The evidentiary status of social science under Daubert: Is it "scientific," "technical," or "other" knowledge?

The U.S. Supreme Court assumed the difficult task of establishing the threshold standard for the admissibility of expert testimony that is based on "scientific" knowledge in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals (113 S. Ct. 2786, 1993). Psychology confronts a significant challenge under Daubert, which calls for judges themselves to make determinations of scientific validity rather than merely looking to the pertinent scientific community for approval. Daubert identifies 4 factors lower courts can use to determine scientific validity: falsifiability, error rate, peer review and publication, and general acceptance. It is argued that expert testimony on eyewitness identification would hold up fairly well to these scientific validity factors, whereas expert testimony on repressed memories might not. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The "stars" revisited: What are the "stars" of the 1970s doing in the 1980s?

Used the Social Science Citation Index as a source for citation counts and publication counts to examine the activities (1977–1983) of the 25 most cited Canadian psychologists (stars) of the early 1970s. Most of these psychologists are still highly productive and highly cited. It is suggested that as scholars mature they shift their focus from empirical research to theoretical, conceptual, and integrative scholarly pursuits. Comparison of the publication records of these 25 psychologists offers support for this proposed maturity shift. It is suggested that the maturity shift necessitates the consideration of the scholarly contribution represented by books and book chapters in any evaluation of the contributions of mature scholars. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Productivity Ratings of Psychology Programs Based on Publications in Clinical Journals": Correction.

Reports an error in the original article "Productivity Ratings of Psychology Programs Based on Publications in Clinical Journals" by Charles J. Golden, Sally Kuperman, and David Osmon (Professional Psychology, 1980, Vol. 11, No. 5, pp. 797-806). In Table 10 on page 804, Larue D. Carter Hospital, Indianapolis, Indiana, is incorrectly listed as a general hospital. It is a state mental hospital. (The following abstract of this article originally appeared in record 1981-28771-001.) Sought to identify the relative standing of clinical psychology programs by evaluating their frequency of publication in the major clinical journals. In addition, the relative contribution of university programs, hospital programs, medical centers, and other institutions to the clinical literature was investigated. It was found that although American Psychological Association (APA)-approved university clinical programs are responsible for the largest number of articles in the sample examined, (14 journals for the years 1975, 1976, and 1977), 6 of every 10 articles were published either by non-APA-approved academic programs or by individuals in other institutional settings. The general reputation of universities did not reflect their productivity in the clinical journals. The article includes an analysis of the major sources of publication in the clinical literature and an evaluation of the meaning of these findings for clinical psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assessing the scholarly impact of health psychology: A citation analysis of articles published from 1993 to 2003.

Objective: We conducted a citation analysis to explore the impact of articles published in Health Psychology and determine whether the journal is fulfilling its stated mission. Design: Six years of articles (N = 408) representing three editorial tenures from 1993–2003 were selected for analysis. Main Outcome Measures: Articles were coded for several dimensions enabling examination of the relationship of article features to subsequent citations rates. Journals citing articles published in Health Psychology were classified into four categories: (1) psychology, (2) medicine, (3) public health and health policy, and (4) other journals. Results: The majority of citations of Health Psychology articles were in psychology journals, followed closely by medical journals. Studies reporting data collected from college students, and discussing the theoretical implications of findings, were more likely to be cited in psychology journals, whereas studies reporting data from clinical populations, and discussing the practice implications of findings, were more likely to be cited in medical journals. Time since publication and page length were both associated with increased citation counts, and review articles were cited more frequently than observational studies. Conclusion: Articles published in Health Psychology have a wide reach, informing psychology, medicine, public health and health policy. Certain characteristics of articles affect their subsequent pattern of citation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Bibliometric analysis of the original articles published in the Revista Espa?ola de Anesthesiología y Renimación in 10 years (1987-1996)

