(Or, if not, knocking a pharmaceutical intervention journal)
Keith S. Taber
an International Peer-Reviewed, Multi-disciplinary Scientific Journal (https://www.scriptionpublications.org/journal-details/10/Journal-of-Pharmaceutical-Interventions#)
Yesterday,
Yesterday I was setting up a discrete webpage for characterising predatory journals as my page on 'Journals and poor academic practice' was looking a bit text heavy. I was listing a number of the features that I saw in invitations to publish in journals that seemed to fit the descriptor 'predatory' (after my money, and not really interested in the quality of scholarship they publish).
…today…
As if by magic…
When I turned on the computer this morning I found an email from the Journal of Pharmaceutical Interventions asking me to contribute to the journal. It was almost like they were looking to offer an illustration of several of the features I was highlighting:
being in a rush to get submissions (perhaps because they do not seem to have published a single article yet)
accepting a wide range of different 'article' types
praising my eminence in a field I have never worked in
name-checking and claiming to have read something (of little relevance to the inviting journal!) I've published
a relatively broad range of topics 1
This does not prove that the journal will not have high editorial standards, but it is not looking promising. 2
…and tomorrow?
I guess I will be pretty busy if I am going to learn enough about the field of Pharmaceutical Interventions to produce something of publishable quality within a week.
Notes
1 The list in the email does not look overly inclusive, but the website (https://www.scriptionpublications.org/journal-details/10/Journal-of-Pharmaceutical-Interventions – accessed 2021-11-18) offers the following list of topics a being within the journal's scope – including some that certainly do not look like pharmaceutical science to me!
Analytical Chemistry
Bioanalytical Chemistry
Bio-Chemical Science
Biomedical Engineering
Bio-medical Sciences
Biopharmaceutics
Biopharmaceutics and Pharmacokinetics
Clinical and Hospital Pharmacy
Computational Chemistry
Cosmetics and Neutraceuticals
Dental and Medical Sciences
Drug Design
Drug Development
Drug Discovery
Drug Regulatory Affairs
Drug Targeting
Drug-Receptor Interactions
Environmental Chemistry
Environmental Sciences
Fermentation Technology
Fisheries and Dairy Science
Food and Nutrition Science
Genetics and Proteomics
Genomics
Green Chemistry
Health Sciences
Herbal Technology
Industrial Pharmacy
Intellectual property rights in Chemical Sciences
Life Sciences
Marine Biology
Medical Pharma
Medication Management
Medicinal Chemistry
Medicine and Neurobiology
Microbiology and Nuclear Pharmacy
Molecular Drug Design
Nanomedicine
Nanotechnology/ nanomedicine
Natural Chemistry
Natural Product Research
Novel Drug Delivery Systems
Oncology
Patent Laws
Pharma Administration
Pharma Engineering
Pharmaceutical Analysis
Pharmaceutical Analysis
Pharmaceutical Biotechnology and Microbiology
Pharmaceutical Care
Pharmaceutical Chemistry
Pharmaceutical Formulation
Pharmaceutical Public Health
Pharmaceutical Sciences
Pharmaceutics
Pharmacodynamics
Pharmacoeconomics
Pharmacoepidemiology
Pharmacogenetics and Pharmacogenomics
Pharmacogenomics
Pharmacogenomics and Physiology
Pharmacognosy and Ethanobotany
Pharmacology and Toxicology
Pharmacotherapy
Pharmacovigilance
Pharmacovigilance
Pharmacy Practice and Hospital Pharmacy
Physiological and Biochemical Effects of Drugs on the Body
Phytochemistry
Phytochemistry and QC / QA
Phytomedicine
Plant pathology and Entomology
Polymer Sciences
Quality Assurance
Regulatory Affairs
Soil and Seed Science
Synthetic Chemistry
2 The journal claims:
"Every article submitted to our platform is peer-reviewed by a distinguished editorial board and expert reviewers at the same moment, peer reviewers follow rigorous publication ethics thus confirming the article standards of significance and scientific excellence and deliver a quality systematic service to the Authors, Reviewers and Readers throughout the publication process….Every article submitted to the journal is rigorously examined and published only after the acceptance of Editorial Board members."
I would be happy to learn this is so, and that rigorous editorial processes are simply not well reflected by the sloppy direct marketing approach to encouraging submissions. I guess only time will tell.
Can an article be simultaneously out of scope, and limited in scope?
Keith S. Taber
Not only had two paragraphs from the abstract gone missing, along with the figures, but the journal article had also lost two-thirds of its authors.
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 (currently $1519, according to the website), 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.
Although the journal is called the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice (not to be confused, even if the publishers would like it to be, with the well-established journal Chemistry Education Research and Practice) only a few of the papers published are actually education studies.
One of the articles that IS on an educational topic is called 'An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students [sic] Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum' (Mohialdin, 2018a), by Vian Mohialdin, an Associate Professor of Pathology and Molecular Medicine at McMaster University in Ontario.
A single-authored paper by Prof. Mohialdin
Review articles
Research journals tend to distinguish between different types of articles, and most commonly:
papers that report empirical studies,
articles which set out theoretical perspectives/positions, and
articles that offer reviews of the existing literature on a topic.
'An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum' is classified as a review article.
A review article?
Typically, review articles cite a good deal of previous literature. Prof. Mohialdin cites a modest number of previous publications – just 10. Now one might suspect that perhaps the topic of point-of-care ultrasound in undergraduate medical education is a fairly specialist topic, and perhaps even a novel topic, in which case there may not be much literature to review. But a review of ultrasound in undergraduate medical education published a year earlier (Feilchenfeld, Dornan, Whitehead & Kuper, 2017) cited over a hundred works.
Actually a quick inspection of Mohialdin's paper reveals it is not a review article at all, as it reports a single empirical study. Either the journal has misclassified the article, or the author submitted it as a review article and the journal did not query this. To be fair, the journal website does note that classification into article types "is subjective to some degree". 1
So, is it a good study?
Not a full paper
Well, that is not easy to evaluate as the article is less than two pages in length whereas most research studies in education are much more substantial. Even the abstract of the article seems lacking (see the table below, left hand column). An abstract of a research paper is usually expected to very briefly report something about the research sample/population (who participated in the study?); the research design/methodology (is it an experiment, a survey…), and the results (what did the researchers find out?) The abstract of Prof. Mohialdin's paper misses all these points and so tells readers nothing about the research.
The main text also lacks some key information. The study is a type of research report that is sometimes called a 'practice paper' – the article reports some teaching innovation carried out by practitioners in their own teaching context. The text does give some details of what the practice was – but simply writing about practice is not usually considered sufficient for a research paper. At the least, there needs to be some evaluation of the innovation.
The research design for the evaluation is limited to two sentences under the section heading 'Conclusion/Result Result'. (Mohialdin, 2018a, p.1)
Here there has been some evaluation, but the report is very sketchy, and so might seem inadequate for a research report. Under a rather odd section heading, the reader is informed,
"A questionnaire was handed to the first year undergraduate medical students at the end of session four, to evaluate their hands on ultrasound session experience."
Mohialdin, 2018a, p.1
That one sentence comprises the account of data collection.
The questionnaire is not reproduced for readers. Nor is it described (how many questions, what kinds of questions?) Nor is its development reported. There is not any indication of how many of the 150 students in the population completed the questionnaire, whether ethical procedures were followed 2, where the students completed the questionnaire (for example, was this undertaken in a class setting where participants were being observed by the teaching staff, or did they take it away with them "at the end of session four" to complete in private?) or whether they were able to respond anonymously (rather than have their teachers be able to identify who made which responses).
Perhaps there are perfectly appropriate responses to these questions – but as the journal peer reviewers and editor do not seem to have asked, the reader is left in the dark.
Invisible analytical techniques
Similarly, details of the analysis undertaken are, again, sketchy. A reader is told:
"Answers were collected and data was [sic] analyzed into multiple graphs (as illustrated on this poster)."
So, readers are left with no idea what questions were asked, nor what responses were offered, that led to the graphs – that are not provided.
There were also comments – presumably [sic – it would be good to be told] in response to open-ended items on the questionnaire.
"The comments that we [sic, not I] got from this survey were mainly positive; here are a few of the constructive comments that we [sic] received:…
We [sic] also received some comments about recommendations and ways to improve the sessions (listed below):…"
Mohialdin, 2018a, 1-2.
A reader might ask who decided which comments should be counted as positive (e.g., was it a rater independent of the team who implemented the innovation?), and what does 'mainly' mean here (e.g., 90 of 100 responses? 6 of 11?).
So, in summary, there is no indication of what was asked, who exactly responded, or how the analysis was carried out. As the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice claims to be a peer reviewed journal one might expect reviewers to have recommended at least that such information (along with the missing graphs) should be included before publication might be considered.
There is also another matter that one would expect peer reviewers, and especially the editor, to have noticed.
Not in scope
Research journals usually have a scope – a range of topics they publish articles on. This is normally made clear in the information on journal websites. Despite its name, the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice does not restrict itself to chemistry education, but invites work on all aspects of the chemical sciences, and indeed most of its articles are not educational.
Outside the scope of the journal? (Original Image by Magnascan from Pixabay )
But 'An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum' is not about chemistry education or chemistry in a wider sense. Ultrasound diagnostic technology falls under medical physics, not a branch of chemistry. And, more pointedly, teaching medical students to use ultrasound to diagnose medical conditions falls under medical education – as the reference to 'Medical Students' in the article title rather gives away. So, it is odd that this article was published where it was, as it should have been rejected from this particular journal as being out of scope.
Despite the claims of Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice to be a peer reviewed journal (that means that all submissions are supposedly sent out to, and scrutinised and critiqued by, qualified experts on the topic who make recommendations about whether something is sufficient quality for publication, and, if so, whether changes should be made first – like perhaps including graphs that are referred to, but missing), the editor managed to decide the submission should be published just seven days after it was submitted for consideration.
The chemistry journal accepted the incomplete report of the medical education study, to be described as a review article, one week after submission.
The journal article as a truncated conference poster?
The reference to "multiple graphs (as illustrated on this poster)" (my emphasis) suggested that the article was actually the text (if not the figures) of a poster presented at a conference, and a quick search revealed that Mohialdin, Wainman and Shali had presented on 'An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum' at an experimental biology (sic, not chemistry) conference.
A poster at a conference is not considered a formal publication, so there is nothing inherently wrong with publishing the same material in a journal – although often posters report either quite provisional or relatively inconsequential work so it is unusual for the text of a poster to be considered sufficiently rigorous and novel to justify appearing in a research journal in its original form. It is notable that despite being described by Prof. Mohialdin as a 'preliminary' study, the journal decided it was of publishable quality.
Although norms vary between fields, it is generally the case that a conference poster is seen as something quite different from a journal article. There is a limited amount of text and other material that can be included on a poster if it is to be readable. Conferences often have poster sessions where authors are invited to stand by their poster and engage with readers – so anyone interested can ask follow-up questions to supplement the often limited information given on the poster itself.
By contrast, a journal article has to stand on its own terms (as the authors cannot be expected to pop round for a conversation when you decide to read it). It is meant to present an argument for some new knowledge claim(s): an argument that depends on the details of the research conceptualisation, design, and data analysis. So what may seem as perfectly adequate in a poster may well not be sufficient to satisfy journal peer review.
The abstract of the conference poster was published in a journal (Mohialdin, Wainman & Shali, 2018) and I have reproduced that abstract in the table below, in the right hand column.
With the technological progress of different types of portable Ultrasound machines, there is a growing demand by all health care providers to perform bedside Ultrasonography, also known as Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS). This technique is becoming extremely useful as part of the Clinical Skills/Anatomy teaching in the undergraduate Medical School Curriculum.
With the technological progress of different types of portable Ultrasound machines, there is a growing demand by all health care providers to perform bedside Ultrasonography, also known as Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS). This technique is becoming extremely useful as part of the Clinical Skills/Anatomy teaching in the undergraduate Medical School Curriculum.
Teaching/training health care providers how to use these portable Ultrasound machines can complement their physical examination findings and help in a more accurate diagnosis, which leads to a faster and better improvement in patient outcomes. In addition, using portable Ultrasound machines can add more safety measurements to every therapeutic/diagnostic procedure when it is done under an Ultrasound guide. It is also considered as an extra tool in teaching Clinical Anatomy to Medical students. Using an Ultrasound is one of the different imaging modalities that health care providers depend on to reach their diagnosis, while also being the least invasive method.
Teaching/training health care providers how to use these portable Ultrasound machines can complement their physical examination findings and help in a more accurate diagnosis, which leads to a faster and better improvement in patient outcomes. In addition, using portable Ultrasound machines can add more safety measurements to every therapeutic/diagnostic procedure when it is done under an Ultrasound guide. It is also considered as an extra tool in teaching Clinical Anatomy to Medical students. Using an Ultrasound is one of the different imaging modalities that health care providers depend on to reach their diagnosis, while also being the least invasive method.
We thought investing in training the undergraduate Medical students on the basic Ultrasound scanning skills as part of their first year curriculum will help build up the foundation for their future career.
We thought investing in training the undergraduate Medical students on the basic Ultrasound scanning skills as part of their first year curriculum will help build up the foundation for their future career.
The research we report in this manuscript is a preliminary qualitative study. And provides the template for future model for teaching a hand on Ultrasound for all health care providers in different learning institutions.
A questionnaire was handed to the first year medical students to evaluate their hands on ultrasound session experience. Answers were collected and data was [sic] analyzed into multiple graphs.
Abstracts from Mohialdin's paper, plus the abstract from co-authored work presented at the Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting according to the journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. (See note 4 for another version of the abstract.)
The abstract includes some very brief information about what the researchers did (which is strangely missing from the journal article's abstract). Journals usually put limits on the word count for abstracts. Surely the poster's abstract was not considered too long for the journal, so someone (the author? the editor?) simply dropped the final two paragraphs – that is, arguably the two most relevant paragraphs for readers?
The lost authors?
Not only had two paragraphs from the abstract gone missing, along with the figures, but the journal article had also lost two-thirds of its authors.
A poster with multiple authors
Now in the academic world authorship of research reports is not an arbitrary matter (Taber, 2018). An author is someone who has made a substantial intellectual contribution to the work (regardless of how much of the writing-up they undertake, or whether they are present when work is presented at a conference). That is a simple principle, which unfortunately may lead to disputes as it needs to be interpreted when applied; but, in most academic fields, there are conventions regarding what kind of contribution is judged significant and substantive enough for authorship
It may well be that Prof. Mohialdin was the principal investigator on this study and that the contributions of Prof. Wainman and Prof. Shali were more marginal, and so it was not obvious whether or not they should be considered authors when reporting the study. But it is less easy to see how they qualified for authorship on the poster but not on the journal article with the same title which seems (?) to be the text of the poster (i.e., describes itself as being the poster). [It is even more difficult to see how they could be authors of the poster when it was presented at one conference, but not when it was presented somewhere else. 4]
Of course, one trivial suggestion might be to suggest that Wainman and Shali contributed the final two paragraphs of the abstract, and the graphs, and that without these the – thus reduced – version in the journal only deserved one author according to the normal academic authorship conventions. That is clearly not an acceptable rationale as academic studies have to be understood more holistically than that!
Perhaps Wainman and Shali asked to have their names left off the paper as they did not want to be published in a journal of chemistry that would publish a provisional and incomplete account of a medical education practice study classified as a review article. Maybe they suspected that this would hardly enhance their scholarly reputations?
