Paula,

I beg your pardon but I don't understand the question.

Can you explain a little more sense of this question.

Many thanks.

Jean.

I was reading an article, and I found that the author cited an article, that has been retracted, and they assume that the results in this article are true and they included this paper in the references list but in internet you can find that it is a retracted article...Whom is responsible of this error, authors?? editors??

It seems to me that if you have found an article that cites a retracted article, you may wish to contact the authors to let them know.

There is an article on this subject called "The persistence of error: a study of retracted articles on the Internet and in personal libraries" http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3411255/#!po=7.14286

Even if articles are retracted from publisher websites or in indexes such as Mediline. they may still persist in personal libraries or elsewhere on the Internet. Before reading or writing an article you may wish to make sure that the copy you have is current and has not been retracted. There are automated ways to do this, such as CrossMark if the publisher participates.

I am not sure whether editors would check each citation to see whether articles have been retracted.

I am curious, what field were these articles in? Is it possible that they were published before the retraction?

Tthe field is neuroscience, and the article was retractred at least 4 years before citation. and it is an electronic article...

Hi Paula,

Not much will happen, but you have to percieve the article as a non-peer reviewed and non-SCI article, hence gray literature. Gray articles do not exclude discussions.

Actually, if the article is under discussion a lot and even cited many times. It might as well be a quite good article and a very cheap one as well.

Cheers,

Frank

Perhaps we should not lose sight of what the primary literature really is. Malicious data fabrication/falsification aside (which may lead to retraction), the primary literature should not be regarded as the final word on a subject matter. It is the frontiers of knowledge where things are still developing and not necessarily black and white, and it is almost certain that you will come across an idea or a conclusion that later found to be incorrect. The danger is when we take something we read in journal articles and hold it as the golden Truth. 

I find it helpful to think of the scientific process as a big sieve that step-by-step separates the gems from the junk. See the book "Scientific Literacy and the Myth of the Scientific Method" by Henry H. Bauer.

Many thanks for the very clear explanations. In my opinion the responsible is the Editor but you must contact the autors. Regards. Jean.