests? I imagine that you have used you own "immaculate … services" to identify my article on 'Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn' as a tag line to get my attention and to identify me as someone who might have a need for and budget for buying into your services.

There is a convention shared among honest users of the internet which is that a subject line should relate to the content of an email – so an email with the subject heading "Developing Intellectual Sophistication and Scientific Thinking–The Schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn' would be expected to have something to do with, well, developing intellectual sophistication and scientific thinking and/or the schemes of William G. Perry and Deanna Kuhn. As your email message body has no connection with the subject heading, this suggests that either:
a) your company is just not very good at extracting and interpreting data from the Internet, or
b) in common with most emails I get which try to attract my attention with irrelevant subject headers, your services are actually a scam – and that you have simply sent messages to a vast number of email addresses hoping that some of the recipients may actually have some use for such services and be willing to send you money.

After all, if your organisation had any competence in data processing services, I imagine it would not be targeting a retired academic with services such as 'medical billing' which clearly have absolutely no relevance.

Yours,

Keith

An honest reply

Shortly after I fired off the reply above, and then posted it here, I received a personal response (and apology) assuring me that the company are genuinely seeking to offer their services and working hard to build up clientele – not out to scam anyone. Had this had been a scam I imagine they would have just ignored my response as the process works by sending out blanket emailing (to as many addresses as possible) and then identifying potential 'marks' (people susceptible to parting with their money) from any responses to focus on. Other responses would just be ignored, as (unlike a genuine business that would be expected to respond to all genuine correspondence) scammers focus their energy on the most likely targets. So I am happy to accept this was just ill-judged, rather than anything underhand.

[I have noticed that the footer of the original email told me "This email may contain information that is privileged, confidential or otherwise protected from disclosure. It may not be used by, or its contents copied or disclosed to, persons other than the address(ees)" so it seems I should not have shared it here –  but then sending out unsolicited emails with such claims is another questionable practice that I've commented on before: 'It's a secret conference invitation: pass it on…'.]

An International Conference on Chemistry (Education and Research)?

Invitation to be an Honorable speaker, but perhaps at a dishonourable conference?

Keith S. Taber

Dear  *****  *****  (Program Coordinator: 'Chemistry Education 2021')

Thank you for the invitation on behalf of the organising committee, to be the Honorable Speaker at your upcoming 4th International Conference on Chemistry Education and Research, and for sending me the link so I could check out the details of the conference. Thank you, also, for suggesting that I share my thoughts on the conference. As someone who has become quite concerned about academic standards, and, in particular, how new academics find their way in the current chaotic scholarly environment, I am happy to do that.

Given the excessive number of invitations I receive to write or edit or talk in areas where I clearly have no expertise, it was reassuring to be invited to talk on a conference that, on the face of it at least, is related to my own area of research.

Despite this I feel I must decline the invitation for a number of reasons.

A very practical reason is that you have invited me to talk at less than four weeks' notice. When I do present, I take this responsibility rather seriously, and would want to plan and prepare a talk carefully. Whilst it is not impossible to produce something of quality on a short time-scale, I have various existing commitments that would need to be put to one side to concentrate on preparing a talk on such a time-scale. I would need a very good reason to do that – and so would need to feel this was indeed an important place to present.

In that regard, you tell me this is a "prestigious" conference, but I am not convinced.  This is not just because I feel I am familiar with the prestigious conferences in my area of work, and this is not one of them. This is also based on the evidence available in response to the kinds of questions I advise research students and new researchers to consider when evaluating conferences they might consider committing their time to attending.

The first point is that this conference seems to be organised by a commercial company, 'Conferenceseries LLC Ltd'. Whilst it is certainly not impossible for a serious and worthwhile conference to be convened by such an organisation, the more prestigious conferences are usually organised by professional societies and learned bodies and research associations in specific fields and disciplines. Your site refers to having "support from 1000 more scientific societies" which sounds at once both impressive, and yet vague. The link you give lists organisations publishing with 'OMICS International' – so is that another name for the same organisation?

More substantively, you refer to the invitation being from the organising committee. When I taught research methods sessions on presenting research I would recommend that students interrogated the membership lists of scientific or organising committees of conferences they were unsure about. Do they include well-known academics in the field – people who they are confident are leading names in the area and who suggest the conference has sufficient prestige to commit valuable time (and often money) to a meeting? I cannot find the list of the committee on the website. It does not seem to be there, suggesting you do not have a list of top people in the field prepared to be publicly associated with this conference. (If the listing is there and I have missed it, I would appreciate being directed to it.) This is often a sign of a predatory conference (that is one whose primary purpose is making money for its sponsors, not furthering knowledge.)

This impression is reinforced by details of the conference programme itself.

For one thing there is some ambiguity about the conference name and theme – something I associate with predatory conferences which are not managed and organised by experts in a field. How is 'Chemistry Education and Research' to be parsed? (n.b. "It is also an opportunity for researchers, chemistry professors, students to present and discuss the most recent advances and challenges on Chemistry Education and Chemistry Research.") The conference details are listed under the subheading 'CHEMISTRY EDUCATION 2021', and the first track is 'Chemistry Education' – but there are 21 other tracks which seem to be about other aspects of the chemical sciences, not education.

Under the first track, 'Chemistry Education' a number of specific 'sub-tracks' are listed:

Track 1-1 Developing theories Science and math ability
Track 1-2 Conduct research Perseverance
Track 1-3 Attending to data Analytical skills
Track 1-4 Curiosity Follow through skills
Track 1-5 Utilizing formulas Perform experiments
Track 1-6 Process data Observation and decision making
Track 1-7 Work independently and in groups Technological skills
Track 1-8 Oral and written communication Remain objective

I find it very difficult to believe that any experts in chemistry education would have devised that set of convoluted and incoherent themes for conference sessions. It reads more like a list that has been put together by a child asked to undertake an internet search in a subject that they have never studied. Presumably there are 16 items here which have been inadvertently paired-up on no particular basis. Indeed this list seems to appear, with exactly the same flaw, at the website of an American University where it is described as "interests and values … related to Chemistry Education". Surely your organisation has not simply copied and pasted from another website without anyone checking to see that that an already questionable list of features of undergraduate chemistry had lost half of its bullets?