Work cited:
Feilchenfeld, Z., Dornan, T., Whitehead, C., & Kuper, A. (2017). Ultrasound in undergraduate medical education: a systematic and critical review. Medical Education. 51: 366-378. doi: 10.1111/medu.13211
Mohialdin, V. (2018a) An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum. Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 2 (2), 1-2.
Mohialdin, V. (2018b). An overview of the first year undergraduate medical students feedback on the point of care ultrasound curriculum. Journal of Health Education Research & Development, 6, 30.
Mohialdin, V., Wainman, B. & Shali, A. (2018) An overview of the first year Undergraduate Medical Students Feedback on the Point of Care Ultrasound Curriculum. The FASIB Journal. 32 (S1: Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting Abstracts), 636.4
Taber, K. S. (2018). Assigning Credit and Ensuring Accountability. In P. A. Mabrouk & J. N. Currano (Eds.), Credit Where Credit Is Due: Respecting Authorship and Intellectual Property (Vol. 1291, pp. 3-33). Washington, D.C.: American Chemical Society. [The publisher appears to have made this open access]
Footnotes:
1 The following section appears as part of the instructions for authors:
"Article Types
Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice accepts Original Articles, Review, Mini Review, Case Reports, Editorial, and Letter to the Editor, Commentary, Rapid Communications and Perspectives, Case in Images, Clinical Images, and Conference Proceedings.
In general the Manuscripts are classified in to following [sic] groups based on the criteria noted below [I could not find these]. The author(s) are encouraged to request a particular classification upon submitting (please include this in the cover letter); however the Editor and the Associate Editor retain the right to classify the manuscript as they see fit, and it should be understood by the authors that this process is subjective to some degree. The chosen classification will appear in the printed manuscript above the manuscript title."
2 The ethical concerns in this kind of research are minimal, and in an area like medical education one might feel there is a moral imperative for future professionals to engage in activities to innovate and to evaluate such innovations. However, there is a general principle that all participants in research should give voluntary, informed consent.
According to Article 2.1 of that document, Research Ethics Board Review is required for any research involving "living human participants". There are some exemptions, including (Article 2.5): "Quality assurance and quality improvement studies, program evaluation activities, and performance reviews, or testing within normal educational requirements when used exclusively for assessment, management or improvement purposes" (my emphasis).
My reading then is that this work would not have been subject to requiring approval following formal ethical review if it had been exclusively used for internal purposes, but that publication of the work as research means it should have been subject to Research Ethics Board Review before being carried out. This is certainly in line with advice to teachers who invite their own students to participate in research into their teaching that may be reported later (in a thesis, at a conference, etc.) (Taber, 2013, pp.244-248).
3 Some days ago, I wrote to the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice (in reply to an invitation to publish in the journal), with a copy of the email direct to the editor, asking where I could find the graphs referred to in this paper, but have not yet had a response. If I do get a reply I will report this in the comments below.
4 Since drafting this post, I have found another publication with the same title published in an issue of another journal reporting conference proceedings (Mohialdin, 2018b):
A third version of the publication (Mohialdin, 2018b).
The piece begins with the same material as in the table above. It ends with the following account of empirical work:
A questionnaire was handed to the first year undergraduate medical students at the end of session four, to evaluate their hands on ultrasound session experience. Answers were collected and data was [sic] analyzed into multiple graphs. The comments that we [sic] got from this survey were mainly positive; here are a few of the constructive comments that we [sic] received: This was a great learning experience; it was a great learning opportunity; very useful, leaned [sic] a lot; and loved the hand on experience.
Mohialdin, 2018b, p.30
There is nothing wrong with the same poster being presented at multiple conferences and this is quite a common academic strategy. Mohialdin (2018b) reports from a conference in Japan, whereas Mohialdin, Wainman, Shali (2018) refers to a US meeting – but it is not clear why the author list is different as the two presentations would seem to report the same research – indeed, it seems reasonable to assume from the commonality of Mohialdin, 2018b) with Mohialdin, Wainman, Shali, 2018 that they are the same report (poster).
Profs. Wainman and Shali should be authors of any report of this study if, and only if, they made substantial intellectual contributions to the work reported – and, surely, either they did, or they did not.
A 100% survey return that represents 73% (or 70%, or perhaps 48%) of the population
Keith S. Taber
…the study seems to have looked for a lack of significant difference regarding a variable which was not thought to have any relevance…
This is like hypothesising…that the amount of alkali needed to neutralise a certain amount of acid will not depend on the eye colour of the researcher; experimentally confirming this is the case; and then seeking to publish the results as a new contribution to knowledge.
…as if a newspaper headline was 'Earthquake latest' and then the related news story was simply that, as usual, no earthquakes had been reported.
Structuring a research report
A research report tends to have a particular kind of structure. The first section sets out background to the study to be described. Authors offer an account of the current state of the relevant field – what can be called a conceptual framework.
In the natural sciences it may be that in some specialised fields there is a common, accepted way of understanding that field (e.g., the nature of important entities, the relevant variables to focus on). This has been described as working within an established scientific 'paradigm'. 1 However, social phenomena (such as classroom teaching) may be of such complexity that a full account requires exploration at multiple levels, with a range of analytical foci (Taber, 2008). 2 Therefore the report may indicate which particular theoretical perspective (e.g., personal constructivism, activity theory, Gestalt psychology, etc.) has informed the study.
This usually leads to one or more research questions, or even specific hypotheses, that are seen to be motivated by the state of the field as reflected in the authors' conceptual framework.
Next, the research design is explained: the choice of methodology (overall research strategy), the population being studied and how it was sampled, the methods of data collection and development of instruments, and choice of analytical techniques.
All of this is usually expected before any discussion (leaving aside a short statement as part of the abstract) of the data collected, results of analysis, conclusions and implications of the study for further research or practice.
There is a logic to designing research. (Image after Taber, 2014).
A predatory journal
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 (currently $1519, according to the website), 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.
Although the journal is called the Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice (not to be confused, even if the publishers would like it to be, with the well-established journal Chemistry Education Research and Practice) only a few of the papers published are actually education studies. One of the articles that IS on an educational topic is called 'Students' Perception of Chemistry Teachers' Characteristics of Interest, Attitude and Subject Mastery in the Teaching of Chemistry in Senior Secondary Schools' (Igwe, 2017).
A research article
The work of a genuine academic journal
A key problem with predatory journals is that because their focus is on generating income they do not provide the service to the community expected of genuine research journals (which inevitably involves rejecting submissions, and delaying publication till work is up to standard). In particular, the research journal acts as a gatekeeper to ensure nonsense or seriously flawed work is not published as science. It does this in two ways.
Discriminating between high quality and poor quality studies
Work that is clearly not up to standard (as judged by experts in the field) is rejected. One might think that in an ideal world no one is going to send work that has no merit to a research journal. In reality we cannot expect authors to always be able to take a balanced and critical view of their own work, even if we would like to think that research training should help them develop this capacity.
This assumes researchers are trained, of course. Many people carrying out educational research in science teaching contexts are only trained as natural scientists – and those trained as researchers in natural science often approach the social sciences with significant biases and blind-spots when carrying out research with people. (Watch or read 'Why do natural scientists tend to make poor social scientists?')
Also, anyone can submit work to a research journal – be they genius, expert, amateur, or 'crank'. Work is meant to be judged on its merits, not by the reputation or qualifications of the author.
De-bugging research reports – helping authors improve their work
The other important function of journal review is to identify weaknesses and errors and gaps in reports of work that may have merit, but where these limitations make the report unsuitable for publication as submitted. Expert reviewers will highlight these issues, and editors will ensure authors respond to the issues raised before possible publication. This process relies on fallible humans, and in the case of reviewers usually unpaid volunteers, but is seen as important for quality control – even if it not a perfect system. 3
This improvement process is a 'win' all round:
the quality of what is published is assured so that (at least most) published studies make a meaningful contribution to knowledge;
the journal is seen in a good light because of the quality of the research it publishes; and
the authors can be genuinely proud of their publications which can bring them prestige and potentially have impact.
If a predatory journal which claims (i) to have academic editors making decisions and (ii) to use peer review does not rigorously follow proper processes, and so publishes (a) nonsense as scholarship, and (b) work with major problems, then it lets down the community and the authors – if not those making money from the deceit.
The editor took just over a fortnight to arrange any peer review, and come to a decision that the research report was ready for publication
Students' perceptions of chemistry teachers' characteristics
There is much of merit in this particular research study. Dr Iheanyi O. Igwe explains why there might be a concern about the quality of chemistry teaching in the research context, and draws upon a range of prior literature. Information about the population (the public secondary schools II chemistry students in Abakaliki Education Zone of Ebonyi State) and the sample is provided – including how the sample, of 300 students at 10 schools, was selected.
There is however an unfortunate error in characterising the population:
"the chemistry students' population in the zone was four hundred and ten (431)"
Igwe, 2017, p.8
This seems to be a simple typographic error, but the reader cannot be sure if this should read
"…four hundred and ten (410)" or
"…four hundred and thirty one (431)".
Or perhaps neither, as the abstract tells readers
"From a total population of six hundred and thirty (630) senior secondary II students, a sample of three hundred (300) students was used for the study selected by stratified random sampling technique."
Igwe, 2017, abstract
Whether the sample is 300/410 or 300/431 or even 300/630 does not fundamentally change the study, but one does wonder how these inconsistencies were not spotted by the editor, or a peer reviewer, or someone in the production department. (At least, one might wonder about this if one had not seen much more serious failures to spot errors in this journal.) A reader could wonder whether the presence of such obvious errors may indicate a lack of care that might suggest the possibility of other errors that a reader is not in a position to spot. (For example, if questionnaire responses had not been tallied correctly in compiling results, then this would not be apparent to anyone who did not have access to the raw data to repeat the analysis.) The author seems to have been let down here.
A multi-scale instrument
The final questionnaire contained 5 items on each of three scales
students' perception of teachers' interest in the teaching of chemistry;
students' perception of teachers' attitude towards the teaching of chemistry;
students' perception of teachers' mastery of the subject in the teaching of chemistry
Igwe informs readers that,
"the final instrument was tested for reliability for internal consistency through the Cronbach Alpha statistic. The reliability index for the questionnaire was obtained as 0.88 which showed that the instrument was of high internal consistency and therefore reliable and could be used for the study"
Igwe, 2017, p.4
This statistic is actually not very useful information as one would want to know about theinternal consistency within the scales – an overall value across scales is not informative (conceptually, it is not clear how it should be interpreted – perhaps that the three scales are largely eliciting much the same underlying factor? ) (Taber, 2018). 4
There are times when aggregate information is not very informative (Image by Syaibatul Hamdi from Pixabay )
Again, one might have hoped that expert reviewers would have asked the author to quote the separate alpha values for the three scales as it is these which are actually informative.
The paper also offers a detailed account of the analysis of the data, and an in-depth discussion of the findings and potential implications. This is a serious study that clearly reflects a lot of work by the researcher. (We might hope that could be taken for granted when discussing work published in a 'research journal', but sadly that is not so in some predatory journals.) There are limitations of course. All research has to stop somewhere, and resources and, in particular, access opportunities are often very limited. One of these limitations is the wider relevance of the population sampled.
But do the results apply in Belo Horizonte?
This is the generalisation issue. The study concerns the situation in one administrative zone within a relatively small state in South East Nigeria. How do we know it has anything useful to tell us about elsewhere in Nigeria, let alone about the situation in Mexico or Vietnam or Estonia? Even within Ebonyi State, the Abakaliki Education Zone (that is, the area of the state capital) may well be atypical – perhaps the best qualified and most enthusiastic teachers tend to work in the capital? Perhaps there would have been different findings in a more rural area?
Yet this is a limitation that applies to a good deal of educational research. This goes back to the complexity of educational phenomena. What you find out about an electron or an oxidising agent studied in Abakaliki should apply in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire or equally in Cambridge, Massachusetts. That cannot be claimed about what you may find out about a teacher in Abakaliki, or a student, a class,a school,a University…
Misleading study titles?
Educational research studies often have strictly misleading titles – or at least promise a lot more than they deliver. This may in part be authors making unwarranted assumptions, or it may be journal editors wanting to avoid unwieldy titles.
"This situation has inadvertently led to production of half backed graduate Chemistry educators."
Igwe, 2017, p.2
The title of this study does suggest that the study concerns perceptions of Chemistry Teachers' Characteristics …in Senior Secondary Schools, when we cannot assume that chemistry teachers in the Abakaliki Education Zone of Ebonyi State can stand for chemistry teachers more widely. Indeed some of the issues raised as motivating the need for the study are clearly not issues that would apply in all other educational contexts – that is the 'situation', which is said to be responsible for the "production of half backed [half-baked?] graduate Chemistry educators" in Nigeria, will not apply everywhere. Whilst the title could be read as promising more general findings than were possible in the study, Igwe's abstract is quite explicit about the specific population sampled.
A limited focus?
Another obvious limitation is that whilst pupils' perceptions of their teachers are very important, it does not offer a full picture. Pupils may feel the need to give positive reviews, or may have idealistic conceptions. Indeed, assuming that voluntary, informed consent was given (which would mean that students knew they could decline to take part in the research without fear of sanctions) it is of note that every one of the 30 students targeted in each of the ten schools agreed to complete the survey,
"The 300 copies of the instrument were distributed to the respondents who completed them for retrieval on the spot to avoid loss and may be some element of bias from the respondents. The administration and collection were done by the researcher and five trained research assistants. Maximum return was made of the instrument."
Igwe, 2017, p.4
To get a 100% return on a survey is pretty rare, and if normal ethical procedures were followed (with the voluntary nature of the activity made clear) then this suggests these students were highly motivated to appease adults working in the education system.
But we might ask how student perceptions of teacher characteristics actually relate to teacher characteristics?
For example, observations of the chemistry classes taught by these teachers could possibly give a very different impression of those teachers than that offered by the student ratings in the survey. (Another chemistry teacher may well be able to distinguish teacher confidence or bravado from subject mastery when a learner is not well placed to do so.) Teacher self-reports could also offer a different account of their 'Interest, Attitude and Subject Mastery', as could evaluations by their school managers. Arguably, a study that collected data from multiple sources would offer the possibility of 'triangulating' between sources.
However, Igwe, is explicit about the limited focus of the study, and other complementary strands of research could be carried out to follow-up on the study. So, although the specific choice of focus is a limitation, this does not negate the potential value of the study.
Research questions
Although I recognise a serious and well-motivated study, there is one aspect of Igwe's study which seemed rather bizarre. The study has three research questions (which are well-reflected in the title of the study) and a hypothesis which I suspect will likely surprise some readers.
That is not a good thing. At least, I always taught research students that unlike in a thriller or 'who done it?' story, where a surprise may engage and amuse a reader, a research report or thesis is best written to avoid such surprises. The research report is an argument that needs to flow though the account – if a reader is surprised at something the researcher reports doing then the author has probably forgotten to properly introduce or explain something earlier in the report.
Here are the research questions and hypotheses:
"Research Questions
The following research questions guided the study, thus:
How do students perceive teachers' interest in the teaching of chemistry?
How do students perceive teachers' attitude towards the teaching of chemistry?
How do students perceive teachers' mastery of the subjects in the teaching of chemistry?
Hypotheses The following null hypothesis was tested at 0.05 alpha levels, thus: HO1 There is no significant difference in the mean ratings of male and female students on their perception of chemistry teachers' characteristics in the teaching of chemistry."
Igwe, 2017, p.3
A surprising hypothesis?
A hypothesis – now where did that come from?
Now, I am certainly not criticising a researcher for looking for gender differences in research. (That would be hypocritical as I looked for such differences in my own M.Sc. thesis, and published on gender differences in teacher-student interactions in physics classes, gender differences in students' interests in different science topics on stating secondary school, and links between pupil perceptions of (i) science-relatedness and (ii) gender-appropriateness of careers.)