OBJECTIVE: To describe the original research articles published in Revista Espa?ola De Anestesiología y Reanimación (REAR) from 1987 through 1996, as well as to characterize the citations included in those articles. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The 299 articles published as original research in REAR over the past 10 years (1987 through 1996) were analyzed. The bibliographic aspects examined were coauthorship (authors/paper index), citations per article, isolation in function of language of publication of references, degree of obsolescence of articles based on year of references cited ("half-life"), self-citation and degree of dispersion of citations. RESULTS: The authors/paper index was 5.16 +/- 1.62. No statistically significant difference was found in number of authors over the 10-year study period. Mean number of references cited per article was 24.05 +/- 12.02. We found statistically significant differences for 1993 and the period 1987 to 1988, and 1994 and the year 1987 (p < 0.001). The "half-life" of articles was 6 when analyzing on a year-by-year basis; this index ranged from 5.5 to 7, with no significant annual differences. REAR articles accounted for 4.02% of all citations. English was the most frequent language of cited publications, with 6,240 references (86.8%), followed by Spanish with 621 (8.64%), French with 223 (3.1%) and German with 74 (1.03%). Of the 7,191 references analyzed, 6,447 (89.65%) were of scientific journals. Books are the second most commonly cited type of document, with 623 (8.66%) citations. Analyzing journals cited 25 or more times, we found that 74.19% of the articles (4,783/6,447) had been published in 5.3% of the journals (36/678). Seven journals of anesthesia, which represented 1.03% of all journals (7/678) appeared in 52.81% of references of this type (3,405/6,447). CONCLUSIONS: The number of authors of original research articles published in REAR in the last 10 years was high. Spanish authors in anesthesiology cite mainly literature in English; use up-to-date sources of information, mainly journals; and take a large proportion of information from a small number of journals, which are those of greatest international impact in our specialty.     

Government Publication Policies.

Comment regarding government publication policies. The various schemes that up to now have been offered to ameliorate the publication difficulties of the APA would, it seems to me, restrict rather than facilitate the communication of scientific information. I do not think that there exists an acceptable alternative to detailed exposition in a recognized (and readily obtainable) scientific journal. On this basis, the solution to the problem must be aimed at the expansion of journal outlets. I think a partial solution would be afforded by persuading government agencies to subsidize the publication in established journals of articles originating in their research programs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The age decrement in outstanding scientific contributions: Fact or artifact?

Lehman in Age and Achievement provides data in the form of works cited in histories of art, science, and other fields and finds that they "very frequently indicate that many fewer significant contributions are made in the later decades of life than in earlier periods… . Taken at their face value, these studies indicate a drastic reduction in the output of outstanding works in the later part of the life span." But the "apparent decline in the output of significant works in the later decades of life may be merely a reflection of the behavior of historians and others with regard to their treatment of historical epochs. The present paper addresses itself to the examination of citation practices of historians and anthologists as they are related to the study of aging… . A more reasonable interpretation of the facts seems to be that, as the total output of science has increased, the percentage of literature cited by historians has declined." The trend toward increase in scientific literature "has necessitated a change in the behavior of historians." 18 refs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Privacy and confidentiality in the publication of pedigrees: a survey of investigators and biomedical journals

CONTEXT: Pedigree diagrams efficiently communicate family information to genetics investigators; however, the publication of pedigrees poses a risk to the privacy and confidentiality of individuals depicted in the diagrams. Two sets of authoritative guidelines have been published to protect the privacy and confidentiality of subjects, but the influence of these guidelines on publication practices for pedigrees is unknown. OBJECTIVE: To determine the attitudes, practices, and experiences of investigators and journals with respect to privacy and confidentiality concerns in the publication of pedigrees. DESIGN: Investigators who have published pedigrees and editors of 26 biomedical journals were surveyed. Journals were reviewed for content in their "information for authors" sections and for documentation of informed consent in articles containing pedigrees. OUTCOME MEASURES: Practices regarding confidentiality and privacy reported by investigators and editors. RESULTS: Of 226 surveys sent to investigators, 177 were returned (78% response rate). Sixty-one investigators (36%) stated that family members were not informed that their pedigree would be published; 131 (78%) do not obtain informed consent specifically for pedigree publication and only 12 (28%) of the 43 who obtained consent obtained consent from all family members depicted. Thirty-two individuals (19%) reported having altered published pedigrees and 14 (45%) of 31 who had altered pedigrees stated that alterations were not disclosed to journals. Of the 14 journals that responded (54% response rate), only 3 reported written policies for managing potentially identifying information. Two journals reported having asked authors to alter pedigrees and 3 stated they had permitted alterations. A review of 5 genetics journals over a 2-year period revealed no documentation of consent for pedigree publication. CONCLUSIONS: Current practices in the publication of pedigrees do not conform with established recommendations and risk the privacy and confidentiality of subjects, often without informed consent. Attempts to address this problem through the alteration of data are being used, although this practice impairs the integrity of scientific communication.     