Major to Career: Chemistry Education (Brigham Young University-Idaho website)

To return to your association with formal learned societies, I see you list an apparently impressive collection of international societies under the Chemistry Education track: – including the Royal Society of Chemistry (of which I am a Fellow, so I know it is not based in Belgium as your site suggests).

  • European Chemical Sciences
  • Society of Austrian Chemists
  • Royal Society of Chemistry
  • Chemical Society of France
  • Society of German Scientists
  • Association of Greek Chemists
  • Association of Hungarian Chemists
  • Italian Chemical Society
  • Polish Chemical Society
  • Portuguese Society of Chemistry
  • Slovak Chemical Society
  • Swedish Chemical Society
  • Swiss Chemical Society
  • Royal Dutch Chemical Society
  • Norwegian Chemical Society
  • American Chemical Society
  • American Institute of Chemists
  • American Institute of Chemical Engineers
  • Association of Analytical Communities
  • Canadian Society for Chemical Technology
  • Chemical Society of Japan
  • Chemical Research Society of India
  • Japan Association for International Chemical Information
  • Korean Chemical Society
  • The Chemical Society of Thailand

The implication would seem to be that these societies from around the world have some formal association with the conference and are, if not supporting it as such, at least offering it some credence by allowing their names to be used in this way. But I wonder if that would be correct?

Your site does not actually specify ANY formal linkage at this point – it just presents a list under the subheading 'Societies'. I therefore assume that although you would like it to be read as a form of accreditation or recommendation of your conference by relevant organisations, it is actually no such thing – rather the list should be read simply as societies whose members you would hope might be interested in your conference. Am I wrong?

In all then, I am unable to find any indicators here of the "prestigious" conference you suggest. Rather I see an inept and incoherent presentation that does not seem to have been developed or informed by experts in the field. Indeed, there are several signs that commonly indicate the kind of predatory conference that is designed to take money from delegates who are misled into signing up for something that has a veneer of academic respect, or who choose to share in the pretence as they wish to expand their own c.v./résumés with conference presentations (and perhaps cannot get their papers accepted at well-respected conferences) and so enter into the conceit and collude with the organisers to mislead others who may assume from the title that this is indeed a prestigious academic conference.

You will appreciate that in the circumstances I would not wish to attend your conference as an honorable (or even honoured) speaker, both as in my evaluation this would not be a good use of my time, and as my involvement could be used to mislead other more junior colleagues in the field to assume this was a conference they should consider investing in and attending themselves.

Best wishes

Keith

A special waiver for my paper in 'The Educaitonal Review, USA'

I have been critical in this blog and elsewhere about the behaviour of predatory journals that use dishonest methods and/or which short-cut proper peer review to attract business. I just received an invitation that at first sight seemed to fit into this category, although on closer inspection  I suspect is actually something more sinister.

The message was as follows:

As the screen-shot above shows, the email was from er@cutablw.com, but the email was set up to send replies to education@hillpublisher.com. That seems odd as the email is from a completely different domain name (and from a time zone ahead of the UK, so not the US) – a common indicator of some kind of scam.

Another predatory journal?

At face value I was being asked to submit a paper for publication, by November 10th for publication on November 16th, apparently with no peer review and so avoiding all that delay and extra work of modifying a perfectly good paper in order to meet the misjudged and idiosyncratic suggestion of reviewers who clearly have not read the work carefully and do not really understand the topic. Well, sometimes it seems like that – but if we want the credit of publishing in peer reviewed outlets then the cost is peer review.

[Read about 'Peer review in academic publishing']

This was not the first invitation of that kind I had received, so 'The Educational Review, USA' (or if you prefer, 'The Educaitonal [sic] Review, USA') seemed to be just another predatory journal, albeit one which was considerate enough to apparently be "dedicated to improve [my] paper's impact".

The logic of such journals is that academics have to publish to get promoted, sometimes to keep their jobs, and even to get appointed in the first place, so they will surely pay good money for publication. If the focus of the journal is to maximise income, then it needs to publish as many papers as possible, and peer review would just get in the way by slowing things down and even losing some contributions. The logic here is to persuade an author of an easy publication, so they are prepared to pay a substantial fee.

[Read more about 'Predatory journals']

Yet here I was being offered a waiver.

So, was this one of those offers that I would find had finished yesterday and my paper could still be published but at cost, or was the offer only available on my third publication, or was some other condition attached? Well, there was at least one condition attached: I had to submit my paper by replying to education@hillpublisher.com.

There was still a credible explanation: sometimes when journals are relatively new, or not getting much interest, they may try to increase their impact by inviting and publishing well-established authors (which perhaps increases internet traffic, or reassures other authors that this is a decent journal). So, offering waivers to particular authors at specific times might still be a tactic that is consistent with an overall strategy to maximise income by selling publication.

I learnt more

The email had a link to find out more. I went where angels fear to click. This led me to the webpages of 'The Educational Review, USA' published monthly by Hill Publishing Group with the ISSN identification shown in the email.

I was able to find from the website that normally being published in that journal would lead to a fee (f0r someone in a high income country) of $400 for a paper up to 15 pages, with a further charge of $50 for each additional page. Given my verbose nature, the waiver being offered would save me many hundreds of US dollars. If I had something ready to publish, and was not sure where to send it, or was worried it might be too weak to survive peer review, then this was looking like a good option.

A waiver on peer review?

However, I was also able to find on the website details of the peer review process. After initial screening,

an Associate Editor with appropriate expertise in the subject area or study design… is responsible for identifying at least 2 external peer reviewers with expertise in the topic or specialty [sic, speciality] of the paper. The peer review process may require 2 to 4 weeks before the decision is reached…
After the authors submit their revision, the manuscript undergoes another peer-review, or it will be sent to the Editor-in-Chief for a final decision, if appropriate.