There might often be good reasons in studies to look for gender differences. But these reasons should be stated up-front. As part of the conceptual framework motivating the study, researchers should explain that based on their informal observations, or on anecdotal evidence, or (better) drawing upon explicit theoretical considerations, or that informed by the findings of other related studies – or whatever reason there might – there are good reasons to check for gender differences.
The flow of research (Underlying image from Taber, 2013) The arrows can be read as 'inform(s)'.
Perhaps Igwe had such reasons, but there seems to be no mention of 'gender' as a relevant variable prior to the presentation of the hypothesis: not even a concerning dream, or signs in the patterns of tea leaves. 5 To some extent, this is reinforced by the choice of the null hypothesis – that no such difference will be found. Even if it makes no substantive difference to a study whether a hypothesis is framed in terms of there being a difference or not, psychologically the study seems to have looked for a lack of significant difference regarding a variable which was not thought to have any relevance.
Misuse of statistics
It is important for researchers not to test for effects that are not motivated in their studies. Statistical significance tells a researcher something is unlikely to happen just by chance – but it still might. Just as someone buying a lottery ticket is unlikely to win the lottery – but they might. Logically a small proportion of all the positive statistical results in the literature are 'false positives' because unlikely things do happen by chance – just not that often. 6 The researcher should not (metaphorically!) go round buying up lots of lottery tickets, and then seeing an occasional win as something more than chance.
No alarms and no surprises
And what was found?
"From the result of analysis … the null hypothesis is accepted which means that there is no significant difference in the mean ratings of male and female students in their perception of chemistry teachers' characteristics (interest, attitude and subject mastery) in the teaching of chemistry."
Igwe, 2017, p.6
This is like hypothesising, without any motivation, that the amount of alkali needed to neutralise a certain amount of acid will not depend on the eye colour of the researcher; experimentally confirming this is the case; and then seeking to publish the results as a new contribution to knowledge.
Why did Igwe look for gender difference (or more strictly, look for no gender difference)?
A genuine relevant motivation missing from the paper?
An imperative to test for something (anything)?
Advice that journals are more likely to publish studies using statistical testing?
Noticing that a lot of studies do test for gender differences (whether there seems a good reason to do so or not)?
This seems to be an obvious point for peer reviewers and the editor to raise: asking the author to either (a) explain why it makes sense to test for gender differences in this study – or (b) to drop the hypothesis from the paper. It seems they did not notice this, and readers are simply left to wonder – just as you would if a newspaper headline was 'Earthquake latest' and then the related news story was simply that, as usual, no earthquakes had been reported.
Work cited:
Igwe, I. O. (2017) Students' Perception of Chemistry Teachers' Characteristics of Interest, Attitude and Subject Mastery in the Teaching of Chemistry in Senior Secondary Schools, Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 1 (1), 1-8. DOI : doi.org/10.33140/JCERP/01/01/00002
Kuhn, T. S. (1970). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (2nd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago.
1 The term paradigm became widely used in this sense after Kuhn's (1970) work although he later acknowledged criticisms of the ambiguous way he used the term, in particular as learning about a field through working through standard examples, paradigms, and the wider set of shared norms and values that develop in an established field which he later termed 'disciplinary matrix'. In psychology research 'paradigm' may be used in the more specific sense of an established research design/protocol.
2 There are at least three ways of explaining why a lot of research in the social science seems more chaotic and less structured to outsiders than most research in the natural sciences.
a) Ontology. Perhaps the things studied in the natural sciences really exist, and some of those in the social sciences are epiphenomena and do not reflect fundamental, 'real', things. There may be some of that sometimes, but if so I think it is a matter of degree (that is, scientists have not been beyond studying the ether or phlogiston), because of the third option (c).
b) The social sciences are not as mature as many areas of the natural sciences and so are sill 'pre-paradigmatic'. I am sure there is sometimes an element of this: any new field will take time to focus in on reliable and productive ways of making sense of its domain.
c) The complexity of the phenomena. Social phenomena are inherently more complex, often involving feedback loops between participants' behaviours and feelings and beliefs (including about the research, the researcher, etc.)
Whilst (a) and (b) may sometimes be pertinent, I think (c) is often especially relevant to this question.
3 An alternative approach that has gained some credence is to allow authors to publish, but then invite reader reviews which will also be published – and so allowing a public conversation to develop so readers can see the original work, criticism, responses to those criticisms, and so forth, and make their own judgements. To date this has only become common practice in a few fields.
Another approach for empirical work is for authors to submit research designs to journals for peer review – once a design has been accepted by the journal, the journal agrees to publish the resulting study as long as the agreed protocol has been followed. (This is seen as helping to avoid the distorting bias in the literature towards 'positive' results as studies with 'negative' results may seem less interesting and so less likely to be accepted in prestige journals.) Again, this is not the norm (yet) in most fields.
4 The statistic has a maximum value of 1, which would indicate that the items were all equivalent, so 0.88 seems a high value, till we note that a high value of alpha is a common artefact of including a large number of items.
However, playing Devil's advocate, I might suggest that the high overall value of alpha could suggest that the three scales
students' perception of teachers' interest in the teaching of chemistry;
students' perception of teachers' attitude towards the teaching of chemistry;
students' perception of teachers' mastery of the subject in the teaching of chemistry
are all tapping into a single underlying factor that might be something like
my view of whether my chemistry teacher is a good teacher
or even
how much I like my chemistry teacher
5 Actually the discrimination made is between male and female students – it is not clear what question students were asked to determine 'gender', and whether other response options were available, or whether students could decline to respond to this item.
6 Our intuition might be that only a small proportion of reported positive results are false positives, because, of course, positive results reflect things unlikely to happen by chance. However if, as is widely believed in many fields, there is a bias to reporting positive results, this can distort the picture.
Imagine someone looking for factors that influence classroom learning. Consider that 50 variables are identified to test, such as teacher eye colour, classroom wall colour, type of classroom window frames, what the teacher has for breakfast, the day of the week that the teacher was born, the number of letters in the teacher's forename, the gender of the student who sits nearest the fire extinguisher, and various other variables which are not theoretically motivated to be considered likely to have an effect. With a confidence level of p[robability] ≤ 0.05 it is likely that there will be a very small number of positive findings JUST BY CHANCE. That is, if you look across enough unlikely events, it is likely some of them will happen. There is unlikely to be a thunderstorm on any particular day. Yet there will likely be a thunderstorm some day in the next year. If a report is written and published which ONLY discusses a positive finding then the true statistical context is missing, and a likely situation is presented as unlikely to be due to chance.
"new chemical elements with atomic numbers 72-75 and 108-111 are supposedly revealed, and also it is shown that for heavy elements starting with hafnium, the nuclei of atoms contain a larger number of protons than is generally accepted"
Henadzi, 2019, p.2
Somehow I managed to miss a 2019 paper bringing into doubt the periodic table that is widely used in chemistry. It was suggested that many of the heavier elements actually have higher atomic numbers (proton numbers) than had long been assumed, with the consequence that when these elements are correctly re-positioned it reveals two runs of elements that should be in the periodic table, but which till now have not been identified by chemists.
According to Henadzi we need to update the periodic table and look for eight missing elements (original image by Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)
Henadzi (2019) suggests that "I would like to name groups of elements with the numbers 72-75 and 108-111 [that is, those not yet identified that should have these numbers], the islets of Filipenka Henadzi."
The orginal Mendeleev
This is a bit like being taken back to when Dmitri Mendeleev first proposed his periodic table and had the courage to organise elements according to patterns in their properties, even though this left gaps that Mendeleev predicted would be occupied by elements yet to be discovered. The success of (at least some) of his predictions is surely the main reason why he is considered the 'father' of the periodic table, even though others were experimenting with similar schemes.
Now it has been suggested that we still have a lot of work to do to get the periodic table right, and that the version that chemists have used (with some minor variations) for many decades is simply wrong. This major claim (which would surely be considered worthy of the Nobel prize if found correct) was not published in Nature or Science or one of the prestigious chemistry journals published by learned societies such as the Royal Society of Chemistry, but in an obscure journal that I suspect many chemists have never heard of.
The original Mendel
This is reminiscent of the story of Mendel's famous experiments with inheritance in pea plants. Mendel's experiments are now seen as seminal in establishing core ideas of genetics. But Mendel's research was ignored for many years.
He presented his results at meetings of the Natural History Society of Brno in 1865 and then published them in a local German language journal – and his ideas were ignored. Only after other scientists rediscovered 'his' principles in 1900, long after his death, was his work also rediscovered.
Moreover, the discussion of this major challenge to accepted chemistry (and physics if I have understood the paper) is buried in an appendix of a paper which is mostly about the crystal structures of metals. It seems the appendix includes a translation of work previously published in Russian, explaining why, oddly, a section part way through the appendix begins "This article sets out the views on the classification of all known chemical elements, those fundamental components of which the Earth and the entire Universe consists".
Calling out 'predatory' journals
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 (currently $1519, according to the website), 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 'Nature of Chemical Elements' (Henadzi, 2019). Most of the paper is concerned with the crystal structures of metals, and presenting a new model to explain why metals have the structure they do. This is related to the number of electrons per atom that can be considered to be in the conduction band – something that was illustrated with a simple diagram that unfortunately, to my reading at least, was not sufficiently elaborated.1
The two options referred to seem to refer to n-type (movement of electrons) and p-type (movement of electrons that can be conceptualised as movement of a {relatively} positive hole, as in semi-conductor materials) – Figure 1 from Henadzi, 2019: p2
However, what really got my attention was the proposal for revising the periodic table and seeking eight new elements that chemists have so far missed.
Beyond Chadwick
Henadzi tells readers that
"The innovation of this work is that in the table of elements constructed according to the Mendeleyev's law and Van-den- Broek's rule [in effect that atomic number in the periodic table = proton number], new chemical elements with atomic numbers 72-75 and 108-111 are supposedly revealed, and also it is shown that for heavy elements starting with hafnium, the nuclei of atoms contain a larger number of protons than is generally accepted. Perhaps the mathematical apparatus of quantum mechanics missed some solutions because the atomic nucleus in calculations is taken as a point."
Henadzi, 2019, p.4
Henadzi explains
"When considering the results of measuring the charges of nuclei or atomic numbers by James Chadwick, I noticed that the charge of the core of platinum is rather equal not to 78, but to 82, which corresponds to the developed table. For almost 30 years I have raised the question of the repetition of measurements of the charges of atomic nuclei, since uranium is probably more charged than accepted, and it is used at nuclear power plants."
Henadzi, 2019, p.4
Now Chadwick is most famous for discovering the neutron – back in 1932. So he was working a long time ago, when atomic theory was still quite underdeveloped and with apparatus that would seem pretty primitive compared with the kinds of set up used today to investigate the fundamental structure of matter. That is, it is hardly surprising if his work which was seminal nearly a century ago had limitations. Henadzi however seems to feel that Chadwick's experiments accurately reveal atomic numbers more effectively than had been realised.
Sadly, Henadzi does not cite any specific papers by Chadwick in his reference list, so it is not easy to look up the original research he is discussing. But if Henadzi is suggesting that data produced almost a century ago can be interpreted as giving some elements different atomic numbers to those accepted today, the obvious question is what other work, since, establishes the accepted values, and why should it not be trusted. Henadzi does not discuss this.
Explaining a long-standing mystery
Henadzi points out that whereas for the lighter elements the mass number is about twice the atomic number (that is, the number of neutrons in a nucleus approximately matches the number of protons) as one proceeds through the period table this changes such the ratio of protons:neutrons shifts to give an increasing excess of neutrons. Henadzi also implies that this is a long standing mystery, now perhaps solved.
"Each subsequent chemical element is different from the previous in that in its core the number of protons increases by one, and the number of neutrons increases, in general, several. In the literature this strange ratio of the number of neutrons to the number of protons for any the kernel is not explained. The article proposes a model nucleus, explaining this phenomenon."
Henadzi, 2019, p.5
Now what surprised me here was not the pattern itself (something taught in school science) but the claim that the reason was not known. My, perhaps simplistic, understanding is that protons repel each other because of their similar positive electrical charges, although the strong nuclear force binds nucleons (i.e., protons and neutrons collectively) into nuclei and can overcome this.
Certainly what is taught in schools is that as the number of protons increases more neutrons are needed to be mixed in to ensure overall stability. Now I am aware that this is very much an over-simplification, what we might term a curriculum model or teaching model perhaps, but what Henadzi is basically suggesting seems to be this very point, supplemented by the idea that as the protons repel each other they are usually found at the outside of the nucleus alongside an equal number of neutrons – with any additional neutrons within.
The reason for not only putting protons on the outer shell of a large nucleus in Henadzi's model seems to relate to the stability of alpha particles (that is, clumps of two protons and two neutrons, as in the relatively stable helium nucleus). Or, at least, that was my reading of what is being suggested,
"For the construction of the [novel] atomic nucleus model, we note that with alpha-radioactivity of the helium nucleus is approximately equal to the energy.
Therefore, on the outer layer of the core shell, we place all the protons with such the same number of neutrons. At the same time, on one energy Only bosons can be in the outer shell of the alpha- particle nucleus and are. Inside the Kernel We will arrange the remaining neutrons, whose task will be weakening of electrostatic fields of repulsion of protons."
Henadzi, 2019, p.5
The lack of proper sentence structure does not help clarify the model being mooted.
Masking true atomic number
Henadzi's hypothesis seems to be that when protons are on the surface of the nucleus, the true charge, and so atomic number, of an element can be measured. But sometimes with heavier elements some of the protons leave the surface for some reason and move inside the nucleus where their charge is somehow shielded and missed when nuclear charge is measured. This is linked to the approximation of assuming that the charge on an object measured from the outside can be treated as a point charge.
This is what Henadzi suggests:
"Our nuclear charge is located on the surface, since the number of protons and the number of neutrons in the nucleus are such that protons and neutrons should be in the outer layer of the nucleus, and only neutrons inside, that is, a shell forms on the surface of the nucleus. In addition, protons must be repelled, and also attracted by an electronic fur coat. The question is whether the kernel can be considered a point in the calculations and up to what times? And the question is whether and when the proton will be inside the nucleus….if a proton gets into the nucleus for some reason, then the corresponding electron will be on the very 'low' orbit. Quantum mechanics still does not notice such electrons. Or in other words, in elements 72-75 and 108-111, some protons begin to be placed inside the nucleus and the charge of the nucleus is screened, in calculations it cannot be taken as a point."
Henadzi, 2019, p.5
So, I think Henadzi is suggesting that if a proton gets inside the nucleus, its associated electron is pulled into a very close orbit such that what is measured as nuclear charge is the real charge on the nucleus (the number of protons) partially cancelled by low lying electrons orbiting so close to the nucleus that they are within what we might call 'the observed nucleus'.
This has some similarity to the usual idea of shielding that leads to the notion of core charge. For example, a potassium atom can be modelled simplistically for some purposes as a single electron around a core charge of plus one (+19-2-8-8) as, at least as a first approximation, we can treat all the charges within the outermost N (4th) electron shell (the 19 protons and 18 electrons) as if a single composite charge at the centre of the atom. 2
Dubious physics
Whilst I suspect that the poor quality of the English and the limited detail included in this appendix may well mean I am missing part of the argument here, I am not convinced. Besides the credibility issue (how can so many scientists have missed this for so long?) which should never be seen as totally excluding unorthodox ideas (the same thing could have been asked about most revolutionary scientific breakthroughs) my understanding is that there are already some quite sophisticated models of nuclear structure which have evolved alongside programmes of emprical research and which are therefore better supported than Henadzi's somewhat speculative model.
