2016 年至 2022 年间，泰国高产研究人员的相对增幅最大。图片来源：Lauren DeCicca/Getty
每年发表 60 多篇论文的研究人员比不到十年前增加了四倍1。根据 11 月 24 日发布在 bioRxiv 上的预印本，沙特阿拉伯和泰国的此类科学家数量在过去几年中增长最快。这些“生产力极高”作者的增加引起了人们的担忧，即一些研究人员正在采用可疑的方法来发表额外的论文。
“我怀疑可疑的研究实践和欺诈可能是一些最极端行为的根源，”该研究的合著者约翰·约安尼迪斯（John Ioannidis）说，他是加州斯坦福大学专门研究元科学的医生。“我们的数据为所有科学领域讨论这些问题提供了一个起点。”
Ioannidis 和他的同事检查了 Scopus 数据库中 2000 年至 2022 年索引的文章、评论和会议论文。他们排除了物理学作者，这些作者往往会发表大量论文，因为该领域的作者实践与其他学科不同。研究人员追踪了不同国家和领域随着时间的推移，极其富有成效的作者身份发生了怎样的变化。
总体而言，物理学之外最具生产力的作者来自临床医学领域，到 2022 年，临床医学领域将拥有近 700 名此类超强研究人员（参见“高生产力领域”）。农业、渔业和林业的研究人员数量增长最快，2016 年至 2022 年间增长了 14.6 倍，其次是生物学、数学和统计学。
仅在 2022 年，就有 1,266 名非物理学作者每 5 天（包括周末）发表一篇论文，而 2016 年为 387 名。Ioannidis 表示，自 2016 年以来的加速增长令人惊讶，因为早期的分析 2 显示极端生产力已经开始2014 年达到稳定水平。“增长非常快，”他说。
资料来源：参考文献。1.
在物理学之外，2016 年至 2022 年间，大多数国家的高产作者数量增加了一倍多，尽管有些国家的飞跃甚至更大（参见“极端增长”）。泰国的生产力最高作者从 2016 年的第 1 位跃升至 2022 年的第 19 位，是所有国家中相对增幅最大的国家。然而，沙特阿拉伯的绝对增长幅度最大，同一时期生产力极高的作者从 6 名增加到 69 名。
曼谷朱拉隆功大学学术与研究诚信办公室成员蒂拉育·维莱万 (Tirayut Vilaivan) 表示，泰国每年产出大量论文的作者屈指可数，但极高的生产力突然增加令人担忧。政策和标准。“我们不能忽视这一点，”他说。
该研究的化学家戴维·哈丁（David Harding）表示，这一增长至少在一定程度上是由该国的研究资助体系推动的，该体系已转向支持大型跨学科团队而不是小型团体，这使得研究人员更容易在更多论文中获得自己的名字。素罗娜丽科技大学（Suranaree University of Technology），位于泰国呵叻府。“泰国对其研究生态系统进行了彻底改革，试图提高生产力，”哈丁说。
维莱万说，另一个影响因素可能是泰国对大学排名的重视，而大学排名是以出版物数量和指标为基础的。他补充说，该国许多大学利用现金奖励来鼓励研究人员在著名期刊上发表论文。他说，如果研究人员运用得当，他们每年仅通过发表论文就可以赚取高达 100 万泰铢（28,000 美元）的收入。
资料来源：参考文献。1.
维莱万补充道，这种蓬勃发展的“要么出版，要么灭亡”文化与金钱奖励制度相结合，为不法分子的蓬勃发展创造了肥沃的土壤。他说，在大流行期间，造纸厂——向研究人员出售假论文的非法企业——开始在泰国出现。
但泰国开始调查发表论文数量可疑的研究人员。一月份，高等教育、科学、研究和创新部通过审查发表异常多产的出版物或多篇超出其专业知识的论文的研究人员，调查了泰国大学是否存在不当行为。调查发现，8 所大学的 33 名研究人员支付了作者署名费，还有数十人涉嫌在购买的论文上列出自己的名字。
约安尼迪斯认为，为了阻止高产作者不断涌现，研究机构和资助机构应该关注研究人员工作的质量，而不是他们发表的论文数量。这将防止科学家偷工减料。“论文的数量实际上不应该被视为正面或负面，”他说。
doi：https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-03865-y
Ioannidis, JPA、Collins, TA 和 Baas, J. BioRxiv 预印本https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.11.23.568476(2023)。
Ioannidis, JPA, Klavans, R. & Boyack, KW Nature 561 , 167–169 (2018)。
Thailand experienced the biggest relative jump in extremely productive researchers between 2016 and 2022.Credit: Lauren DeCicca/Getty
Up to four times more researchers pump out more than 60 papers a year than less than a decade ago1. Saudi Arabia and Thailand saw the sharpest uptick in the number of such scientists over the past few years, according to a preprint posted on bioRxiv on 24 November. The increase in these 'extremely productive’ authors raises concerns that some researchers are resorting to dubious methods to publish extra papers.