This did not sound so different to a serious journal, one that actually sought to only publish work of reasonable quality.

So perhaps by avoiding the on-line submission and replying directly to education@hillpublisher.com I not only got a waiver on the fee, but avoided peer review altogether. Sometimes even decent journals publish invited contributions identified as such without full peer review. This would normally be an article from an especially distinguished scholar. Obviously [sic] my status as a giant in the field (I was being enticed to think) meant I was being asked to make an invited contribution that would not need peer review.

Some kind of scam?

But I am fairly sure this is actually some kind of scam, although I've not yet worked out how this is meant to work to the scammer's advantage – unless after I submit my paper I twill hen get told there will be a fee after all. Apart form the different domain name of the actual sender, I also noticed a redirect on the link to find out more.

The embedded link was to http://i7q.cn/5LFrGY – a form of address which both shortens the full URL, and in doing so also hides any domain information. Although it did take me to the Hill Publishing Company (where there does indeed seem to be a Jim Morrison operating, spoiling my illusion that the scammer worked alongside Janis and Jimi and Sandy, and maybe even Elvis), only after being redirected from a page telling me

出错啦！！ 您访问的内容不存在或被安全软件禁止了…

which Google Scholar kindly suggested might mean

Something went wrong! ! The content you are visiting does not exist or is banned by security software…

Another clue is that although replying to education@hillpublisher.com seems to be sending a message to the Hill Publishing Group, the journal's actual email address is edu@hillpublisher.com. Now it is certainly possible for organisations to have multiple email addresses assigned to the same department (e.g., journal), but a websearch suggests education@hillpublisher.com is not used publicly anywhere – although, intriguingly the 'The Educational Review, USA' seems to have previously used the email address education@hillpublishing.org.

A definite scam?

So this looks like a definite scam. Even quite unsophisticated schemes of this kind can be effective as if enough emails addresses are targeted, then even a very tiny response rate may be productive. But would serious scholars really believe that they might be able to get their work published in a research journal without peer review, and in less than a week after submission? Sadly there are enough journals out there which seem to have little concern for academic standards and are just about extracting money from authors by making such offers that this approach could have been seen as quite convincing.

The state of academic publishing has become so degraded that it has become difficult to distinguish a genuine invitation to pay to publish without regard to quality standards, from actual criminal activity!

 

 

 

 

The chemistry curriculum, mental health, and self-regulation

Keith S. Taber

Dear [Assistant Editor]

Thank you for your message about the special Issue entitled "Mental Health Intervention and Self-Regulation in Childhood and Adolescents", to be published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

I am honoured, of course, that you think that, based on my expertise in this field, I could make an excellent contribution.

I was, however, rather unsure on what grounds that you considered I have expertise in "the field" – assuming the field you refer to here is one of Mental Health, Self-Regulation, Environmental Research, or Public Health.

Whilst I am very happy to be contacted in relation to the expertise I do actually have, the lack of any obvious basis for your evaluation of my expertise in relation to this particular special issue theme made me suspect that your message is really just direct marketing for your business rather than a genuine attempt to reach out to a scholar engaged in relevant work. I have been subjected to my fair share of shoddy approaches of that kind (https://science-education-research.com/academic-standards/journals-and-poor-academic-practice/).  

So, I have done a search to see if I could find the earlier message that you refer to. I find that in your previous message you had explained that you ("we", so I assume you and Profs. Pichardo Martínez and Romero López) thought that I could make an excellent contribution based on my expertise and my paper "Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge", published in 'Foundations of Chemistry'.

 I would like to think that you were really impressed with 'Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge' and could see some obvious link between this work and the topic of how self-regulation can become a fundamental element that underlies much of the behaviour, both adapted and maladaptive, which develops during childhood and adolescence. Sadly, I am not seeing the connection.

Perhaps this is a failure of my imagination, in which case I would be very happy to hear from you, or from one of Prof. Pichardo Martínez or Prof. Romero López, about how you see my expertise as potentially offering insight into the special issue.

If I do not hear back from you with a feasible explanation, then I will simply conclude your messages are dishonest and that you see no more connection between my paper and your journal issue than I do, and this is yet another example of a journal that does not adhere to normal academic standards of conduct (presenting itself as if a serious scholarly endeavour whilst actually treating academic publishing as no more than selling a commodity).

I look forward to hearing what you found so interesting and pertinent about "Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge". I would be very pleased to find my cynicism is misplaced and that your approach was truthful: that you have indeed studied my paper and found something of genuine interest in my analysis of the presentation of chemistry concepts in the English school curriculum that you feel suggests I am in a position to make an original contribution about the influence of self-regulation on the personal, social, and academic development of children and adolescents. I look forward to your reflections on my paper.  

Best wishes

Keith

                        On 22/10/2020 12:10, [Assistant Editor] wrote:  

Dear Dr. Taber,

We contacted you on 10th of August, regarding a Special Issue entitled "Mental Health Intervention and Self-Regulation in Childhood and Adolescents", to be published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (ISSN 1660-4601, IF 2.849). Prof. Dr. M. Carmen Pichardo Martínez and Prof. Dr. Miriam Romero-López are serving as Guest Editors for this issue. Based on your expertise in this field, we think you could make an excellent contribution.

The main objective of this Special Issue is to explore how self-regulation can become a fundamental element that underlies much of the behavior, both adapted and maladaptive, which develops during childhood and adolescence. In general, this Issue aims to collect original contributions that work on issues related to the influence of self-regulation on the personal, social, and academic development of children and adolescents.

...


We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,

...
Assistant Editor

      On 10/08/2020 11:02, [Assistant Editor] wrote:  

Dear Dr. Taber,

The International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (ISSN 1660-4601, IF 2.849) is currently running a Special Issue entitled "Mental Health Intervention and Self-Regulation in Childhood and Adolescents". Prof. Dr. M. Carmen Pichardo Martínez and Prof. Dr. Miriam Romero-López are serving as Guest Editors for this issue. We think you could make an excellent contribution based on your expertise and your following paper:

Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge. FOUNDATIONS OF CHEMISTRY 2020, 22, 309-334.