I must confess to not understanding the relevance of the point charge issue as this assumption/simplification would seem to work with Henadzi's model – from well outside the sphere defined by the nucleus plus low lying electrons the observed charge would be the net charge as if located at a central point, so the apparent nuclear charge would indeed be less than the true nuclear charge.
But my main objection would be the way electrostatic forces are discussed and, in particular, two features of the language:
Naked protons
protons must be repelled, and also attracted by an electronic fur coat…
I was not sure what was meant by "protons must be repelled, and also attracted by an electronic fur coat". The repulsion between protons in the nucleus is balanced by the strong nuclear force – so what is this electronic 'fur coat'?
This did remind me of common alternative conceptions that school students (who have not yet learned about nuclear forces) may have, along the lines that a nucleus is held together because the repulsion between protons is balanced by their attraction to the ('orbiting') electrons. Two obvious problems with this notion are that
the electrons would be attracting protons out of the nucleus just as they are repelling each other (that is, these effects reinforce, not cancel), and
the protons are much closer to each other than to the electrons, and the magnitude of force between charges diminishes with distance.
Newton's third law and Coulomb's law would need to be dis-applied for an electronic effect to balance the protons' mutual repulsions. (On Henadzi's model the conjectured low lying electrons are presumably orbiting much closer to the nucleus than the 1s electrons in the K shell – but, even so, the proton-electron distance will be be much greater than the separation of protons in the nucleus.)3
But I may have misunderstood what Henadzi's meant here by the attraction of the fur coat and its role in the model.
A new correspondence principle?
if a proton gets into the nucleus for some reason, then the corresponding electron will be on the very 'low' orbit
Much more difficult to explain away is the suggestion that "if a proton gets into the nucleus for some reason, then the corresponding electron will be on the very 'low' orbit". Why? This is not explained, so it seems assumed readers will simply understand and agree.
In particular, I do not know what is meant by 'the corresponding electron'. This seems to imply that each proton in the nucleus has a corresponding electron. But electrons are just electrons, and as far as a proton is concerned, one electron is just like any other. All of the electrons attract, and are attracted by, all of the protons.
Confusing a teaching scheme for a mechanism?
This may not always be obvious to school level students, especially when atomic structure is taught through some kind of 'Aufbau' scheme where we add one more proton and one more electron for each consecutive element's atomic structure. That is, the hydrogen atom comprises of a proton and its 'corresponding' electron, and in moving on to helium we add another proton, with its 'corresponding' electron and some neutrons. These correspond only in the sense that to keep the atom neutral we have to add one negative charge for each positive charge. They 'correspond' in a mental accounting scheme – but not in any physical sense.
That is a conceptual scheme meant to do pedagogic work in 'building up' knowledge – but atoms themselves are just systems of fundamental particles following natural laws and are not built up by the sequential addition of components selected from some atomic construction kit. We can be misled into mistaking a pedagogic model designed to help students understand atomic structure for a representation of an actual physical process. (The nuclei of heavy elements are created in the high-energy chaos inside a star – within the plasma where it is too hot for them to capture the electrons needed to form neutral atoms.)
A similar category error (confusing a teaching scheme for a mechanism) often occurs when teachers and textbook authors draw schemes of atoms combining to form molecules (e.g., a methane molecule formed from a carbon atom and four hydrogen atoms) – it is a conceptual system to work with the psychological needs for students to have knowledge built up in manageable learning quanta – but such schemes do not reflect viable chemical processes.4
It is this kind of thinking that leads to students assuming that during homolytic bond fission each atom gets its 'own' electron back. It is not so much that this is not necessarily so, as that the notion of one of the electrons in a bond belonging to one of the atoms is a fiction.
The conservation of force conception (an alternative conception)
When asked about ionisation of atoms it is common for students to suggest that when an electron is removed from an atom (or ion) the remaining electrons are attracted more strongly because the force for the removed electron gets redistributed. It is as if within an atom each proton is taking care of attracting one electron. In this way of thinking a nucleus of a certain charge gives rise to a certain amount of force which is shared among the electrons. Removing an electron means a greater share of the force for those remaining. This all seems intuitive enough to many learners despite being at odds with basic physical principles (Taber, 1998).
I am not deducing that Henadzi, apparently a retired research scientist, shares these basic misconceptions found among students. Perhaps that is the case, but I would not be so arrogant as to diagnose this just from the quoted text. But that is my best understanding of the argument in the paper. If that is not what is meant, then I think the text needs to be clearer.
The revolution will not be televised…
In conclusion, this paper, published in what is supposedly a research journal, is unsatisfactory because (a) it makes some very major claims that if correct are extremely significant for chemistry and perhaps also physics, but (b) the claims are tucked away in an appendix, are not fully explained and justified, and do not properly cite work referred to; and the text is sprinkled with typographic errors, and seems to reflect alternative conceptions of basic science.
I very much suspect that Henadzi's revolutionary ideas are just wrong and should rightly be ignored by the scientific community, despite being published in what claims to be a peer-reviewed (self-describing 'leading international') research journal.
However, perhaps Henadzi's ideas may have merit – the peer reviewers and editor of the journal presumably thought so – in which case they are likely to be ignored anyway because the claims are tucked away in an appendix, are not fully explained and justified, and do not properly cite work referred to; and the text is sprinkled with typographic errors, and seems to reflect alternative conceptions of basic science. In this case scientific progress will be delayed (as it was when Mendel's work was missed) because of the poor presentation of revolutionary ideas.
How does the editor of a peer-reviewed journal move to a decision to publish in 4 days?
Let down by poor journal standards
So, either way, I do not criticise Henadzi for having and sharing these ideas – healthy science encompasses all sorts of wild ideas (some of which turn out not to have been so wild as first assumed) which are critiqued, tested, and judged by the community. However, Henadzi has not been well supported by the peer review process at the journal. Even if peer reviewers did not spot some of the conceptual issues that occurred to me, they should surely have noticed the incompleteness of the argument or at the very least the failures of syntax. But perhaps in order to turn the reviews around so quickly they did not read the paper carefully. And perhaps that is how the editor, Professor Nour Shafik Emam El-Gendy of the Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute, was able to move to a decision to publish four days after submission.5
If there is something interesting behind this paper, it will likely be missed because of the poor presentation and the failure of peer review to support the author in sorting the problems that obscure the case for the proposal. And if the hypothesis is as flawed as it seems, then peer review should have prevented it being published until a more convincing case could be made. Either way, this is another example of a journal rushing to publish something without proper scrutiny and concern for scientific standards.
Works cited
Henadzi, F. (2019). Nature of Chemical Elements. Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 3(1), 1-5.
1 My understanding of the conduction band in a metal is that due to the extensive overlap of atomic orbitals, a great many molecular orbitals are formed, mostly being quite extensive in scope ('delocalised'), and occurring with a spread of energy levels that falls within an energy band. Although strictly the molecular orbitals are at a range of different levels, the gaps between these levels are so small that at normal temperatures the 'thermal energy' available is enough for electrons to readily move between the orbitals (whereas in discrete molecules, with a modest number of molecular orbitals available, transitions usually require absorption of higher energy {visible or more often} ultraviolet radiation). So, this spread of a vast number of closely spaced energy levels is in effect a continuous band.
Given that understanding I could not make sense of these schematic diagrams. They SEEM to show the number of conduction electrons in the 'conduction band' as being located on, and moving around, a single atom. But I may be completely misreading this – as they are meant to be (cross sections through?) a tube.
"we consider a strongly simplified one- dimensional case of the conduction band. Option one: a thin closed tube, completely filled with electrons except one. The diameter of the electron is approximately equal to the diameter of the tube. With such a filling of the zone, with the local movement of the electron, there is an opposite movement of the "place" of the non-filled tube, the electron, that is, the motion of a non-negative charge. Option two: in the tube of one electron – it is possible to move only one charge – a negatively charged electron"
Henadzi, 2019, p.2
2 The shell model is a simplistic model, and for many purposes we need to use more sophisticated accounts. For example, the electrons are not strictly in concentric shells, and electronic orbitals 'interpenetrate' – so an electron considered to be in the third shell of an atom will 'sometimes' be further from the nucleus than an electron considered to be in the fourth shell. That is, a potassium 4s electron cannot be assumed to be completely/always outside of a sphere in which all the other atomic electrons (and the nucleus) are contained, so the the core cannot be considered as a point charge of +1 at the nucleus, even if this works as an approximation for some purposes. The effective nuclear charge from the perspective of the 4s electron will strictly be more than +1 as the number of shielding electrons is somewhat less than 18.
3 Whilst the model of electrons moving around the nucleus in planetary orbits may have had some heuristic value in the development of atomic theory, and may still be a useful teaching model at times (Taber, 2013), it seems it is unlikely to have the sophistication to support any further substantive developments to chemical theory.
4 It is very common for learners to think of chemistry in terms of atoms – e.g., to think of atoms as starting points for reactions; to assume that ions must derive from atoms. This way of thinking has been called the atomic ontology.
5 I find it hard to believe that any suitably qualified and conscientious referees would not raise very serious issues about this manuscript precluding publication in the form it appears in the journal. If the journal really does use peer review, as is claimed, one has to wonder who they think suitable to act as expert reviewers, and how they persuade them to write their reports so quickly.
Based on this, and other papers appearing in the journal, I suspect one of the following:
a) peer review does not actually happen, or
b) peer review is assigned to volunteers who are not experts in the field, and so are not qualified to be 'peers' in the sense intended when we talk of academic peer review, or
c) suitable reviewers are appointed, but instructed to do a very quick but light review ignoring most conceptual, logical, technical and presentation issues as long as the submission is vaguely on topic, or
di) appropriate peer reviewers are sought, but the editor does not expect authors to address reviewer concerns before approving publication, or possibly
dii) decisions to publish sub-standard work are made by administrators without reference to the peer reviews and the editor's input
A copy of a copy – or plagiarism taken to the extreme
The journal 'Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences' is a research journal which describes itself as
"a scientific, multidisciplinary journal with 1.020 Impact factor, that strongly desires to disseminate knowledge in the field of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology"
The journal has been publishing since 2017 – one of a great number of new scientific journals competing for researchers' work. As well as the quite decent impact factor for such a new journal it also claims two other metrics – a 32% acceptance rate and period from acceptance to publication of 20-30 days.
Impact factor
The usual (that is, accepted, canonical) way of measuring impact factors is in terms of the average number of times articles in a journal are cited in other articles. Usually it is calculated over a set period (say within 5 years of publication) and based only on citations in articles in a database of journals that are considered to meet quality criteria. Some journal articles may never get cited, whilst others are cited a great deal, and the impact factor reflects an average for a journal.
However, I am wary of claims of impact factors unless I see how they are derived, as I have seen journals claiming 'impact factors' that are based on a completely different set of criteria – a bit like claiming the room temperature is 300K because the display of a chemical balance indicated '300'. (See 'Publish at speed, recant at leisure'.)
The timescale of review and publication
In the past some journals took months, even years to publish a submitted manuscript. Clearly for an author the quicker the time from submission to publication the better – at least all things being equal. They are not always equal however.
It is usually considered better to publish in a recognised high status journal where work is likely to get more attention from others working in a field, and where the publication brings more prestige to the authors and their institutions. So, an author may well feel that slow publication in a 'good' journal is preferable to quicker publication in a nondescript one.
However, time from acceptance to publication is perhaps not the most useful metric to guide authors. By the time I stepped down from editing the Royal Society of Chemistry's education journal, Chemistry Education Research and Practice, it was often publishing an advanced version of an accepted article on the day I accepted it (and the final version of record within about a week or so). Yet that ignores the time a submission spends in review.
That is the time it takes for an editor to
screen the submission (make sure it is within the scope of the journal and includes sufficient detail for a careful evaluation),
identify and invite expert reviewers,
receive back their reports,
consider these and reach a decision
ask authors to make any revisions seen necessary
receive back a corrected/revised submission
decide whether this seems to meet the changes needed
and whether the revised revisions also needs to go back to reviewers
…
Sometimes this process can be quick – sometimes it may be drawn out with a number of cycles of revision before authors satisfy reviewers/editors and a manuscript is accepted. Expert reviewers who are highly respected in their fields are often very busy and get many request to review.
So, average time from submission to acceptance would seem to be a key metric both because it may help authors avoid journals where editors and reviewers are very slow to turn around work, and because if this period is very short then it may bring into question whether there is rigorous review.
Acceptance rate
In this regard, the journal's claimed acceptance rate, 32% looks healthy. Two thirds of material submitted to the journal is (by deduction) rejected as not suitable for publication. Assuming this figure is accurate, this does suggests that peer review is taken seriously. (One likes to trust in the honesty of others, but sadly there are many predatory journals not above being dishonest, as I have discussed in a range of postings.)
Peer review
The publisher's site certainly suggests that the publisher recognises the importance of careful peer review undertaken by "eminent reviewers", with guidance for reviewers.
"Acta Scientifica believes that, thorough peer review process is a critical factor to yield immense quality literature to be published in the journal."
https://www.actascientific.com/reviewer.php
Among the points made here, potential reviewers are guided that
"The study should possess novelty and should present the results of original research. It is required that the reported results are not published elsewhere."
The benefits of peer review are said to be
"The author receives detailed and constructive feedback from experts in the field.
The process can alert authors to errors or gaps in literature they may have overlooked.
It can assist with making the paper more applicable to the journal readership.
It may enable a discussion (between the author, reviewers, and editor) around a research field or topic.
Readers can be assured that the research they are reading has been verified by subject experts." (https://www.actascientific.com/peerreview.php)
The peer review process is said to assure
"Submitted article is original work which has not been previously published nor is under consideration by another journal, in part or whole;
The article meets all applicable standards of ethics;
The paper is relevant to the journal's aims, scope, and readership;
A submitted article presents original research findings;
A submitted article offers a comprehensive critical review and evaluation of key literature sources for a given topic; and
The article is methodologically and technically sound"(https://www.actascientific.com/peerreview.php)
The publisher offers a flow chart showing the stages of the editorial and review process. The publisher also explains the advantages of the double blind peer review process (the reviewers are not told who wrote the submission, and the author is not told who reviewed their work) they operate in order to ensure "evaluation of work in the manuscripts by peers who have an expertise in the relevant field."
Checking for plagiarism
The flow chart shows that before submission are sent for review there is a screening to ensure that at least 80% of the manuscript is 'unique content' – that is, that material has not just been copied from the author's previous publications – or even someone else's
All of this seems encouraging. The impression is that Acta Scientific are genuine in their aspiration to publish quality work, and to use a rigorous peer review process to ensure this quality. This is despite the reason why I came TO be looking into their processes.
Which came first…
I recently posted in this blog about a short article in the Journal of Chemistry: Education and Research(not to be confused with the journal Chemistry Education Research and Practice) that I found to be incoherent and filled with mistakes.
When I was evaluating that article I came across another article with the same title, by the same author, in Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences. It soon became clear that these were (this was?) the same short article, published in both journals. Both articles have the same muddled language and the same errors (running words together and the like – for more details see 'Can deforestation stop indigenous groups starving?')
The chronology seems to be:
14th May 2019 – da Silva submits to Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences
16th May 2019 – da Silva sends the same manuscript to Journal of Chemistry: Education and Research
20th May 2019 – Journal of Chemistry: Education and Research accepts the article for publication (4 days after submission!)