Histopathologic prognostic indicators for renal cell carcinoma

Abstracts of scientific papers and posters that are presented at annual scientific meetings of professional societies are part of the broader category of conference literature. They are an important avenue for the dissemination of current data. While timely and succinct, these abstracts present problems such as an abbreviated peer review and incomplete bibliographic access. METHODS: Seventy societies of health sciences professionals were surveyed about the publication of abstracts from their annual meetings. Nineteen frequently cited journals also were contacted about their policies on the citation of meeting abstracts. Ten databases were searched for the presence of meetings abstracts. RESULTS: Ninety percent of the seventy societies publish their abstracts, with nearly half appearing in the society's journal. Seventy-seven percent of the societies supply meeting attendees with a copy of each abstract, and 43% make their abstracts available in an electronic format. Most of the journals surveyed allow meeting abstracts to be cited. Bibliographic access to these abstracts does not appear to be widespread. CONCLUSIONS: Meeting abstracts play an important role in the dissemination of scientific knowledge. Bibliographic access to meeting abstracts is very limited. The trend toward making meeting abstracts available via the Internet has the potential to give a broader audience access to the information they contain.     

Thomas McKeown and Archibald Cochrane: a journey through the diffusion of their ideas

In the 1970s Thomas McKeown and Archibald L Cochrane were two of the most influential voices in criticizing the dominance of medical thinking. A bibliometric study of the citations to McKeown's The Role of Medicine: Dream, Mirage or Nemesis and Cochrane's Effectiveness and Efficiency: Random Reflections on Health Services was performed from the publication of each book until 1988 to study how their ideas have been disseminated. During the study period 430 papers in the Science Citation Index or the Social Sciences Citation Index cited Cochrane's book, 133 cited McKeown's, and 166 cited both. The citations came mainly from original papers published in journals of internal medicine or public health and epidemiology (35%) and written by authors from the United States or the United Kingdom. Cochrane's book was cited most frequently in medical journals, suggesting a higher degree of penetration of his ideas among medical scientists. Although the dominance of original papers among the citations suggests that these books have been important in stimulating new knowledge, the main problems that McKeown and Cochrane identified--namely, the relatively small impact of clinical medicine on health outcomes and the poor use of scientific methods in clinical practice--are still with us.     

What Do the Cited and Citing Environments Reveal about Advances in Atmospheric Physics?

T The networking status of journals reflects their academic influence among peer journals. This paper analyzes the cited and citing environments of this journal, Advances in Atmospheric Sciences (Adv. Atmos.Sci.), using methods from social network analysis. Since its initial publication, Adv. Atmos. Sci. has been actively participating in the international journal environment and international journals are frequently cited in Adv. Atmos. Sci. Particularly, this journal is intensely interrelated with its international peer journals in terms of their similar citing patterns. The international influence of Adv. Atmos. Sci. is comparatively bigger than other Chinese SCI journals in atmospheric sciences as reflected by total cites to Adv. Atmos.Sci. and the total number of international journals citing it. The academic visibility of Adv. Atmos. Sci. is continuing to improve in the international research community as the number of reference citation it receives in its peer journals internationally increases over time.     

A comment on Dennis' "Productivity among American psychologists".

Doubtlessly, as W. Dennis states (American Psychologist, 1954, 9, pp. 191-194), '...scientists differ greatly in regard to the number of their publications...." Thus psychologists are no different in this respect than chemists, biologists, or other groups in the scientific fraternity. In studying the publications data of four different groups of American psychologists, Dennis found "the total output of each of the groups is made up to a large extent of the publications of a relatively small number of productive individuals." This disparity could be (and probably would be) accentuated even more if additional sources of publications data were consulted other than those specifically relating to psychological publications only, as was the case in the studies cited by Dennis. Particularly within the past quarter century, and more especially since World War II, an increasing number of psychologists have been writing for and have published articles of a psychological nature which have appeared in nonpsychological and nonscientific journals, e.g., trade journals and popular magazines. The point is: if more rigorous and exhaustive publication-searching evidence is and can be employed in comparing the productivity of scientists, including psychologists, we may find that this disparity may be more pronounced than we had been led to think from the studies made to date. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Review of Pure types are rare": Comment on book review.

My book Pure types are rare: Myths and meanings of madness (see record 2007-08930-001) may have piqued some members of the mental health community; thus I was not entirely surprised by the caustic review that appeared in the January 1985 issue of Canadian Psychology, nor do I wish to engage the polemics or the personal asides therein. I am impelled, however, to respond to the allegation of "repeated failure of professional scholarship." The reviewer provides three substantive examples. In the first, he objects to the citation following my statement that post-mortem studies have failed to find neurological correlates of senile dementia, and implies that the study cited did find such correlates. Actually, the study was inadequate for the question inasmuch as statistics were not presented for senile dementia exclusive of other conditions, and normal controls were not used. The second maintains that I underestimated the significance of a concordance rate of 53% for the diagnosis of schizophrenia between two psychiatrists examining the same patient, and says it should actually be "somewhere beyond even the .00000001 level." My point, however, was that in vivo, where more than 50% of mental patients are diagnosed schizophrenic, a 53% concordance rate represents chance. Third, Professor Burd relates several sentences of mine to make it appear that I questioned the validity of the co-twin data on genetic factors in schizophrenia on the "curious grounds" that similar data have been obtained for a variety of behavioural and personality traits. I will comment on the statement "There are but a dozen references to articles in established professional journals." I did not attempt to deduce the criteria for "established," nor did I count journals, but I did ascertain that there were 112 citations in the text, comprising 80 separate sources. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Responding to "no-shows": Some effects of follow-up method on community mental health center attendance patterns.