The main objective of this Special Issue is to explore how self-regulation can become a fundamental element that underlies much of the behavior, both adapted and maladaptive, which develops during childhood and adolescence.

...
We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,
...
Assistant Editor

Update: a response to my letter

Dear [Assistant Editor]

Thank you for getting back to me.

I am surprised that you found 'some contents related to learning behaviours in children in [my] published work "Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge"' as the paper was a philosophical analysis of some aspects of a curriculum document in relation to canonical disciplinary knowledge. I do not recall any specific content that was substantially about learning behaviours in children.

However, I am pleased that you were able to find something of interest in your reading of the paper.

Best wishes

Keith

      On 10/08/2020 11:02, [Assistant Editor] wrote:  

Dear Dr. Taber,

Thank you for your kind feedback.

We found that there are some contents related to learning behaviors in children in your published work "Conceptual confusion in the chemistry curriculum: exemplifying the problematic nature of representing chemical concepts as target knowledge". We now understand that there may be a deviation between them.

We are sorry if this Special Issue does not fit into the scope of your research.

Kind regards,
...
Assistant Editor

At least the journal did me the courtesy of replying, and behaving politely. I chose to ignore the 'disclaimer' that "You may not copy this message in its entirety or in part, or disclose its contents to anyone" as I am not prepared to receive unsolicited emails on that basis. If people do not wish me to share their messages then they have the option of not bothering me in the first place. [Read: "It's a secret conference invitation: pass it on…"]

Responding to a misconception about my own teaching

Keith S. Taber

There are many postings here about things that learners said, and so presumably thought, about curriculum topics that would likely surprise, if not shock, the teachers who had taught them those topics. I am certainly not immune from being misunderstood. Today, I reflect on how someone seems to have understood some of my own teaching, and indeed seriously objected to it.

When I have called-out academic malpractice in this blog the targets have usually been conference organisers or journal administrators using misleading (or downright dishonest) techniques, or publishers mistreating authors. I feel somewhat uneasy about publicly contradicting a junior scholar. However, I also do not appreciate being publicly described as deliberately misleading a student, as has happened here, and my direct challenge to the blog author was rejected.

The accusation

A while back some Faculty colleagues referred me to a blog that included the following comments:

In the Faculty of Education students pursuing the MPhil or PhD take a research ethics lecture that presents the Tuskegee Syphilis Study as ethically sound, but only up to the year 1947 when penicillin was actively being used to treat syphilis. According to the Cambridge lecturer, that's the point when the study became unethical.

When I interrupted his lecture to object to his presentation, I was told by that lecturer that he'd never received any objections in his many, many years of teaching the same slides on the same course. That was not true. He knew and the Faculty knows and yet that false information continues to be disseminated to students, many of whom will go on to complete research in developing countries where their only reference for their ethical or unethical behavior is this lecture.

I am not named, but virtually anyone in my Faculty, or having taken graduate studies there in the last few years, would surely know who was being discussed. As is pointed out in our Educational Research course, and the Research Methods strand of other graduate courses, if you want to avoid someone being identified in your writing, it is not enough to not name them. I can be fairly confident the author of the comments above should have known that: it is a point made in the very lecture being criticised.

This blog posting seems to have received quite a lot of attention among students at the University Faculty where I worked. Yet the two claims here are simply not correct. The teaching is seriously misrepresented, and I certainly did not lie to this student.

The blog invited me to 'Leave a Reply', so I did. My comments were subject to moderation – and the next morning I found a response in my email in-box. My comments would not be posted, and the claims would not be amended: I was welcome to post my reply elsewhere, but not at the site where I was being criticised. So, here goes:

The (rejected) reply

I hope you are well.

I was directed to your blog by a group of scholars in the Faculty (Of Education at Cambridge). It is an impressive blog. However, I was rather surprised by some of what you have posted. I was the lecturer you refer to in your posting who taught the lecture on research ethics. I do indeed remember you interrupting me when I was presenting the Tuskagee syphilis study as an example of unethical research. I always encouraged students to participate in class, and would have welcomed your input at the end of my treatment of that example.

However, having read your comments here, I do need to challenge your account. I do not consider that the Tuskegee syphilis study was initially ethically sound, and I do not (and did not) teach that. I certainly did make the point that even if the study had been ethical until antibiotics were widely available, continuing it beyond that point would have been completely unjustifiable. But that was certainly not the only reason the study was unethical. Perhaps this would have been clearer if you had let me finish my own comments before interjecting – but even so I really do not understand how you could have interpreted the teaching that way.

Scheme (an annotated version of 'the ethical field', Taber, 2013a, Figure 9.1) used to summarise ethical issues in the Tuskegee syphilis study in my Educational Research lecture on ethical considerations of research.

The reference to 1947 in the posting quoted above relates to the 'continue' issue under research quality – the research (which involved medical staff periodically observing, but not treating, diseased {black, poor, mostly illiterate} men who had not been told of the true nature of their condition) was continued even when effective, safe treatment was available and any claims to the information being collected having potential to inform medical practice became completely untenable.

I may well have commented that no one had ever raised any objections to the presentation when I had given the lecture on previous occasions over a number of years – because that is true. No one had previously raised any concerns with me regarding my teaching of this example (or any aspect of the lecture as far as I can recall). I am not sure why you seem to so confidently assume otherwise: regarding this, you are simply wrong.

Usually in that lecture I would present a brief account of the Milgram 'learning' experiment, which would often lead to extended discussion about the ethical problems of that research in relation to its motivation and what was usefully learnt from it. Then, later in the session, I would talk about the Tuskegee study, which normally passed without comment. I had always assumed that was because the study is so obviously and seriously problematic that no one would see any reason to disagree with my critique. Then I would go on to discuss other issues and studies. I can assure you that no one had previously, before you, raised any concerns about my teaching of this example with me. If anyone in earlier cohorts had any concerns about this example they would have been welcome to talk to me about them – either in class, or privately afterwards. No one ever did.