28th May 2019 – Journal of Chemistry: Education and Research publishes the article
7th June 2019 – Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences publishes paper
Was da Silva frustrated with not getting his article accepted within two days of first submission? (An acceptance date for Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences is not given)
So, the article was submitted first to Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences, but had already been published in Journal of Chemistry: Education and Research by the time it was published in Acta Scientific Pharmaceutical Sciences. Given that authors are not supposed to publish the same material in several journals, this might raise the interesting question of which journal should require the work to be retracted, and which should allow it to stand.
A copy of a copy
However this would be a rather pointless question, as neither of the articles can claim to be original. As I discuss in 'Can deforestation stop indigenous groups starving?', virtually the entire text is simply lifted from three prior, unacknowledged publications written by other authors – odd paragraphs have been taken from parts of more detailed papers on the topic and simply collated (in a somewhat incoherent manner) into da Silva's manuscript. Any reputable journal that spotted this would require retraction because the work is not original but is plagiarised – it is the intellectual property of other scholars.
Why was this not spotted?
Although the opening of the article is simply copied word for word from the abstract of a published work (which is likely to be spotted by the tool used to screen to check for 'unique content') the rest of the material (that is, more than the critical 80%) is translated from texts which are in Portuguese.
When an expert translator produces a new version of a work in a different language, and this is done with permission, the translator is entitled to credit and the translation is considered to be a work (albeit a derivative work) in its own right. Good translations are more than mechanical substitutions, and skillful translators are much appreciated.
However, here we have works translated, without expertise (the English is full of mistakes), presumably without permission and certainly without attribution to the original authors. The software will not have recognised the translated text as not being 'unique content'.
However, the process of peer review is supposed to evaluate the quality of the work, and identify areas for improvement. It is difficult to believe anyone who read this very short article carefully (for either journal) could have thought it was making a coherent argument, or that it did not at least need restructuring, clarifications and corrections.
"We ensure that all the articles published in Acta Scientific undergo integrated peer review by peers and consequent revision by authors when required."
https://www.actascientific.com/peerreview.php
So, despite Acta Scientific's efforts to claim careful peer review processes, and what seems a genuine aspiration to ensure article originality and quality through peer review by those with expertise in the field, somehow the journal published the copy-and-paste job that is 'The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples'.
Of course, for peer review to work, those asked to review have to take the role seriously.
"Acta Scientific trusts the genuine peer review process that the reviewers carry out so that it helps us to publish the content with good essence."
https://www.actascientific.com/reviewer.php
I would like to believe that Acta Scientific's fine claims about peer review ARE sincere, and perhaps in this case it was just that their trust was betrayed by sloppy reviewers.
Work cited:
da Silva, M. A. l. G. (2019). The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples. Acta Scientific Phamaceutical Sciences, 3 (7), 20-21.
da Silva, M. A. G. (2019) The Chemistry of Indigenous Peoples. Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 3 (1), 1-2
An invalid research instrument for testing 'safety sign awareness'
Keith S. Taber
I was recently invited to write for the 'Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice' (not to be confused with the well-established R.S.C. Journal 'Chemistry Education Research and Practice') which describes itself as "a leading International Journal for the publication of high quality articles". It is not.
I already had reason to suspect this of being a predatory journal (one that entices authors to part with money to publish work without adhering to the usual academic standards and norms). But as I had already reached that judgement before the journal had started publishing, I decided to check out the quality of the published work.
The current issue, at the time of writing, has five articles, only one of which is educational in nature: 'Chemistry Laboratory Safety Signs Awareness Among Undergraduate Students in Rivers State'.
Below I describe key aspects of this study, including some points that I would have expected to have been picked-up in peer review, and therefore to have been addressed before the paper could have been published.
Spoiler alert
My main observation is that the research instrument used is invalid – I do not think it actually measures what the authors claim it does. (As the article is published with a open-access license1, I am able to reproduce the instrument below so you can see if you agree with me or not.)
'Chemistry laboratory safety signs awareness among undergraduate students in Rivers State'
A study about chemistry laboratory safety signs awareness?
Laboratory safety is very important in chemistry education, and is certainly a suitable topic for research. A range of signs and symbols are used to warn people of different types of potential chemical hazard, so learning about these signs is important for those working in laboratories; and so investigating this aspect of learning is certainly a suitable focus for research.
Motivating a study
As part of a published research study authors are expected to set out the rationale for the study – to demonstrate, usually based on existing literature, that there is something of interest to investigate. This can be described as the 'conceptual framework' for the study. This is one of the aspects of a study which is usually tested in peer-review where manuscripts submitted to a journal are sent to other researchers with relevant expertise for evaluation.
The authors of this study, Ikiroma, Chinda and Bankole, did begin by discussing aspects of laboratory safety, and reporting some previous work around this topic. They cite an earlier study that had been carried out surveying second-year science education students at Lagos State University, Nigeria, and where:
"The result of the study revealed 100% of the respondents are not aware of the laboratory sign and symbols" 2
Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole, 2021: 50
This would seem a good reason to do follow-up work elsewhere.
Research questions and hypotheses
A study should have one or more research questions. These will be quite general in more open-ended 'discovery research' (exploratory enquiry), but need to be more specific in 'confirmatory research' such as experiments and surveys. This study had both specific research questions and null hypotheses
"Research Questions
1. What is the percentage awareness level of safety signs among undergraduate Chemistry students?
2. What is the difference in awareness level of safety signs between undergraduate Chemistry Education students and Chemistry Science students?
3. To what extent do the awareness levels of safety signs among undergraduate Chemistry students depended on Institutional types?"
Hypotheses
1. There is no significant difference in awareness level of safety signs between undergraduate Chemistry Education students and Chemistry Science students
2. The awareness levels of safety signs among undergraduate Chemistry students are not significantly dependent on Institutional types."
Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole, 2021: 50
These specific questions and hypotheses do not seem to be motivated in the conceptual framework. That is, a reader has not been given any rationale to think that there are reasons to test for differences between these different groups. There may have been good reasons to explore these variables, but authors of research papers are usually expected to share their reasoning with reader. (This is something which one would expect to be spotted in peer review, leading to the editor asking the authors to revise their submission to demonstrate the background behind asking about these specific points.)
It is not explained quite what 'institutional types' actually refers to. From the way results are discussed later in the paper (p.53), 'Institutional types' seems to be used here simply to mean different universities
Sampling – how random is random?
The sample is described as:
"A total of 60 year three undergraduate students studying Chemistry Education (B.Sc. Ed) and Pure Chemistry (B.Sc.) were randomly drawn from three universities namely; University of Port Harcourt (Uniport), Rivers State University (RSU) and Ignatius Ajuru University of Education (IAUE) with each university contributing 20 students."
Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole, 2021: 50
This study was then effectively a survey where data was collected from a sample of a defined population (third undergraduate students studying chemistry education or pure chemistry in any of three named universities in one geographical area) to draw inferences about the whole population.
Randomisation is an important process when it is not possible to collect data from the whole population of interest, as it allows statistics to be used to infer from the sample what is likely in the wider population. Ideally, authors should briefly explain how they have randomised (Taber, 2013) so readers can judge if the technique used does really give each member of the population (here one assumes 3rd year chemistry undergraduates in each of the Universities) an equal chance of being sampled. (If the authors are reading this blog, please feel free to respond to this point in the comments below: how did you go about the randomisation?)
Usually in survey research an indication would be given of the size of the population (as a random sample of 0.1% of a population gives results with larger inherent error than a random sample of 10%). That information does not seem to be provided here.
Even if the authors did use randomisation, presumably they did not randomise across the combined population of "year three undergraduate students studying Chemistry Education (B.Sc. Ed) and Pure Chemistry (B.Sc.)…from three universities" as they would have been very unlikely to have ended up with equal numbers from the three different institutions. So, probably this means they took (random?) samples from within each of the three sub-populations (which would be sensible to compare between them).
It later becomes clear that of the 60 sampled students, 30 were chemistry education students and 30 straight chemistry students (p.53) – so again it seems likely that sampling was done separately for the two types of course. There does not seem to be any information on the break down between university and course, so it is possible there were 10 students in each of 6 cells,if each University offered both courses:
chemistry education
pure chemistry
total
University of Port Harcourt
?
?
20
Rivers State University
?
?
20
Ignatius Ajuru University of Education
?
?
20
total
30
30
60
Sample
Clearly this distribution potentially matters as there could be interactions between these two different variables. Consider for example that perhaps students taking pure chemistry tended to have a higher 'awareness level of safety signs' than students taking chemistry education: then (see the hypothetical example in the table below), if a sample from one university mostly comprised of pure chemistry students, and that from another university mostly of chemistry education students, then this would likely lead to finding differences between institutions in the samples even if there were no such differences between the combined student populations in the two universities. The uneven sampling from the two courses within the universities would bias the comparison between institutions.
course 1
course 2
total
University A
20
0
20
University B
10
10
20
Education C
0
20
20
total
30
30
60
A problematic sample for disentangling factors
My best guess is the the authors appreciated that, and that all three universities taught both types of course, and the authors sampled 10 students from each course in each of the universities. Perhaps they even did it randomly – but it would be good to know how as I have found that sometimes authors who claim to have made random selections have not used a technique that would strictly support this claim. (And if a sample is not random we can have much less confidence about how it reflects the population sampled.)
The point is that a reader of a research report should not have to guess. Often researchers (and research students) are so close to their own project that it becomes easy to assume others will know things about the work that have become taken for granted by the research team. This is where a good editor or peer reviewer can point out, and ask for, missing information that is not available to a reader.
Ethical research?
Sampling can also be impacted by ethics. It is one thing to select people randomly, but not all people will volunteer to help with research and it is general principle of educational research that participants should offer voluntary informed consent. Where some people agree to participate, and others do not, this may bias results if people's reasons for accepting/declining an invitation are linked to the focus of the research.
Imagine inviting students to some research to test whether cheating (copying homework, taking reference material into examinations) can be detected by using a lie detector to questions students about their behaviours. Are those who cheat and those who are scrupulously honest likely to volunteer to take part in such research to the same extent, or might we expect most cheats to opt out?
It is normal practice in educational research to make a brief statement that the research was carried out ethically, e.g., that participants all volunteered freely having had the purpose and nature of the research clearly explained to them. I could not find any such statement in the article, nor any requirement for authors to include this in the journal's author guidelines.
Lack of face validity
In research, validity is about measuring what you think you are measuring. In the school laboratory, if we saw a student completing the 'potential difference/V' column of a results table when taking readings with an ammeter we would consider the recorded results were invalid.
I once gave a detention to a first year (Y7) student who had done something naughty that I forget now, and as we were working on a measurement topic I set her to measure the length of the corridor outside the lab. with a metre rule. Although this was an appropriate instrument, I found that she did not appreciate that in order to get a valid result she had to make sure she moved the metre stick on by the right amount (that is, one metre!) for each counted metre – instead she would move the metre stick by about half its length! Some pupils may resent being in detention and deliberately respond with sloppy work, but in this case it seemed the fault was with the teacher who had overestimated prior knowledge and consequently given an insufficiently detailed explanation of the task!
In research we have to be confident that an instrument is measuring what it is meant to. This may mean testing and calibrating – using the instrument somewhere where we already have a good measure and checking it gives the expected answers (like checking a clock against the Greenwich pips on the radio) before using it in research to measure an unknown.
In educational studies we can sometimes spot invalid instruments because they lack face validity – that is, 'on the face of it' an instrument does not seem suitable to do the job. Certainly when 'we' are people with relevant expertise. Consider an instrument to test understanding of trigonometry which consisted of the item: "discuss five factors which contributed to the 'industrial revolution' in eighteenth century Britain". We might suspect this could be used to measure something, but probably not understanding of trigonometry. This would be an invalid test to use for that purpose.
Awareness level of safety signs?
The focus of Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole's study was 'awareness level of safety signs'. Strictly this only seems to mean being aware of such signs3, but I read this to mean that the authors wanted to know if students recognised the meaning of different signs commonly used: whether they were aware what particular signs signified.
The 'Chemistry Laboratory Test on Safety Signs' instrument:
The authors report they used:
A well validated and researchers['] constructed test instrument, titled, Chemistry Laboratory Test on Safety Signs (CLTSS) which had an internal reliability index of 0.94 via Cronbach Alpha was used for data collection in the study. The questions in the test required the students to match a list of 20 chemicals in column A and of nine safety signs accompanied with a short description in column B. This aimed to reduce the wrong response because the students incorrectly considered only the symbol.
Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole, 2021: 50
Validation
A key question that an editor would expect peer reviewers to consider is whether the instrumentation used in research can provide valid findings. Where this is not clear in a manuscript submited to a journal, the editor should (if not rejecting the paper) ask for this to be addressed in a revision of the manuscript. Validity is clearly critical, and research should not be published it if makes claims based on invalid instrumentation.
Therefore when reporting research instruments it is usually expected that authors explain how they tested for validity – simply stating something is well-validated does not count! Face validity might be tested by asking carefully identified experts to see if they think the instrument tests what is claimed (so here, perhaps asking university chemistry lecturers – "do you think these questions are suitable for elciiting undergraduate students' awareness levels of safety signs?").
If an instrument passed this initial test, more detailed work would be undertaken. Here perhaps a small sample of students from a closely related poopulation to that being studied (pehaps second year chemistry students in the same universities; or third year chemistry students from another university) would be asked to complete the instrument using a 'think aloud' protocol where they explain their thinking as they answer the questions – or would be interviewed about their awareness of safety signs as well as comepleting the instrument to triangulate reponses to the instrument against interview responses.
Cronbach's alpha measures the internal consistency of an scale (Taber, 2018), but offers no assurance of validity. (If a good set of items meant to test enjoyment of school science were used instead to measure belief in ghosts the set of items would still show the same high level of internal consistency despite being used for a totally invalid purpose.)
Chemistry Laboratory Test on Safety Signs (Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole, 2021: 51)
So, what the students had to do was match a chemical (name) with the appropriate hazard sign.What was being tested was knowledge of the hazards associated with laboratory chemicals (an important enough topic, but not what was promised).
Had the signs not been labelled, then the items would have required BOTH knowing about the hazards of specific chemicals AND knowing which sign was used for the associated hazards. However, Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole had actually looked "to reduce the wrong response because the students incorrectly considered only the symbol" (emphasis added). That is, they had built into the test instrument a means to ensure it did not test awareness of 'safety signs' (what they were supposedly interested in) and only measured awareness of the hazards associated with particular substances.
What Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankolehad tested was potentially useful and interesting – but it was not what they claimed. The paper title, the research questions, and the hypotheses (and consequently their statements of findings) were all misleading in that regard. One would have expected the editor and peer reviewers should have noticed that and required corrections before publication was considered.
Quality assurance?
The journal's website claims that "Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice is an international peer reviewed journal…" Peer review involves the editor rejecting poor submissions, and ensuring that the quality of what is published by arranging that experts in the field scrutinise submissions to ensure they meet quality standards. Peer reviewers are chosen for expertise related to the specific topic of the specific submission. In particular, reviewers will ask for changes where these seem to be needed, and the editor of a journal decides to publish only when she is satisfied sufficient changes have been made in response to review reports.
Publishing poor quality work, especially work with glaring issues, reflects badly on the authors, the journal, and the editor.4
The journal accepted the paper about 9 days after submision
In this case the editor – Professor Nour Shafik Emam El-Gendy of the Environmental Sciences & Nanobiotechnology Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute in Egypt – appears to have taken just over a week to
arrange peer review,
receive and consider the referee reports, and
report back to the authors asking them for any changes she felt were needed, and (once she received any revisions that may have been requested) then
decide the paper was ready for publication in this supposed 'leading international journal'.
That could be seen as impressive, but actually seems incredible.
