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Reference Hygiene and Death on the Internet - Decay, Rot, Half-Life, Deterioration, and Corruption.
1School of Engineering, Mercer University, Macon, GA, USA.
JSLS : Journal of the Society of Laparoendoscopic Surgeons
|March 14, 2022
Summary
Many scientific references are lost or inaccessible, hindering the verification of research findings. This study found over 14% of references in a surgical journal were unretrievable, posing a significant scientific hazard.
Area of Science:
- Medical publishing
- Scientific communication
- Bibliometrics
Background:
- Ensuring the retrievability of references is crucial for validating scientific information.
- Lack of accessible references impedes the verification of statements, methodologies, data collection, and conclusions in medical articles.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the retrievability of references cited in scientific articles.
- To assess the impact of reference accessibility on scientific integrity.
Main Methods:
- A systematic evaluation of references from review, scientific, and research articles published in the Journal of the Society of Laparoscopic & Robotic Surgeons in 2019-2020.
- Analysis of 2,424 references across 95 articles to determine their accessibility.
Main Results:
- Out of 2,424 references, 357 (14.7%) were found to be unavailable due to various issues like broken links or incorrect citations.
- A significant portion of references were behind paywalls (47.7%), potentially limiting accessibility.
Conclusions:
- The inability to retrieve scientific references constitutes a significant hazard to scientific progress.
- Loss of reference accessibility compromises science's self-correcting nature, as past discoveries and methodologies become inaccessible.
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