I am a degree student. and when I started publication, I had a bit of naive faith that my ultimate goal of research was to contribute to humanity, which is generally what research is about. but with time, I came to realize that for many lecturers ( and I would say researchers). the ultimate goal is to make sure that they have as many publications as possible since this is the main route to getting promoted and developing your career as an academic. and I also found myself doing the same things, since I need to get a scholarship for my master, I started just to make any sort of research and publication( without considering how much meaningful it is). but at the same time, I try to remind myself frequently of my first naive faith in doing researcher to help humanity. and I really want to know how others really manage to balance and resolve this type of conflict.