Peer review is not just about sorting good work from bad, it is also about supporting authors by showing them where their work needs to be improved before it is put on public display. Peer review is as much about improving work as selecting.
I do not know if Ikiroma, Chinda & Bankole were expected to pay the standard charge for publishing – that is $999 for this journal – but, if so, I do not think they got value for money. Given the level of support they seem to have received from the peer review process, I think they should be entitled to a refund.
Work cited:
Ikiroma, B., Chinda, W., & Bankole, I. S. (2021). Chemistry Laboratory Safety Signs Awareness Among Undergraduate Students in Rivers State. Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice, 5(1), 47-54.
Oludipe, O. S., & Etobro, B. A. (2018). Science Education Undergraduate Students' Level of Laboratory Safety Awareness. Journal of Education, Society and Behavioural Science, 23(4), 1-7. https://doi.org/10.9734/JESBS/2017/37461
Taber, K. S. (2014).Ethical considerations of chemistry education research involving "human subjects".Chemistry Education Research and Practice, 15(2), 109-113. [Free access]
1: "All works published by 'Journal of Chemistry: Education Research and Practice' is [sic, are] under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License. This permits anyone to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt the work provided the original work and source is appropriately cited." (https://opastonline.com/journal/journal-of-chemistry-education-research-and-practice/author-guidelines)
2: This is indeed what these authors claim – by which they seem to mean none of the students tested reaches a score of half-marks. (I infer that from the way they report other results in the same study.) They report that, of 50 respondents,
"21 (42%) could not identify correctly all [sic, could not identify correctly any of] the eight symbols presented in the survey. 24 (48%) was only able to identify one out of eight symbols presented, and 5 (10%) could identify just two. Thus, it is alarming to discover that *100% of the respondents are not aware of the laboratory signs and symbols"
Oludipe & Etobro, 2018: 5
(The asterisk seems to indicate which rows from a result table are being summed to give 100%.)
3. If we simply wanted to test for awareness of safety signs we might think of displaying some jars of reagents and asking something like "is there any way you would know about which of these chemicals present particular risks?" or "how might we find out about special precautions we should take when working with these reagents?" and see if the respondents pointed out the safety signs printed on the labels.
4. Journals that attract high volumes of submissions may have a team of editors to share the work. Some journals with several editors acknowledge the specific editor who handles each published study.
I suspect that some predatory journals appoint editors who do not actually see the submissions (as it is difficult to see how qualified editors would approve some of the nonsense published in some journals), which are instead handled by administrators who may not be experts in the field (and so may not be in a position to judge the expertise of peer reviewers). If this is so, the editor should be described as an 'honorary editor' as misrepresenting a journal as edited by a subject expert is dishonest.
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'.
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)
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.
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', incorrectlyin 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 material
English 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.
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
Some responses to the "Initial teacher training market review"
A 'market' review
Image by Pexels from Pixabay
The UK Government's Department for Education (responsible for the school system in England) is currently undertaking what it called a 'market review' of initial teacher education (ITE) or initial teacher 'training' as it prefers to describe ite. (Arguably, 'education' suggests broad professional preparation for someone who will need to make informed decisions in complex situations, whereas 'training' implies learning the skills needed for a craft.)
The aims of the review are certainly unobjectionable:
The review has aimed to make well informed, evidence-based recommendations on how to make sure:
• all trainees receive high-quality training • the ITT market maintains the capacity to deliver enough trainees and is accessible to candidates • the ITT system benefits all schools1
Despite such intentions clearly being laudable, the actual proposals (which, inter alia, can be seen as looking to further increase central government control over the professional preparation of teachers) raised concerns among many of those actually involved in teacher education.
The consultation
There was a public consultation to which all interested were invited to respond. Since the consultation closed, the Secretary of State (i.e., senior minister) for Education has changed, so we await to see whether this will derail the review.
The review is wide ranging, but there is a widespread view that once again government is seeking to reduce the influence of academic education experts (see for example, 'Valuing the gold standard in teacher education'), and my colleagues still working in university-school based ITE partnerships certainly felt that if all the proposals were brought to fruition such partnership would be at risk. Not that Universities would not be able to contribute, but they would not be able to do so in a way that allowed full quality control and proper planning and sustainable commitment.
My own University, Cambridge, has suggested
We cannot, in all conscience, envisage our continuing involvement with ITT should the proposals be implemented in their current format.
Some discussion on one teachers' email list I subscribe to, provoked me me decide to look back at my own consultation responses.
A selective response – and a generic default hole-filler
I have not worked in I.T.E. for some years, and so did not feel qualified to comment on all aspects of the review. However, there were some aspects of the plans (or at least my interpretation of what was intended) that I felt would put at risk some of the strongest and most important aspects of high quality teacher preparation.
As being able to submit a response to the consultation required providing a response at every section (a cynic might suggest that expecting full completion of such a long consultation document is a disincentive for most people to contribute), I used a generic statement to cover those questions where I did not feel I had anything informed and useful to say:
I am aware of concerns raised in responses by the Russell group of Universities, the University of Cambridge (of which I am an emeritus officer), and Homerton College, Cambridge (of which I am a senior member). I concur with these concerns, and rather than seek to reproduce or mirror all of their comments (already available to you), I refer you to those responses. Further, I am offering some specific comments on particular issues where I have strong concerns based on my past experiences as a PGCE student teacher; as a teacher in comprehensive secondary schools; as a school/college-based mentor supporting graduates preparing for teaching in schools and also in a further education context; as a researcher exploring aspects of student learning and the teaching that supports it; as a lecturer and supervisor on initial teacher education courses as part of University-School training partnerships; as a supervisor for teachers in post undertaking school-based research; as an advisor to schools undertaking context-directed research; and as a lecturer teaching graduates how to undertake research into educational contexts.
Here are my more specific responses highlighting my particular concerns:
Individual differences
Having worked in initial teacher education as well as having been a school teacher, I am well aware that one of the most important things anyone working in the education sector has to appreciate is individual differences – between pupils, between teachers, between classes, between schools, and between new-entrants. Too much focus on uniformity is therefore unwelcome and likely to reduce the quality of the highest provision which takes this into diversity into account, Similarly, genuinely 'rigorous' sequencing of the educational experience will be responsive to individual needs and that would be welcome. However, uniform and inflexible sequencing, which would be far from rigorous, would be damaging.
Being equipped to engage with research
I am aware that the diversity in routes for new entrants now available has reduced the quality of training experience available to some new teachers. In particular, the fully professional teacher has to be a critical reader of research, and to have the tools and confidence to undertake their own small-scale context based enquiry to develop their own practice.
This is essential because the research shows clearly that whilst it is sometimes possible to identify some features of best practice that generalise across most teaching contexts, this is by no means always the case. Teaching and learning are highly complex phenomena and are strongly influenced by contextual factors. So, what has been found to 'normally' work best will not be the best approach in all teaching contexts. Teachers needs to be able to read research claims critically
(there are always provisos
most studies are small-scale where strict generalisation is simply not possible,
few studies are sufficiently supported with the resources to test ideas across a wide range of contexts; and
as randomisation {a critical aspect of true experimental research} is seldom possible, and
there is seldom the information or means to characterise populations sufficiently to build representative samples;
moreover the complexity of educational contexts does not allow the identification (let alone control) of all relevant variable, and
there are some key known factors which influence results when double-blind methods are not viable
– a situation that is very common when testing innovations in educational practices as teachers and learners are usually well aware of deviations from normal practice)
and identify the most promising recommendations when taking into account their own teaching context (i.e., what is referred to as reader or naturalistic generalisation) and test out ideas in their own classrooms, and iteratively develop their own practice.
Sadly, whilst the M-level PGCE type programmes usually support new teachers in introducing these skills, this does not seem to necessarily be the case on some other routes.
On 'intensive' practice placements
I consider this is a misguided notion based on a flawed conceptualisation of teaching and teacher skills. It is certainly the case that generally speaking teachers develop their skills over time with greater teaching experience, and that all other things being equal, the more direct teaching experience a new entrant has during the period of initial teacher education the better, as long as this is productive experience.
However, teaching is a highly complex activity that requires making myriad in the moment decisions in response to interactions with unique classes of unique people. The quality of those decisions tends to increase over time with experience, but only if the teacher is well prepared for the teaching in terms of subject knowledge, general and specialist pedagogic knowledge, and knowledge of the particular learners.
This requires that the teacher has extensive preparation time especially when new to teaching a topic, age, group or pedagogic approach, and opportunities for productive debrief and reflection. Given the intensity of teaching as an experience, it is much better for new entrants to initially focus on parts of lessons with plenty of opportunity for preparation and reflection than to too quickly progress to whole lessons where much of the experience will not be fully processed before moving on. Similarly, it is better that new teachers have sufficient time between classes to focus intensely on those classes rather than be moving directly from class to class.
In the same way, the programmes that allow regular movements between the teaching context and an HEI or similar context offer an ideal context for effective learning. The intense focus on the school is broken up by time in faculty (still focused, but as a student without the intense scrutiny in school), where there are extensive opportunities for peer support (especially important given the extreme highs and lows often experienced by new teachers).
Partnerships of Universities with Schools offer new entrants complementary expertise, and opportunities for 'iteration' – moving between the 'graduate student' and 'teaching department member' contexts 2 (Figure 1 from Taber, 2017)
This is also critical for developing teaching that is informed by research-informed and evidence-based theories and constructs. Being taught 'theory' in an academic context, and expecting such content to be automatically applied in a teaching context is unrealistic – rather the new teacher has to learn to conceptualise actual classroom experience in terms of the theory, and to see how to apply the theory in terms of actual teaching experience. 2
This learning is best supported by an iterative process – where there are plenty of opportunities to reflect on and analyse experience, and compare and discuss experiences with peers, as well as with mentors, other experienced teachers, and with academic staff. Over time, as new teachers build experiences, especially ones they recognise as productive and successful, they will come to automatically apply ideas and skills and techniques, and will be able to 'chunk' component teaching moves into longer sequences – being able to work effectively for sequences of whole classes, with less reflection time, and less explicit support. 3
The aim is for the new teachers to be able to prepare, teach, assess, on something approaching a teaching timetable whilst working in school full-time. However, efforts to move to such a state too quickly will [be counter-productive] for many potentially excellent teachers, and will likely increase drop-out rates.
Ultimately, the quality of the teaching experience, and the ability to manage increasing workload according to individual needs, is what is important. Any attempts to increase the intensity of the teaching placements, or to accelerate the rate at which new teachers take on responsibility without recourse to individual circumstances is likely to be counterproductive in terms of retention, and the quality of the 'training' experience in supporting the development of excellent teachers.
I am very pleased that I would not be 'training' nor still working in teacher education under such expectations as I think the incidents of crises, mental health issues, and drop-out, would be likely to increase.
On common timetables for progress
As suggested above, any attempt to tightly quantify these things would be misplaced as it removes the ability of providers to manage the process to seek the best outcomes for individual trainees, and it ignores the responsibilities of teachers and schools to ensure that trainees are only given responsibilities as and when they are ready.
Please remember that every class taught by a trainee contains children or young people who are required to be in school and are entitled to be taught by someone who
is prepared for class,
confident they are ready to teach that class, and
is not under such intense stress that they cannot perform to their potential.
You have a responsibility to consider the pupils as well as to your 'market'.
On applying research evidence
A postgraduate award is meant to include a strong research component. As suggested in earlier comments, it is essential for the fully professional teacher who will need to make informed decisions about her own classroom practice to be be provided with the skills to access research (including understanding strengths and weaknesses of methodology), critique it, evaluate its potential relevance to the immediate teaching and learning contexts, and to evaluate it in the context. Many PGCE-MEd and PGCE-MA programmes already support this.
I totally agree that this should be provided to all new trainees, and would have thought there are enough HEIs with expertise in educational research for this to be possible (as it is on the PGCE-M route already). However, it is not enough to simply provide teachers the skills, they also have to have
access to research publications,
time to
read them and
undertake small-scale context-directed enquiry, and
to give them the confidence that this aspect of professional practice is recognised and appreciated.
For example, a teacher has to know that if they are doing something differently to some government advice because they have looked at the research, considered it in relation to their specific context, and evaluated approaches in their own teaching context and concluded that for a particular class/course/students some approach other than that generally recommended is indicated, THEN this would be recognised (e.g., in Inspections) as praiseworthy.
On 'incentives that could encourage schools and trusts to participate in ITT'
I would think it is dangerous and perhaps foolish to add to schools' expected responsibilities where they do not welcome this.
On proposed reforms on the recruitment and selection process
To me, this seems to complicate matters for a PGCE applicant who at the moment has to only select a university-schools partnership.
Potential equality impacts
As discussed above, in my experience current arrangements, at least for the PGCE route, offer flexibility to meet the individual needs of a range of new entrants. My sense is the proposals would be unhelpful in this regard.
Comments on 'any aspect'
I was lucky enough to undertake my PGCE at a university that at the time was recognised as one with excellent provision in my teaching subjects (chemistry and physics, at Nottingham Trent). At that time the structure of the teaching placement (two isolated blocks, one of 4 weeks, one of 8 weeks) did not allow the kind of incredibly valuable iterative experience of moving between the university and school contexts I discuss above, and the teachers in the schools did not act as mentors, but merely handed over their classes for a period of time.
Otherwise I was very happy with my 'training' experience.
If (some) university-schools partnerships (such as that based at the University of Cambridge) are recognised as excellent, why change the system in ways that threaten those providers?
Despite this, I know some of our excellent new recruits went through serious periods of doubt and crises in their teaching due to the intense and highly skilled nature of the work. In the context where I was lucky enough to work, the structure of the training year and the responsive and interactive nature of managing the graduates in their work meant that nearly always these setbacks were temporary, and so could be overcome.
I am concerned that some of this good practice may not continue if some of the proposals in the review are carried through – and that consequently a significant number of potentially excellent new teachers will not get the support they need to develop at the pace that best matches their needs. This will lead to drop-out, and early burn-out – or potentially candidates doing enough to cope, without meeting the high standards they wish to set for themselves to the benefit of their pupils.
Keith S. Taber
1 It strikes me that the third bullet point might seem a little superfluous – after all, surely a system of initial teacher education that both maintains the supply of new teachers at the level needed (which in some subjects would be a definite improvement on the existing system) and ensures they all receive high quality preparation should inherently benefit all schools by making sure there was always a pool of suitably qualified and well-prepared teachers to fill teaching vacancies across the school curriculum.
Perhaps, however, this means something else – such as (in view of the reference to 'incentives that could encourage schools and trusts to participate in ITT' in the consultation) making sure all schools receive funding for contributing to the preparation of new teachers (by making sure all schools make a substantial contribution to the preparation of new teachers).
2 It strikes me that the way in which teachers in preparation are able to move back and forth between a study context and a practitioner context, giving opportunities to apply learning in practice, and to 'stand back' and reflect on and conceptualise that practice, reflects the way science proceeds – where theory motivates new practical investigations, and experience of undertaking the empirical enquiry informs new theoretical refinements and insights (which then…).
3 That is, the pedagogic principles which teachers are expected to apply when working with their students are, in general terms, just as relevant in their own professional education.
Work cited:
Taber, K. S. (2010). Preparing teachers for a research-based profession. In M. V. Zuljan & J. Vogrinc (Eds.), Facilitating effective student learning through teacher research and innovation (pp. 19-47). Ljubljana: Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana.