“I suspect that questionable research practices and fraud may underlie some of the most extreme behaviours,” says study co-author John Ioannidis, a physician specializing in metascience at Stanford University in California. “Our data provide a starting point for discussing these issues across all science.”
Ioannidis and his colleagues examined articles, reviews and conference papers indexed in the Scopus database between 2000 and 2022. They excluded physics authors, who tend to publish large numbers of papers because authorship practices in this field differ from those of other subjects. The researchers tracked how extremely productive authorship has changed over time in various countries and fields.
Overall, most extremely productive authors outside physics were in clinical medicine, which had nearly 700 of these supercharged researchers in 2022 (see 'Hyper-productive fields’). Agriculture, fisheries and forestry saw the speediest growth in extremely productive researchers, increasing by 14.6 times between 2016 and 2022, followed by biology, and mathematics and statistics.
In 2022 alone, 1,266 non-physics authors published the equivalent of one paper every 5 days, including weekends, compared with 387 in 2016. The accelerated growth since 2016 was surprising, says Ioannidis, because an earlier analysis2 showed that extreme productivity was beginning to plateau in 2014. “There has been a very fast increase,” he says.
Source: Ref. 1.
Outside physics, most countries more than doubled the number of extremely productive authors between 2016 and 2022, although some nations saw even bigger leaps (see 'Extreme growth’). Thailand jumped from 1 extremely productive author in 2016 to 19 in 2022, the largest relative increase of all countries. However, Saudi Arabia saw the biggest growth in absolute terms, rising from 6 to 69 extremely productive authors over the same period.
Thailand has only a handful of authors who churn out huge volumes of papers each year, but the sudden increase in extreme productivity is concerning, says Tirayut Vilaivan, a member of the Office of Academic and Research Integrity at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, which develops research policies and standards. “We cannot ignore that,” he says.
The uptick could be driven at least in part by the country’s research-funding system, which has switched to favouring large interdisciplinary teams instead of small groups, making it easier for researchers to get their names on more papers, says David Harding, a chemist at Suranaree University of Technology in Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand. “Thailand has undergone a radical overhaul of its research ecosystem in an attempt to improve productivity,” says Harding.
Another contributing factor might be Thailand’s focus on university rankings, which are underpinned by publication numbers and metrics, says Vilaivan. He adds that many universities in the country use cash incentives to encourage researchers to publish in prominent journals. If researchers play their cards right, they can earn up to 1 million Baht (US$28,000) a year through publications alone, he says.
Source: Ref. 1.
The combination of such a burgeoning 'publish or perish’ culture and a monetary reward system creates fertile grounds for shady actors to flourish, adds Vilaivan. During the pandemic, paper mills — illegal businesses that sell fake papers to researchers — began surfacing in Thailand, he says.
But Thailand is beginning to investigate researchers who have a suspiciously high number of published papers. In January, the Ministry of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation investigated whether misconduct was taking place at Thailand’s universities by examining researchers with unusually prolific publication records or several papers outside their expertise. The probe found that 33 researchers at 8 universities had paid for authorship, with dozens of other people suspected of listing their names on papers they had bought.
Ioannidis thinks that, to stem the rising tide of extremely productive authors, research institutions and funding agencies should focus on the quality of a researcher’s work instead of on the volume of papers they publish. This would prevent scientists from cutting corners. “The number of papers should not really count as positive or negative,” he says.
doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-03865-y
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03865-y
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