I have no reason to believe that colleagues at Cambridge are deliberately disseminating false information to students, but then I do not audit other teaching officers' lectures, and I cannot speak for them. However, I can speak for myself, just as you rightly speak up for yourself. I have certainly always taken care to do my best not to teach things that are not the case. Of course, as a school and college science teacher I was often teaching models and simplifications, and not the 'whole' truth, but that is the nature of pedagogy, and is something we should make clear to learners (i.e., that they are being taught models and simplifications that can later in their studies be developed through more sophisticated treatments).

In a similar way, I used simplifications and models in my research methods lectures at Cambridge – for example, in terms of the 'shape' of a research project, or contrasting paradigms, or types of qualitative analysis, and so on, but would make explicit to the class that this is what they were: 'teaching models'. I entered the teaching profession to make a positive difference; to help learners develop, and to acquire new understandings and perspectives and skills; not to misinform people. I very much suspect that on occasions I must have got some things wrong, but, if so, such errors would always have been honest mistakes. I have never knowingly taught something that I thought was untrue.

So, whilst I admire your courage in standing up for what you believe, and I certainly wish you well, what you have written is not correct, and I trust my response will be posted so that your inaccurate remarks will not go unchallenged. I suspect that you are not being deliberately untruthful (you accuse me of telling you something I knew was not true: I try to be charitable and give people the benefit of doubt, so I would like to think that you were writing your comments in good faith), but I do not understand how you managed to come to the interpretation of my teaching that you did, and wish that you would have at least heard me out before interrupting the class, as that may have clarified my position for you. The Tuskegee syphilis study was a racist, unethical study that misled and abused some of those people with the lowest levels of economic and political power in society: people (not just the men subjected to the study, but also their families) who were betrayed by those employed by the public health service that they trusted (and should have been able to trust) to look after their interests. I do not see how anyone could consider it an ethically sound study, and I struggle to see why you would think anyone could.

Your claim that I lied about not having previously received complaints about my teaching of this topic before is simply untrue – it is a falsehood that I hope you will be prepared to correct.

What should a 'constructivist' teacher make of this?

I should be careful about criticising a student for thinking I was teaching something quite different from what I thought I was teaching. I have spent much of my career telling other teachers that learners will make sense of our teaching in terms of the interpretive resources they have available, and so they may interpret our teaching in unexpected ways. Learners will always be biased to understand in terms of their expectations and past experiences. We see it all the time in science teaching, as many of the posts here demonstrate.

I have described learning as being an incremental, interpretive, and so iterative, process and not a simple transfer of understanding (Taber, 2014). Teaching (indeed communication) is always a representation of thinking in a publicly accessible form (speech, gesture, text, diagrams {what sense does the figure above make out of the context of the lecture?}, models, etc.) – and whatever meaning may have informed the production of the representation, the representation itself does not have or contain meaning: the person accessing that presentation has to impose their own interpretation to form a meaning (Taber, 2013b). After teaching and writing about these ideas, I would be a hypocrite to claim that a learner could not misinterpret my own teaching as I can communicate perfectly to a room full of students from all around the world with different life experiences and varied disciplinary backgrounds!

Even so, I am still struggling to understand the interpretation put on my teaching in this case, despite going back to revisit the teaching materials a number of times. Most of the points I was making must have been completed disregarded to think I did not consider the study, which ran from 1932 to 1972 (Jones, 1993) unethical until 1947. So, even for someone who claims to be a constructivist teacher and knows there is always a risk of learners misconceiving teaching, this example seems an extreme case.

The confident claim that it was not true that I had not received previous complaints about my teaching of this example is even harder to understand. It is at least a good reminder for me not to assume I know what students are thinking or that they know what I am thinking, or can readily access the intended meaning in my teaching. I've made those points to others enough times, so I will try to see this incident as a useful reminder to follow my own advice.

Sources cited:

Just come to talk at our conference – don't worry what it's about

Keith S. Taber

Image by 정훈 김 from Pixabay 

Dubious conference invitations

I have raised the issue of dodgy conference invitations – such as being asked to talk at a conference in a field far from one's own, and to pay for the privilege of doing so – before in this blog, BUT a recent invitation from Kostas Chiotopoulos takes the top prize for the most desperate and pointless attempt by a commercial conference organiser to tempt academics who have given up the will to engage in meaningful scholarship.

The subject line of the email was:

"Rome, Italy, May 26-28, 2018. Malta Island, June 22-24, 2018. Mallorca Island, Spain, July 14-17, 2018 kst24@cam.ac.uk Hard Copy of Proceedings available again* kst24@cam.ac.uk A Certificate from the University will be given to all the Invited Speakers.."

Not exactly succinct, but then I'm sitting writing this while listening to (Rick Wakeman's excellent) 'The Myths and Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table' so I cannot claim to be inherently adverse to a long title!

Perhaps Kostas Chiotopoulos knows about some very clever marketing principles, but I could not help wondering:

  • why does my email address need to appear twice in the subject of the email?
  • what does the asterisk indicate – was the subject even longer originally and Kostas Chiotopoulos took pity on me?
  • Does a second full stop at the end of a sentence add emphasis?

Of course, one thing that was missing from the subject line was the topic of the conferences. Were these conferences on science education, or some closely related field? Perhaps that was the clever marketing ploy – Kostas Chiotopoulos got me intrigued enough to read the whole email in the expectation that the conferences would not actually be relevant to me, but wanting to check just in case he might prove me wrong!