The government are about to1 publish a white paper on education2 that will set out intentions for the future of teacher education (teacher 'training'). The expectation is that there will be a shift from University-based teacher education, to school-based training. By university-based, the government will mean such routes into teaching as the Post-graduate Certificate in Education, or PGCE, which has long been considered the major way of preparing to teach in secondary schools. However, such courses have not really been University-based for many years. Indeed, there are good reasons to believe that the PGCE represents a 'gold standard' in teacher preparation that has evolved towards an optimal mode of teacher preparation.
I was trained on a PGCE course about 30 years ago. At that time, I spent twice as much time in the University, as in schools. Moreover, the school-based practices were blocks of time in school, with minimal input from teaching staff, largely seen as an opportunity to practice the theoretical ideas being taught in the university lectures. The PGCE today is quite unlike this. The students admitted have good degrees in their disciplines – and, often, higher degrees – making them strong subject specialists. During the 36-week PGCE course these students spent two-thirds of their time working in schools. Moreover, this work is interspersed with time in the university in a schedule allowing university-based teaching to carefully support, prepare for, and allow careful reflection upon, school experience. University teaching is not lecturing about abstract theory, but introducing basic principles of learning and pedagogy, essential information about school structures and the curriculum, and a detailed induction into the nature of subject-specific pedagogy: things that the new teachers can apply directly in the classroom.
In the schools, where these 'trainees' spend most of their time, teachers act as their mentors and managers. Schools are partners with the university, and the teaching is shared between university and school staff. Unlike the 'being left to get on with it' mentality of teaching practice during my own training, these days the new teachers are carefully inducted, working alongside an experienced teacher who provides a structured introduction to teaching. Each trainee has a flexible, individualised learning plan, and negotiates with their mentor the rate at which they incrementally take on more responsibility for teaching classes. Trainees work within overlapping communities, as both members of school teaching departments and as part of a group of peers within their subject specialism, supported by an expert subject-specialist educator within the University. It offers the best of both worlds.
Figure 1 from Taber (2017)
In the past decade, the Post-graduate teaching certificate has really become a gilt-edged award, as courses have developed to reflect the Master's level status of the qualification, making sure that trainee teachers are working at the forefront of scholarship in their specialist area: science education, or maths education, or English education etc. In particular, PGCE courses provide trainees with the knowledge and skills that support classroom enquiry. Trainees undertake small-scale research projects during school placements, which ensure that they have the skills to critically draw upon existing research, and practically tackle problems in their own teaching. In my own institution, this work is impressive enough for us to have started an on-line journal to share PGCE student work with the teaching community (http://jotter.educ.cam.ac.uk/). This prepares PGCE graduates to be full professionals:
experts in their own discipline;
experts in the teaching of their subject;
and skilled to tackle problems, and find ways to improve their own practice.
Many teachers prepared through this route, go on to complete practice-based Master's degrees in education.
The excellence of many PGCE courses has been demonstrated not only by Ofsted inspections3, but also by the evaluations of both the graduates who take this route into teaching, and the schools in which they work. Over many years the PGCE has evolved to balance the needs of providing a solid grounding in the theoretical basis of effective teaching; positive and carefully supported classroom experience; induction into working in teams in schools, and levels of critical, analytical and research skills expected of a Master's level qualification. It is indeed the 'gold standard' in initial teacher education, and would only be sacrificed by a government who values a cheaply prepared and uncritical teaching force, over a body of professionals who are experts in teaching their subjects. Let us trust that does not prove to be the case.
Keith S. Taber
1 This piece was written in 2010 (when much of my teaching was on the PGCE programmes at Cambridge) and published as a blog posting on the Academia social media site (an edited version was also published as an opinion piece in 'Science Teacher Education'). Having recently had to think back to this in the context of the current 'market (sic) review' of Initial Teacher Education ('training') being carried out in England (see 'Reviewing initial teacher education'), I discovered that the original blog posting seems to have now disappeared from the www.
[Despite clear indications that the UK government wished to move the responsibility of initial teacher preparation away form Higher Education 'led' partnerships to school-based consortia, this only happened to some extent. If initial teacher education is considered a market, it was clear that many (if certainly not all) of the the 'clients' preferred to train in the university-school partnership routes. Whether the current [2021] 'market' review, which seems designed in part to make it more difficult for Universities to remain as key partners in I.T.E., will change this situation remains to be seen.]
2The importance of teaching. Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Education, November 2010
It was nice to have a sunny and warm day in October to sit in the garden and do some reading. Looking at Chemistry World, I came across an article by Raychelle Burks (2021) on the the natural poison aconitine, extracted from plants collectively known as aconite. The article was punningly called 'The dead of aconite'.
Regular readers of this blog (if that is not a null set) may have noticed my interest in analogies used in teaching and communicating science, and so I was intrigued with the comparison between the effect of the poison and a damaged car engine:
Aconitine likely serves as a defensive tool for the plants that produce it, discouraging [!] predators with its deadly action. It acts quickly on sodium ion signalling channels, opening them and preventing their closure. 'To use a car analogy, if the valves in your car's engine open up, but then won't close, it's dead in the water', wrote toxicologist Justin Bower [sic]. 'Just like aconitine victims.'
Burks, 2021: 69
I was quite interested in following this up, but no citation was given. A little searching around the web led to the a blog called 'Nature's Poisons' written by forensic toxicologist Justin Brower [sic], and an entry on 'the queen of the poisons'.
Making the unfamiliar familiar
Analogy is just one technique used by teachers and others communicating technical or abstract ideas to assist in introducing those ideas – by suggesting that what is unfamiliar and is to be communicated is actually somewhat like something that the listeners(s) or reader(s) already know(s) about.
For this to work, the analogue needs to actually be more familiar than the target idea being communicated. Dr Brower's analogy relies upon people knowing enough about car engines to be familiar with the possibility of engine valves getting stuck open and preventing the car operating.
That the function and operation of the two systems are quite different means that knowing about car engines only offers limited support in learning about the effects of the poison on body cells, but this kind of superficial mapping between systems is true of many teaching analogies. Their role is more about initial familiarisation with the novel concept or phenomenon than providing a detailed explanation. We might almost see their primary role as affective rather than cognitive – making something quite technical seem less alien (and potentially less inaccessible).
Dr Brower explained in his blog that aconitine is found in the plant Monkshood (a.k.a. Wolfsbane), "in every part…from its pretty flowers right down to its dirty roots", and therefore
When any part of the plant is ingested, the aconitine is absorbed through the gut and goes to work. It binds to receptors that help regulate the muscle cells' sodium-ion channels, key components of the nervous system and cardiac cells (i.e. the heart). This action keeps the channels open, allowing sodium to flow freely into the cell. Unable to repolarize, the cells are stuck in a state of "open", and paralysis sets in. To use a car analogy, if the valves in your car's engine open up, but then won't close, it's dead in the water. Just like aconitine victims.
Brower, 2014
Cell membranes have to both prevent the unrestrained ingress and egress of materials, and yet also allow transport of particular substances across the barrier. Sodium ion channels are structures in the cell membrane that are specifically suited to allowing sodium ions (but not, say, calcium ions) to pass through. Moreover these channels do not remain open all the time. (They act as metaphorical 'gates' that can be closed.) The channels depend on specific proteins embedded in the membrane – substances that can have relatively 'large' molecules (that is, large for molecules!) with complex structures. The shapes of proteins can be very complicated.
Molecular shapes
The shapes of simple molecules are understood in terms of the electrical forces within the molecule (and at upper secondary school level the VSEPRT – the valance shell electron pair repulsion theory – model is often taught). Put very simply, the distribution of charges attracting and repelling each other (positive atomic cores, negative electrons) leads to the conformation of lowest potential energy.
The simple molecules can be considered to have one 'central' atomic centre (O in H2O; N in NH3; C in CH4; P in PCl5, and so forth) and the shape decided by considering the electronic distribution around that atom. In a molecule like propane (CH3CH2CH3) the shape can be considered by considering the situation around each of the of the C centres in turn, but taking into account that free rotation around the C-C bonds means that the molecule has a dynamic conformation. In larger molecules, there may be interactions (such as hydrogen bonding) between different parts of the molecule which influence and constrain the shape. Proteins may be very large molecules with many such interactions, often leading to a convoluted shape as the molecule 'folds' according to these interactions. Such protein folding can very difficult to predict.
Two views of a voltage-gated sodium channel. (Source: Protein Data Bank). The second view shows the protein located in the membrane (represented in grey).
VSEPRT is used to consider isolated molecules, and ignores the influence of other charges from outside the molecule (such as interactions with solvent molecules). The protein in a context such as a cell membrane may have quite a different shape than the same protein had it been isolated. Moreover, a change in the environment may affect the protein shape. In cells, when the membrane potential changes, the electric field around the ion channel proteins change, and they may change shape. The changes 'open' or 'close' the channels.
The same protein molecule, showing sites where two different toxins (shown as green and yellow) are known to bind and change the conformation of the structure preventing the 'gate' functioning. (Source: Protein Data Bank).
If a poison interferes with this process, the channels can no longer control the transport of sodium ions across the membrane in a way that enables the cell's normal functioning. Without this process nerve cells are unable to transmit electrical signals, and heart cells called myocytes (muscle cells) do not beat. That is important, as the beating of the heart is due to the synchronised beating of these cells. And the beating heart keeps the blood flowing, and with it the critical movement of substances (glucose, carbon dioxide, oxygen, etc.) around the body. Aconitine, then, acts as a cardiotoxin and neurotoxin (a heart poison and nerve poison).
Individual heart cells beat in this YouTube video from Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center's Institute for Regenerative Medicine
The car analogy breaks down in the sense that engine valves that are stuck open might later be closed again with some oil and a hammer and may then function again, and this restoration is not time critical; whereas after a heart has stopped beating, irreversible tissue damage will soon follow.
The first symptoms of aconitine poisoning appear approximately 20 min to 2 hr after oral intake and include paraesthesia [odd sensations], sweating and nausea. This leads to severe vomiting, colicky diarrhoea, intense pain and then paralysis of the skeletal muscles. Following the onset of life-threatening arrhythmia [irregular heartbeat], including ventricular tachycardia [fast, abnormal heartbeat] and ventricular fibrillation [loss of coordination in the muscle activity so there is no effective pumping1] death finally occurs as a result of respiratory paralysis or cardiac arrest.
In a worse case scenario for the car, the engine could be replaced, and the car made as good as new. Nonetheless, this is a useful analogy for anyone who knows a little of how the car engine works, as without working valves, the engine cycle (which I seem to recall summarised as 'suck-squeeze-bang-blow' on one course I once taught on) cannot occur, and the car goes nowhere.
cell does not function with channels unable to close
engine does not function with valves stuck open
if nerve and heart cells do not function, paralysis occurs, and person dies
if engine does not work, car does not go
negative mapping
tissue damage will soon be irreversible
valves may sometimes be freed up, restoring engine function – a quick response is not critical
Mapping between target idea and analogue
Work cited:
Beike, J., Frommherz, L., Wood, M., Brinkmann, B., & Köhler, H. (2004). Determination of aconitine in body fluids by LC-MS-MS. International Journal of Legal Medicine, 118(5), 289-293. doi:10.1007/s00414-004-0463-2
Brower, J. (2014). Aconitine: Queen of poisons. Nature's poisons. Retrieved from https://naturespoisons.com/2014/02/20/aconitine-queen-of-poisons-monkshood/
Burks, R. (2021). The dead of aconite. Chemistry World (October), 69.
Could an oral Covid-19 treatment be available soon?
There was an item on the BBC radio programme/podcast 'Science in Action' (23rd September 2021) about anti-viral agents being used in response to the COVID-19 pandemic: 'Could an oral Covid-19 treatment be available soon?'
"But even after someone is infected, the host actually mounts, for all these [respiratory] viruses, a really dramatic immune and inflammatory response. So it sort of lights a fire. And even when the virus stops replicating, you know that fire continues to burn, and in a lot of cases that's what lands people in the hospital. And so you want to prevent the virus from igniting that fire, that is what really ends up causing a huge amount of damage to the patient. …
the greatest benefit [of the antiviral drug being tested] is in the outpatient setting before that fire gets ignited."
Daria Hazuda being interviewed on 'Science in Action'
A scientific simile
Science communicators, such as teachers, but also scientists and journalists presenting science in the public media, often use techniques to 'make the unfamiliar familiar', to get across abstract or difficult ideas in ways that their audience can relate to.
These techniques can include analogies, metaphors and similes. Here Dr Hazuda used an analogy between the damage to tissue that can occur in disease, and the damage a fire can do. In particular, she was suggesting that the virus may be seen as like something which ignites a fire (such as a match or a spark) but which is not needed to keep the fire going once it had taken hold.
She introduced this idea by suggesting that the virus "sort of lights a fire". This can be considered a simile, which is a figure of speech which is a kind of explicit comparison where one thing is said to be like or similar to another.2 Dr Hazuda did not suggest that the virus actually lights a fire, but rather it has an effect which can be considered somewhat like ('sort of') igniting a fire.
"We didn't start the fire It was always burning, since the world's been turning We didn't start the fire No, we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it"
Billy Joel
Viruses triggering long term disease
The symptoms we experience when ill can be the results of our immune system reacting to illness, rather than the direct effect of the disease causing agent. That does not mean the disease itself would not harm us (infectious agents may be destroying cells which would not be obvious until extensive damage was done), but that in some conditions what we notice – perhaps sneezing, coughing, a raised temperature – is due to the immune response.
The immediate context of the Science in Action interview was the current COVID-19 pandemic caused by infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. However, the idea that a viral infection may trigger ('ignite') a longer term immune response (the 'fire') is not new with COVID. The syndrome sometimes known as chronic fatigue syndrome has unknown cause(s), but viruses are among the suspects. Viruses have been suspected as being a possible trigger (if perhaps in combination with other factors) in a range of autoimmune conditions. In autoimmune conditions the mechanisms that usually protect a person from infectious agents such as (some) bacteria and viruses attack and destroy the person's own cells leading to inflammation and potentially serious tissue damage.
People might commonly say that the immune system is 'meant' or 'intended' to protect us from diseases and that it sometimes 'goes wrong' leading to autoimmune disease – but strictly this is not a scientific way of thinking. The immune system has no purpose as such (this would be 'teleological' thinking), but has just evolved in ways such that it has on balance increased fitness.
From that perspective, it might not seem so strange that our immune systems are sometimes insufficient to protect us from harm, and yet can also sometimes be over-sensitive and start doing damage – as that surely is what we might expect if evolution has (through natural selection) led to a system which has tendedon the whole to be protective.
The admirable HLA-B27?
"HLA B27 plays an admirable, perhaps outstanding role in the immune response to viruses, however, it is also directly involved in the pathogenesis of the spondyloarthropathies"
Bowness, 2002: 866
My late wife Philippa was diagnosed with a complex autoimmune condition – she was told that she had atypical Wegener's granulomatosis (a disease now usually called Granulomatosis with polyangiitis2), a form of vasculitis (a disease leading to inflammation in the blood vessels), and that she might have been genetically susceptible to autoimmune diseases because she produced a particular type of human leukocyte antigen, HLA-B27. HLA is an important component of human immune systems, but the precise antigens a person produces varies, depending on their genes (just as we all have blood but people can be assigned into different blood groups). It was also suggested to her that an otherwise minor infection may have acted as a trigger in setting off the autoimmune problems.
Medicine today has some effective agents such as steroids that help 'dampen down' the 'fires' that damage tissues in autoimmune diseases. But these conditions can be very serious. Fifty years ago, most people found to have Wegener's granulomatosis were dead from that damage within a year of their diagnosis.
