Shepperd M, Yousefi L. An analysis of retracted papers in Computer Science.
PLoS One 2023;
18:e0285383. [PMID:
37159472 PMCID:
PMC10168558 DOI:
10.1371/journal.pone.0285383]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/15/2022] [Accepted: 02/23/2023] [Indexed: 05/11/2023] Open
Abstract
CONTEXT
The retraction of research papers, for whatever reason, is a growing phenomenon. However, although retracted paper information is publicly available via publishers, it is somewhat distributed and inconsistent.
OBJECTIVE
The aim is to assess: (i) the extent and nature of retracted research in Computer Science (CS) (ii) the post-retraction citation behaviour of retracted works and (iii) the potential impact upon systematic reviews and mapping studies.
METHOD
We analyse the Retraction Watch database and take citation information from the Web of Science and Google scholar.
RESULTS
We find that of the 33,955 entries in the Retraction watch database (16 May 2022), 2,816 are classified as CS, i.e., ≈ 8%. For CS, 56% of retracted papers provide little or no information as to the reasons. This contrasts with 26% for other disciplines. There is also some disparity between different publishers, a tendency for multiple versions of a retracted paper to be available beyond the Version of Record (VoR), and for new citations long after a paper is officially retracted (median = 3; maximum = 18). Systematic reviews are also impacted with ≈ 30% of the retracted papers having one or more citations from a review.
CONCLUSIONS
Unfortunately, retraction seems to be a sufficiently common outcome for a scientific paper that we as a research community need to take it more seriously, e.g., standardising procedures and taxonomies across publishers and the provision of appropriate research tools. Finally, we recommend particular caution when undertaking secondary analyses and meta-analyses which are at risk of becoming contaminated by these problem primary studies.
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