However, it seems Kostas Chiotopoulos is even more wily than that! So I carefully read the email and find that I am invited to be an 'invited lecturer' at conferences in:

  • Paris, or in Rome, Italy
  • or in Malta Island, or in Mallorca Island, Spain
  • or even [sic] in Corfu Island, Greece, or in Dubrovnik, Croatia
  • or in any London, UK [n.b., there is only one London, UK I'm aware of] or in Rome, Italy
  • or in Bern, Switzerland, or in Madrid, Spain
  • or in Cambridge, UK, or in Venice, March 2019 …

I'm told that "A certificate from the Universities that sponsor each particular event will be given to" (I'm guessing my University, Cambridge, is not issuing the certificate for the Cambridge conference!)

I'm told my contributions can be published in journals published by the likes of "…SAGE, Springer Verlag, Elsevier…" – publishers one might expect would have their own editorial and peer review procedures.

So what information is missing?

Well I cannot complain that Kostas Chiotopoulos is inviting me to talk at a conference outside my field, as the invitation contains absolutely no information about the fields, subjects, disciplines, themes, or topics, of any of these conferences.

So it seems that things have got so bad (cf. Taber, 2018) that commercial companies are now prepared to sell 'invited lecturer' status to anyone who is prepared to pay, to talk about anything they like, without any pretence that these are serious academic conferences that are actually about something.

Retirement, take me soon.

Source cited:
  • Taber, K. S. (2018). The end of academic standards? A lament on the erosion of scholarly values in the post-truth world. Chemistry Education Research and Practice, 19(1), 9-14. doi:10.1039/C7RP90012K [Free access]

Read about 'Conferences and poor academic practice'

First published 5th April 2018 at http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/kst24/

An unpublished Theory of Everything

Keith S. Taber

A TOE? (Image by congerdesign from Pixabay)

Dear Dr. Prof. Tambara Federico


Thank you for sending me your manuscript reporting your "revolutionary" paper

offering your

"own comprehensive, mass-related physical-mathematical Research Study, proposing new scientific data and formulas [sic] with a view to making it possible to unify the four universal interaction fields…, which as a matter of fact cover all possible physical as well as scientific-mathematical aspects and domains of reality itself…"

and incorporating your "FOUR REMARKABLE CONCLUSIVE THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS".

You ask that I (and the others among the "500 SCIENTIFIC ADDRESSEES" to whom you sent the paper) "will kindly agree to publish" your "Research Study in Your worldwide famous scientific Reviews and / or Journals as soon as possible". I assume you have contacted me, inter alia, seeking publication in Chemistry Education Research and Practice?

I must decline your request, on several grounds.

Your paper does not seen to be within the scope of the journal. That may seem odd when you propose a TOE (Theory of Everything). I am certainly open to the argument that in principle all academic fields could be reduced to fundamental physics, but not that this is always sensible. So for example in chemistry we have concepts such as acidity, resonance, hyperconjugation, oxidation, and so forth. These are probably, in principle, capable of being redescribed in terms of fundamental physics – but any such description is likely to be too cumbersome to be of practical value in chemistry. We have these specifically chemical concepts because the complexity of the phenomena leads to emergent properties that are most usefully considered at the level of chemistry, not physics.

How much more so the concepts related to teaching and learning chemistry! Perhaps pedagogy could (again, in principle) be reduced to physics – but that would be little more than an impressive technical achievement of no practical value. Sadly, a theory of everything tells us very little of value about most things.

Secondly, the journal has peer review processes that need to be followed, and editorial fiat is not used to publish a paper without following these processes. You may well have made major breakthroughs in this fundamental area of science, but science is communal, and your work has no status in the field until other experts have critiqued and evaluated it.

So, thirdly, any submission needs to be made through the journal's on-line review system, allowing proper editorial screening and then – should it be considered suitable (which it would not in this case, see above) allowing it to be sent to review.

However, submitting a manuscript for formal review requires you to make a number of declarations. One of these is that the manuscript you wish to be considered is not published, under review or consideration, or has been submitted to, any other journal. As you have adopted a 'scatter gun' approach to submitting your work, you would need to wait until you have received formal notification that the other 499 scholarly outlets approached are declining your manuscript before you could make a formal submission.

As you are concerned that unless your work is published it may be plagiarised, I suggest you deposit your paper in one of the many repositories now available for posting unpublished documents. This will make your work available and will demonstrate your priority in anything that may later be judged (in peer review) by experts in the field as novelty in your work.


First published 12th March 2017 at http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/kst24/

Keith S. Taber – acclaimed polymath (apparently)!

Keith S. Taber

Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay 

I've always admired those people who seem to be able to turn their hand to a wide range of activities and master them at will: people like Jonathan Miller. Most of us, however, are best advised to find something we are reasonably good at, and that we have a strong interest in, and then to work hard to develop some worthy level of expertise. I always thought that it was realistic to settle for that, but I am increasingly finding that in this post-truth world (where if we say something with conviction often enough it can be treated as reality) I have aimed too low.

The idea that the scholarly world adheres to values of honesty, integrity, balance and so forth seems pretty passé. Rather those arranging conferences, founding journals or setting up book proposals, seem to feel that hyperbole, exaggeration, guesswork, flattery, and other cheap marketing tactics are fair game as they fish (or should that be phish) for contributors.

At least that is the only explanation I've come up with for my apparent reputation as a polymath…

Keith Taber: Eminent biologist

In a previous blog posting I reported how I was surprised to be invited as an eminent Plenary Speaker at an International Conference on Synthetic Biology. I am clearly not qualified to be considered an expert in synthetic biology, so considered this invitation had to be a scam. My reply to the conference organisers (and some of the eminent scientists on the scientific committee) asking why they thought I was suitable to be a plenary speaker on synthetic biology did not get a response.

However, I have just been having one of my periodic attempts to sort my email in-box and could not help but notice that my reputation for expertise is not restricted to science education (which I would claim) and synthetic biology (which I struggle to find a justification for), but rather that I seem to be a recognised authority across a range of scientific fields.