HLA-B27 is only found in a minority of people in most populations and is associated with a higher prevalence of certain immune conditions such as ankylosing spondylitis (an inflammatory condition especially affecting the spine), inflammatory bowel disease, and some forms of arthritis. It might seem odd that evolution has not led to the elimination of HGLA-B27 if it is associated with serious medical conditions. Yet, again, it may be that something which can make people prone to some conditions may also be better at protecting them from others.
People with HLA-B27 may be better at mounting an effective immune response to some viral infections (the fire is more readily ignited, we might say) and this might be enough of an advantage to balance its unfortunate role in autoimmune conditions. Over human history, HLA-B27 might have protected a great many people from dangerous infections, if also being responsible for a smaller number becoming very ill.
"HLA-B27 appears to excel at its natural function of binding and presenting viral peptide epitopes to cytotoxic T cells. We have suggested that HLA-B27 may, however, act as a 'double-edged sword'. Thus, certain features of its peptide binding ability or cell biology (perhaps those favouring excellent antiviral responses) might also lead to autoimmunity."
McMichael & Bowness, 2002: S157
That is, what makes this immune component so good at attacking certain viruses (as if the immune system had been doused in petrol so that the slightest spark might initiate a response) may also be responsible for its association with autoimmune diseases. HLA-B27 may (metaphorically) be the can of petrol that means that a viral spark starts not just a fire, but a conflagration.
1: "the first oral, direct-acting antiviral shown to be highly effective at reducing nasopharyngeal SARS-CoV-2 infectious virus" according to a preprint reported at medRχiv). A preprint is a paper written to report scientific research but NOT yet tested through peer review and formally published, and so treated as reporting more provisional and uncertain findings than a peer-reviewed paper.
2 By comparison, a metaphor may be considered an implicit comparison presented as if an identity: e.g., the nucleus is the brain of the cell.
2. The disease was named after the German physician Friedrich Wegener who described the condition. After Wegener was identified as a Nazi and likely war criminal (suspected, but not convicted) it was decided to rename the disease.
When I was listening to the radio news I heard a clip of the Rt. Hon. Sajid Javid MP, the U.K. Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, talking about the ongoing response to the COVID pandemic:
Health Secretary Sajid Javid talking on 12th September
"Now that we are entering Autumn and Winter, something that COVID and other viruses, you know, usually like, the prime minister this week will be getting out our plans to manage COVID over the coming few months."
Sajid Javid
So, COVID and other viruses usually like Autumn and Winter (by implication, presumably, in comparison with Spring and Summer).
This got me wondering how we (or Sajid, at least) could know what the COVID virus (i.e., SARS-CoV-2 – severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) prefers – what the virus 'likes'. I noticed that Mr Javid offered a modal qualification to his claim: usually. It seemed 'COVID and other viruses' did not always like Autumn and Winter, but usually did.
Yet there was a potential ambiguity here depending how one parsed the claim. Was he suggesting that
[COVID and other viruses]
usually
like Autumn and Winter
or
COVID
[and other viruses usually]
like Autumn and Winter
This might have been clearer in a written text as either
COVID and other viruses usually like Autumn and Winter
or
COVID, and other viruses usually, like Autumn and Winter
The second option may seem a little awkward in its phrasing, 1 but then not all viral diseases are more common in the Winter months, and some are considered to be due to 'Summer viruses':
"Adenovirus, human bocavirus (HBoV), parainfluenza virus (PIV), human metapneumovirus (hMPV), and rhinovirus can be detected throughout the year (all-year viruses). Seasonal patterns of PIV are type specific. Epidemics of PIV type 1 (PIV1) and PIV type 3 (PIV3) peak in the fall [Autumn] and spring-summer, respectively. The prevalence of some non-rhinovirus enteroviruses increases in summer (summer viruses)"
Moriyama, Hugentobler & Iwasaki, 2020: 86
Just a couple of days later Mr Javid was being interviewed on the radio, and he made a more limited claim:
Health Secretary Sajid Javid talking on BBC Radio 4's 'Today' programme, 15th September
"…because we know Autumn and Winter, your COVID is going to like that time of year"
Sajid Javid
So, this claim was just about the COVID virus, not viruses more generally, and that we knowthat COVID is going to like Autumn and Winter. No ambiguity there. But how do we know?
Coming to knowledge
Historically there have been various ways of obtaining knowledge.
Divine revelation: where God reveals the knowledge to someone, perhaps through appearing to the chosen one in a dream.
Consulting an oracle, or a prophet or some other kind of seer.
Intuiting the truth by reflecting on the nature of things using the rational power of the human intellect.
Empirical investigation of natural phenomena.
My focus in this blog is related to science, and given that we are talking about public health policy in modern Britain, I would like to think Mr Javid was basing his claim on the latter option. Of course, even empirical methods depend upon some metaphysical assumptions. For example, if one assumes the cosmos has inbuilt connections one might look for evidence in terms of sympathies or correspondences. Perhaps, if the COVID virus was observed closely and looked like a snowflake, that could (in this mindset) be taken as a sign that it liked Winter.
A snowflake – or is it a virus particle? (Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)
Sympathetic magic
This kind of correspondence, a connection indicated by appearance, was once widely accepted, so that a plant which was thought to resemble some part of the anatomy might be assumed to be an appropriate medicine for diseases or disorders associated with that part of the body.
This is a kind of magic, and might seem a 'primitive' belief to many people today, but such an idea was sensible enough in the context of a common set of underlying beliefs about the nature and purposes of the world, and the place and role of people in that world. One might expect that specific beliefs would soon die out if, for example, the plant shaped like an ear turned out to do nothing for ear ache. Yet, at a time when medical practitioners could offer little effective treatment, and being sent to a hospital was likely to reduce life expectancy, herbal remedies at least often (if not always) did no harm.
Moreover, many herbs do have medicinal properties, and something with a general systemic effect might work as topical medicine (i.e., when applied to a specific site of disease). Add to that, the human susceptibility to confirmation bias (taking more notice of, and giving more weight to, instances that meet our expectations than those which do not) and the placebo effect (where believing we are taking effective medication can sometimes in itself have beneficial effects) and the psychological support offered by spending time with an attentive practitioner with a good 'bedside' manner – and we can easily see how beliefs about treatments may survive limited definitive evidence of effectiveness.
The gold standard of experimental method
Of course, today, we have the means to test such medicines by taking a large representative sample of a population (of ear ache sufferers, or whatever), randomly dividing them into two groups, and using a double-blind (or should that be double-deaf) approach, treat them with the possible medicine or a placebo, without either the patient or the practitioner knowing who was getting which treatment. (The researchers have a way to know of course – or it would difficult to deduce anything from the results.) That is, the randomised control trial (RCT).
Now, I have been very critical of the notion that these kinds of randomised experimental designs should be automatically be seen as the preferred way of testing educational innovations (Taber, 2019) – but in situations where control of variables and 'blinding' is possible, and where randomisation can be applied to samples of well-defined populations, this does deserve to be considered the gold standard. (It is when the assumptions behind a research methodology do not apply that we should have reservations about using it as a strategy for enquiry.)
So can the RCT approach be used to find out if COVID has a preference for certain times of year? I guess this depends on our conceptual framework for the research (e.g., how do we understand what a 'like' actually is) and the theoretical perspective we adopt.
So, for example, behaviourists would suggest that it is not useful to investigate what is going on in someone's mind (perhaps some behaviorists do not even think the mind concept corresponds to anything real) so we should observe behaviours that allow us to make inferences. This has to be done with care. Someone who buys and eats lots of chocolate presumably likes chocolate, and someone who buys and listens to a lot of reggae probably likes reggae, but a person who cries regularly, or someone that stumbles around and has frequent falls, does not necessary like crying, or falling over, respectively.
A viral choice chamber
So, we might think that woodlice prefer damp conditions because we have put a large number of woodlice in choice chambers with different conditions (dry and light, dry and dark, damp and light, damp and dark) and found that there was a statistically significant excess of woodlice settling down in the damp sections of the chamber.
Of course, to infer preferences from behaviour – or even to use the term 'behaviour' – for some kinds of entity is questionable. (To think that woodlice make a choice based on what they 'like' might seem to assume a level of awareness that they perhaps lack?) In a cathode ray tube electrons subject to a magnetic field may be observed (indirectly!) to move to one side of the tube, just as woodlice might congregate in one chamber, but I am not sure I would describe this as electrons liking that part of the tube. I think it can be better explained with concepts such as electrical charge, fields, forces, and momentum.
It is difficult to see how we can do double blind trials to see which season a virus might like, as if the COVID virus really does like Winter, it must surely have a way of knowing when it is Winter (making blinding impossible). In any case, a choice chamber with different sections at different times of the year would require some kind of time portal installed between its sections.
Like electrons, but unlike woodlice, COVID viral particles do not have an active form of transport available to them. Rather, they tend to be sneezed and coughed around and then subject to the breeze, or deposited by contact with surfaces. So I am not sure that observing virus 'behaviour' helps here.
So perhaps a different methodology might be more sensible.
A viral opinion poll
A common approach to find out what people like would be a survey. Surveys can sometimes attract responses from large numbers of respondents, which may seem to give us confidence that they offer authentic accounts of widespread views. However, sample size is perhaps less important than sample representativeness. Imagine carrying out a survey of people's favourite football teams at a game at Stamford Bridge; or undertaking a survey of people's favourite bands as people queued to enter a King Crimson concert! The responses may [sic, almost certainly would] not fully reflect the wider population due to the likely bias in such samples. Would these surveys give reliable results which could be replicated if repeated at the Santiago Bernabeu or at a Marillion concert?
How do we know what 'COVID 'really likes? (Original Images by OpenClipart-Vectors and Gordon Johnson from Pixabay)
A representative sample of vairants?
This might cause problems with the COVID-19 virus (SARS-CoV-2). What counts as a member of the population – perhaps a viable virus particle? Can we even know how big the population actually is at the time of our survey? The virus is infecting new cells, leading to new virus particles being produced all the time, just as shed particles become non-viable all the time. So we have no reliable knowledge of population numbers.
Moreover, a survey needs a representative sample: do the numbers of people in a sample of a human population reflect the wider population in relevant terms (be that age, gender, level of educational qualifications, earnings, etc.)? There are viral variants leading to COVID-19 infection – and quite a few of them. That is, SARS-CoV-2 is a class with various subgroups. The variants replicate to different extents under particular conditions, and new variants appear from time to time.
So, the population profile is changing rapidly. In recent months in the UK nearly all infections where the variant has been determined are due to the variant VOC-21APR-02 (or B.1.617.2 or Delta) but many people will be infected asymptotically or with mild symptoms and not be tested, and so this likely does not mean that VOC-21APR-02 dominates the SARS-CoV-2 population as a whole to the extent it currently dominates in investigated cases. Assuming otherwise would be like gauging public opinion from the views of those particular people who make themselves salient by attending a protest, e.g.:
"Shock finding – 98% of the population would like to abolish the nuclear arsenal,
according to a [hypothetical] survey taken at the recent Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament march"
In any case, surveys are often fairly blunt instruments as they need to present objectively the same questions to all respondents, and elicit responses in a format that can be readily classified into a discrete number of categories. This is why many questionnaires use Likert type items:
Would you say you like Autumn and Winter:
1
2
3
4
5
Always
Nearly always
Usually
Sometimes
Never
Such 'objective' measures are often considered to avoid the subjective nature of some other types of research. It may seem that responses do not need to be interpreted – but of course this assumes that the researchers and all the respondents understand language the same way (what exactly counts as Autumn and Winter? What does 'like' mean? How is 'usually' understood – 60-80% of the time, or 51-90% of the time or…). We can usually (sic) safely assume that those with strong language competence will have somewhat similar understandings of terms, but we cannot know precisely what survey participants meant by their responses or to what extent they share a meaning for 'usually'.
There are so-called 'qualitative surveys' which eschew this kind of objectivity to get more in-depth engagement with participants. They will usually use interviews where the researcher can establish rapport with respondents and ask them about their thoughts and feelings, observe non-verbal signals such as facial expressions and gestures, and use follow-up questions… However, the greater insight into individuals comes at a cost of smaller samples as these kinds of methods are more resource-intensive.
But perhaps Mr Javid does not actually mean that COVID likes Autumn and Winter?
So, how did the Department of Health & Social Care, or the Health Secretary's scientific advisors, find out that COVID (or the COVID virus) likes Autumn and Winter? The virus does not think, or feel, and it does not have preferences in the way we do. It does not perceive hot or cold, and it does not have a sense of time passing, or of the seasons.2 COVID does not like or dislike anything.
Mr Javid needs to make himself clear to a broad public audience, so he has to avoid too much technical jargon. It is not easy to pitch a presentation for such an audience and be pithy, accurate, and engaging, but it is easy for someone (such as me) to be critical when not having to face this challenge. Cabinet ministers, unlike science teachers, cannot be expected to have skills in communicating complex and abstract scientific ideas in simplified and accessible forms that remain authentic to the science.
It is easy and perhaps convenient to use anthropomorphic language to talk about the virus, and this will likely make the topic seem accessible to listeners, but it is less clear what is actually meant by a virus liking a certain time of year. In teaching the use of anthropomorphic language can be engaging, but it can also come to stand in place of scientific understanding when anthropomorphic statements are simply accepted uncritically at face value. For example, if the science teacher suggests "the atom wants a full shell of electrons" then we should not be surprised that students may think this is a scientific explanation, and that atoms do want to fill their shells. (They do not of course. 3)
Image by Gordon Johnson from Pixabay
Of course Mr Javid's statements cannot be taken as a literal claim about what the virus likes – my point in this posting is to provoke the question of what this might be intended to mean? This is surely intended metaphorically (at least if Mr Javid had thought about his claim critically): perhaps that there is higher incidence of infection or serious illness caused by the COVID virus in the Winter. But by that logic, I guess turkeys really would vote for Christmas (or Thanksgiving) after all.
Typically, some viruses cause more infection in the Winter when people are more likely to mix indoors and when buildings and transport are not well ventilated (both factors being addressed in public health measures and advice in regard to COVID-19). Perhaps 'likes' here simply means that the conditions associated with a higher frequency/population of virus particles occur in Autumn and Winter?
A snowflake. The conditions suitable for a higher frequency of snowflakes are more common in Winter. So do snowflakes also 'like' Winter? (Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)
However, this is some way from assigning 'likes' to the virus. After all, in evolutionary terms, a virus might 'prefer', so to speak, to only be transmitted asymptomatically, as it cannot be in the virus's 'interests', so to speak, to encourage a public health response that will lead to vaccines or measures to limit the mixing of people.
If COVID could like anything (and of course it cannot), I would suggest it would like to go 'under the radar' (another metaphor) and be endemic in a population that was not concerned about it (perhaps doing so little harm it is not even noticed, such that people do not change their behaviours). It would then only 'prefer' a Season to the extent that that time of year brings conditions which allow it to go about its life cycle without attracting attention – from Mr Javid or anyone else.
The health secretary was interviewed on 1st December
"…we have always known that when it gets darker, it gets colder, the virus likes that, the flu virus likes that and we should not forget that's still lurking around as well…"
Rt. Hon. Sajid Javid MP, the U.K. Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, interviewed on BBC Radio 4 Today programme, 1st December, 2021
Works cited:
Moriyama, M., Hugentobler, W. J., & Iwasaki, A. (2020). Seasonality of Respiratory Viral Infections. Annual Review of Virology, 7(1), 83-101. doi:10.1146/annurev-virology-012420-022445
1. It would also seem to be a generalisation based on the only two Winters that the COVID-19 virus had 'experienced'
2. Strictly I cannot know what it is like to be a virus particle. But a lot of well-established and strongly evidenced scientific principles would be challenged if a virus particle is sentient.
