Article titles often contain messages that do not represent the scales of analysis practically explored in the published studies. For instance, if a title contains a science terminology like 'global warming' and the study supporting the title is limited to one continent, there is a mismatch between communication (e.g. the message in a title) and science practice (e.g. the empirical study supporting the title). Why do editors of scientific journals allow such a mismatch from a scientific or philosophical point of view?
Hallo Marcel,
You have at least two questions here; are journal editors scientists, and why do editors allow such a mismatch.
The first question is easy to answer. No, journal editors are not (always) scientists. Nevertheless, my experience and available research suggests that all are scientifically knowlegable and competent even if they are not, or have never been, scientists.
The second question is more tricky because you don't give an example of a title with a mismatch. I have to assume therefore that you'd not object to a title like this "Regular cycles in predator-prey dynamics, Japanese foxes and voles". Or, "Global warming does not affect the ranges of ground beetles in Scandinavia". Both these titles specify the general topic and the specific example being covered. You objection is, i suspect, to titles such as "Global warming does not affect the ranges of ground beetles" if the paper gave results only from Scandinavia. As a reviewer or editor, I'd recommend a "necessarily" before the 'affect' to make a more informative title. However, I wouldn't read the title as being a mismatch because all scientists are aware that we study particular systems from which we generalise and would never imagine that a general title implies study of all and every ground beetle.
I'd be interested to see what other responses there are.
I have to close though by saying that there are much more serious things wrong with many published papers than a mismatch such as you describe. I hope editors are concentrating on those !
best, Andrew
Hi,
there is often confusion between 'what is measured' and 'the interpretation of what is measured'. For instance, 'plumage colour' is an interpretation of the measured 'plumage reflectance pattern' using a spectrometer. Authors prefer 'colour' because it reads more easily. Just a simple example that 'exciting' communication is often more important than scientifically correct boring terminology....
Because being an editor (-in chief) is an overseeing and, in parts, a management position, sometimes more awarded then a specific, skills-derived hand-pick. And, of course, the broader the topic of a journal is (cf, Plos journals), the less a specific or punctuated expertise of an editor would fit on the operational level. However, it is always a responsibility of an editor to stay in charge and delegate the different expertise and peer review processes. But is this a realistic scenario, in every case, considering that some editors (i.e., journals) geht more than 100 submissions a day!??
I get your point - but I wouldn't know how to change that without changing the whole system (which might be a good idea... anyway).
Tobias
Journal Editors are simply acts like a postman and communicator among Author and Reviewers. Based on reviewers recommendations, Editors communicate the decision of publishing the manuscript to authors and later passed on to production manager of the publishing house.
No, journal editors do not simply 'act like postmen'. In particular they are major influences on the scope and the market position of a journal. They choose and maintain lists of suitable referees and determine which referees are retained and which not. For specific manuscripts, they are the person who decides whether the ms should even be sent to referees. And after referees have reported, journal editors decide whether or not to accept the referees' recommendations - they don't always, and they're not required to.
To see them as 'postmen' is to greatly underestimate editors and their role..
Perhaps you also underestimate 'postmen', e.g. they trust other people in what they write?
Hallo Marcel, I don't understand your post.
Postmen are conduits, they have no influence on the contents of what they carry or how they carry them. Journal editors in contrast do influence what they process, and how they do so.
Hallo Andrew,
If editors select so-called reliable referees with time, e.g. based on past experiences, editors might start to blindly trust some so-called outstanding referees, therefore also accepting 'unfair' reports to which authors respond? Editors do not wish to have 'bad publicity', and therefore will not publish studies of which the results show the opposite of what has been recently published before in the same journal?
'Nature' policy and propaganda:
- Never publish studies that simply rejects a hypothesis
- Always publish studies of individual/team X, never publish studies of individual/team Y
- Etc....
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/propaganda
you raise 2 points ...
1, "editors 'blindly trust' outstanding referees" ... referees work for journal editors, top journals keep lists of referees that do a good job, editors return to referees who do a good job (at least, that's what my editors tell me). I don't think the trust of editors is 'blind' though, and I know of no research that suggests it.
2, "editors will not publish studies showing the opposite of what has been recently published in their journal" ... there is no evidence of this, but of course editors (and the referees they reply on) have their own views of how the world works so different journals in the same area tend to belong to different 'schools of thought' (and long may they do so, diversity is the spice of life !)
Journal editors are not always scientists. But their team, necessarily, includes scientists. Others (editors) do great job, others not. In some cases, the mismatch of the question may be arranged by the addition of the phrase 'The case study...' in the title of the article. An example is shown in the attached publication.
Regards
Article Bioclimatic Conditions in Relation to Shading in a Glasshous...
An editor can at the same time be a scientist (e.g. when he masters the relevant literature) and not a scientist (e.g. when he does not master the relevant literature), depending on the manuscripts to be handled?
Regarding the latter question of Dr. Lambrechts, an editor may be either a scientist or a not scientist, as already said. It may be possible an editor to act differently according to the manuscript they handle.
Regards
May be or may not be. However, it is better if the editors are scientists too.
But then again, if the editors know the relevant literature as scientists do, why do editors require referees? And why do opinions of so-called experts, called referees, differ?
Why do editors need referees ? Because no editor has the time to read the constant torrent of incoming manuscripts. (Editors have a lot more to do than just look at manuscripts. Furthermore, editors that are active scientists are also busy with their science and editors that are not active scientists tend to be working for big publishing companies and have other responsibilities (e.g. other journals or book editing)).
Why do the opinions of experts differ ? Because experts employed as referees have different palettes of sills, experience and (therefore) opinions. Editors choose referees carefully based on the referees' skills. For example, I get a lot of manuscripts with complicated statistics because editors know that I have a lot of skill and expertise in this area. Another referee might be expert in DNA sequencing. A particular ms might be excellent statistically (and I'd report that to the editor) but bad on the sequencing (which the molecular referee would report). Our opinions about a particular ms would differ because of our different skills palettes. Similarly, a German referee would not notice that a German author's text was written in 'German English' and so would rank the language 'good' but someone trained in international scientific English would notice and so rank the language as 'not good'. The different skills of referees is the reason why there's more than one referee and why an editor may well, formally or informally, ask for other opinions on a manuscript.
Other journals are exclusively run by professional scientific editors.
wish you good luck.
What do you mean with 'other journals'?
Given that a scientific editor can be not more than a 'generalist', a scientific editor can check general procedures of science practices, but will never be able to check the fast evolving literature and know everything about the model systems/species that are published in the journal, e.g. because of time constraints. Interesting is that so-called specialists will juge the same manuscript in different ways
Thank you!
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