My immense contributions to physics

So I can add areas of chemistry and physics to biology. To be fair I am a chartered chemist and chartered physicist, but had always seen my expertise within these disciplines as limited to chemistry education and physics education. It seems I am selling myself short. Rather, it would appear that I have made "immense contribution to the field" of atomic and nuclear physics. I am not sure what these contributions are, but presumably the organisers of the "International Conference on Atomic and Nuclear Physics" must have something specific in mind?

My eminent contributions to chemistry

I feel I have made some modest contributions to chemistry (and am very proud that this was recognised through the RSC Education Award) – but would certainly not claim anything that goes beyond my educational work. A mild fantasy that the degassing that occurs when dissolving salt displaces dissolved air from water might become know as the Taber effect has yet to come to fruition. Yet apparently I have made "eminent contribution in [the] field" of computational chemistry. Perhaps my undergraduate project on computerised orbital calculations for TTF-TCNQ was not as flawed as I had suspected at the time. Certainly the editors of the Frontiers in Computational Chemistry book series were interested in calling upon my expertise.

 Keith Taber: An expert in computer science

Indeed it appears that my work in computing is more widely recognised. I was invited to join the committee for a conference where the organisers were "very interested in the contributions you have made in Computer Science", considering me "an expert". Amazing considering that I am so 'fingers and thumbs' that I often have to have several attempts at the passwords to get into my personal computers.

Keith Taber: Eminent researcher with excellent contributions to medical sciences

Moreover it seems my strengths are not limited to the so-called pure sciences. Additionally I am told that I have made such "excellent contributions to the field of medical sciences" that  "the scientific committee of the conference [on HIV & AIDS] is aware of your published works in this field". I'm struggling to identify which publications they are referring to, but then my memory is not so good. 

Indeed it seems that I am considered such an "eminent researcher" in Otolaryngology that I have been invited to join the editorial board of a new international journal in the specialism. That, on getting this invitation, I felt the need to check exactly what Otolaryngology is, merely reinforces just how unreliable my memory has become. Indeed, I'm wondering if there are any other areas of expertise I have developed a reputation for, that my modesty has allowed me to forget. 

Addendum: it seems I am considered, at least by by a specialist journal inviting my "prominent contribution", to also be "eminent" in the area of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.

First published 3rd December 2016 at at http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/kst24/

(Read about 'Journals and poor academic practice')

(Read about 'Conferences and poor academic practice')

Addendum:

My significant contributions to psychotherapy

It seems from an invitation to join the editorial board of another new journal that I am also known as an expert in psychotherapy where I "have made significant contributions, worth mentioning" with "achievements in various stages" indeed. It seems such expertise is very time-sensitive as the invitation "is valid only for one week and expires if no communication is received from" me.

Further addendum: more than a month after that time-sensitive request, I had another invitation to join the editorial board of this 'International Journal' of psychotherapy as my "knowledge of the subject and the contributions to field are noteworthy". I feel a bit bad about not accepting joining the journal as they think my "expertise will surely take it to great heights".

My prominence in immunodiagnostics

I was honoured to be "cordially invite[d] … to be … an Editorial Board Member for the Journal of Immunodiagnostics" considering that the journal manager, Maria Carla was able to "assure [me] of international quality and standards of our articles published in our journals, using state-of-the-art prominent reviewers and editorial board". Good to be considered prominent and state of the art.

My remarkable achievements in human resources

I have been invited to join the Editorial Board of Modern Management Forum, a new journal from Universe Scientific Publishing. This invitation has been made "In light of [my] remarkable achievements in Human Resources", which apparently were discernible when reading my review published in Science & Education of a science education handbook.

Is there no end to my (supposed) achievements?

Well, the praise keeps rolling in, as I get asked to write, chair, edit, talk, etcetera in a vast range of fields where, despite claims to the contrary, I clearly have no experise, or where someone (or some machine) imagines that my writngs about science education demonstrate eminence in unrelated areas…

(Read about the faint parise

(Read about the Illogical connections between what is cited, and what they consequently invite you to do)

(Read about examples of vague praise used to justify invitations)

Senior academics and conference scams

Expertise in the field – science education, and synthetic biology? Senior academics and conference scams.

Image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay 

It is considered an honour to be invited as a plenary speaker at a major international conferences – and an indicator of recognition as an expert in a field.

So it seems odd when one is invited to be a plenary speaker at a conference in a field that one has never worked in and so has no published work.

On 02/11/2015 17:21, Syntheticbiology 2016 wrote:

 Honorable Invitation from Synthetic Biology 2016 at London UK

Dear Dr. Keith S. Taber,
 
Basing on your expertise in the related field, we are pleasured to welcome your eminent Plenary Speaker at the upcoming 2nd International Conference on Synthetic Biology 2016 London UK, which is going to be held during August 18-20, 2016 London UK.
 
Synthetic Biology 2016, a three day event consisting of a scientific program, workshops, symposiums, comprehensive talks, special sessions, oral and poster presentations of peer-reviewed contributed papers and exciting and innovative research products which can be exhibited for further development of Synthetic Biology.
 
Synthetic Biology research area interconnects Systems Biology, Computational Biology, Nano biotechnology, Biophysics, Evolutionary Biology, Molecular Biology, Protein Engineering, Bio-Chemical Engineering and Genetic Engineering. …

[Note – science education does not get a mention here.] …
 

My response:

On 26/02/2016 19:51, Prof Keith S Taber wrote:

Dear Kevin

I apologise for not giving this invitation attention earlier, but for some reason it was in my SPAM folder, so I had not seen it.

I am of course honoured to be invited as a Plenary Speaker at your conference. However, your invitation did not offer any details of what this would involve. I assume you repay travel expenses for your Plenary Speakers, but do you offer free accommodation for the whole conference, or just the day of the Plenary Lecture?

Do you offer a fee to Plenary Speakers, or do you simply cover their conference fees?

I would also be keen to know how you came to choose me as potential Plenary Speaker at this conference – and which area of my research the conference organising committee were especially keen for me to speak to your delegates about.

I look forward to receiving more details relating to your kind invitation.

Best wishes

Keith

This was copied to several academics at prestigious universities who were apparently part of the organising committee that had invited me:

  • Dr. Oscar Ces (OC), a Reader in Chemistry at Imperial College London
  • Professor Krams who holds a Chair in Molecular Bioengineering at Imperial College, London
  • Anthony Forster Professor at Uppsala University, Sweden
  • Vsevolod V Gurevich, Professor at Vanderbilt University.

Not surprisingly, I did not receive a reply from ‘Kevin’ (or anyone else) who had written to invite me as a plenary speaker – not to develop the invitation, to explain it, or apologise for it being a mistake (perhaps they meant to invite that other Keith S. Taber well known for his work in synthetic biology?)

This seems another sign of the sad demise of academia as a body worthy of being respected in the public domain. I wonder how many other academics with no connection to this field were invited as plenary speakers (but presumably actually would be charged fees if they did wish to speak). I find this type of scam as annoying (although my email application seemed to know I was being spammed), as I teach research methods, and it is difficult for new researchers to sift the decent conferences from the less worthy ones, when this type of irresponsible marketing ploy is used. I tell students to look to see if conference committees include senior academic they recognise from their reading, as one indicator of conference quality. In this case, committee members from top universities was no assurance of the quality of conference processes.

I am not surprised at some conference organisers behaving in such disreputable ways – I guess to them conferences are just events to be marketed in the search for profits. What I find very sad is that top academics from such highly regarded institutions put their names to these scams*, giving them a veneer of respectability they clearly do not deserve.

Read about 'Conferences and poor academic practice'

First published 24th July 2014 at http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/kst24/

* This assumes, of course, that the academics named as scientific committee members have agreed to join such a committee, which I found when investigating another dubious invitation is not always the case! ⚗︎

Publish at speed, recant at leisure

Keith S. Taber

Image by InstagramFOTOGRAFIN from Pixabay

In scholarly circles it is sometimes said "Publish, or be dammed" (a variation on the 'Publish and be dammed" retort to blackmail), and there is no doubt that, generally, success in academia – when judged in such mundane terms as getting academic positions, keeping them, getting promoted – in large part requires academics to build up their publication list.

The value of peer review

Quality should obviously be more important than quantity, but that requires evaluations of the former. The peer review process that is used by most journals is far from perfect, but is said (like democracy) to be, despite its flaws, the best system we have. Quality journals depend upon rigorous peer review to ensure that articles published will be recognised within a field to be robust and significant. Peer review takes time. Some publishers pressure editors and reviewers to work to a short time scale – but there is always a fine balance: the review needs to be done carefully, and by experts – rather than either hastily, or by those who are not really qualified but will have a go because they want the reviewing on their c.v (resumé)

Authors are under pressure to publish, and publish quickly. (Indeed I am aware that recently university employees in one country were put under pressure to get published quickly even if that meant compromising where the work was published).

Peer review not only leads to rejection of substandard work, but also provides feedback on submitted work that could be published, suggesting improvements indicated. Such suggestions inevitably are somewhat subjective – but I think most editors would agree that generally the peer review process improves the quality of the final published article – even if it often delays the process by some months and requires authors to go back and do further work when they might have hoped to have moved on to the next article they want to write.

Ultimately peer review (when done carefully by qualified reviewers) means not only that there is quality control that rejects poor work, but that several people scrutinise published work, point out any mistakes missed by authors, and often suggest changes that will lead to work more likely to impress the readership and have lasting impact. As authors we should welcome rigorous peer review of our work – even if sometimes we do not agree with the criticisms of our precious writing.

Instant gratification – immediate publication

Since the advent of on-line publishing, it has become very easy to start a journal, and the number of journals out there has proliferated. (Read 'Challenges to academic publishing from the demand for instant open access to research'.) This makes it hard sometimes, especially for new scholars, to know which journals are of high quality. Many journal publishers are looking to get a competitive edge by speeding up processes. I know from my own role as an editor that it is now possible, sometimes, to get a paper from submission to publication in around a month – but this is still the exception and a quality journal will never look to speed up the process by deliberately selecting referees who are not thorough or avoiding author revisions that are indicated.

So I was rather surprised to get an invitation from a journal I was not familiar with, International Educational Scientific Research Journal, entitled 'Publish your paper in May issue' on 15th April. The idea that I could submit something and have it published two weeks later seemed unlikely if there was any kind of robust peer review process in place. However, the email suggested that the

"Last date for manuscript submission is 30th April, 2016 for 1st May, 2016 Issue".

Really?

Dubious impact factors

Of course it is quite possible that the 1st May issue may not appear till September (that would not be a first in journal publishing), but otherwise this seemed to shout "we publish anything, quality not an issue". This is a journal which charges fees to authors – and the homepage suggests that the cost depends on the length of the manuscript and (oddly) the number of authors. However the email also claimed an Impact factor of 3.606.

If I was a new scholar I would likely be very impressed by an impact factor of over 3, as I know many quality specialist journals in my field with much lower impact factors. However, visiting the webpage revealed that the impact factor has not be awarded by Thomson Reuters, the organisation used by most quality journals, but rather by 'SJIF'.

The impact factors used by top journals reflect how many times (on average) each of their published papers are cited in articles in the highly ranked journals over a period. I found the webpage of the SJIF and found that it evaluates journals on a wide range of criteria, such as number of papers published, language of papers, quality of graphics and many other things. Some of the criteria used are certainly relevant to journal quality – but this type of evaluation is not comparable to the impact factors that are recognised and used by the top academic publishers.

The academic publishing landscape is very diverse today. The possibility of open publishing, and the easy access to tools to publish internet journals, is to be welcomed – but makes it more difficult for scholars to know which journals are genuinely of quality. There is certainly no intrinsic value in a journal having slow processes and all authors welcome a speedy review and publication process. Ultimately, however, submit today, publish tomorrow is likely to mean ignored thereafter.

 

Read more about 'Journals and poor academic practice'

 

(First published 24th April 2016 at http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/kst24/)