69 clients who missed a scheduled appointment received (a) a follow-up letter asking the client to reschedule, (b) one automatically rescheduling a return appointment, or (c) no follow up. Analyses indicated that automatically rescheduled clients returned for treatment more often, received more services, and remained in active treatment longer than other clients. The value of follow-up depends on the criterion selected: returning clients to treatment or minimizing "no-shows." (1 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Two solitudes" in psychology.

Used frequency of citation in a 6-yr sample of the journal literature (143,260 citations referring to the work of 48,903 authors) to identify a group of "visible" psychologists. A sample of 300 authors, out of 3,056 with 6 or more citations was used. A principal component factor analysis of the correlation matrix across journals showed a bipolar factor suggesting that there were 2 groups of journals in the sample: a general-experimental group and a personality-social group. It was found that most "visible" psychologists are cited frequently in only 1 of these groups of journals, and that very few are cited frequently in both groups. (french summary) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Policies, practices, and attitudes of North American medical journal editors

OBJECTIVE: To describe U.S. and Canadian medical journals, their editors, and policies that affect the dissemination of medical information. DESIGN: Mailed survey. PARTICIPANTS: Senior editors of all 269 leading medical journals published at least quarterly in the United States and Canada, of whom 221 (82%) responded. MAIN MEASURES: The questionnaire asked about characteristics of journal editors and their journals and about journals' policies toward peer review, conflicts of interest, prepublication discussions with the press, and pharmaceutical advertisements. RESULTS: The editors were overwhelmingly men (96%), middle-aged (mean age 61 years), and trained as physicians (82%). Although 98% claimed that their journals were "peer-reviewed," the editors differed in how they defined a "peer" and in the number of peers they deemed optimal for review. Sixty-three percent thought journals should check on reviewers' potential conflicts of interest, but only a minority supported masking authors' names and affiliations (46%), checking reviewers' financial conflicts of interest (40%), or revealing reviewers' names to authors (8%). The respondents advocated discussion of scientific findings with the press (84%), but only in accord with the Ingelfinger rule, i.e., after publication of the article (77%). Fifty-seven percent of the editors agreed that journals have a responsibility to ensure the truthfulness of pharmaceutical advertisements, and 40% favored subjecting advertisements to the same rigorous peer review as scientific articles. CONCLUSIONS: The responding editors were relatively homogeneous demographically and professionally, and they tended to support the editorial status quo. There was little sentiment in favor of tampering with the current peer-review system (however defined) or the Ingelfinger rule, but a surprisingly large percentage of the respondents favored more stringent review of drug advertisements.     

An example of psychological science’s failure to self-correct.

This paper illustrates the impact of the human element in the scientific process by presenting the history of Broverman, Broverman, Clarkson, Rosenkrantz, and Vogel (1970), one of the most highly cited papers in psychology. Broverman et al. stimulated remarkable interest in sex bias among mental health professionals. Several articles published in major psychology journals demonstrated the paper’s fatal flaws in the 2 decades following its publication. Nonetheless, Broverman et al. was accepted with little resistance. Broverman et al. continues to be cited as empirical support for the sex bias hypothesis among mental health professionals. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The impact factor--a reliable sciento-metric parameter?

With shortage of research funds and increasing competition for medical posts, performance indicators and control instruments are being looked for in order to be able to allot research funds and make professorial appointments in relation to scientific performance. Incomprehensibly for many, the impact factor has become the decisive scientometric indicator at German universities despite of substantial systematic limitations. The impact factor is derived from the journal citation reports. Its basis of calculation entails the following problems: the editorial board of the private Institute of Scientific Information (ISI) decides on whether a journal is to be classified as a source journal. The citation index of all journals is calculated from their citations alone. Crucial means of influencing the impact factor result from self-citations and citation groups in these source journals. Languages other than English and other than Latin alphabets are appreciably disadvantaged by the citation index, which is why for example despite its international significance the rapid development of the osteosynthesis technique in German speaking countries went unnoticed by British and American orthopedic surgeons and scientists. The articles on postgraduate training necessarily published by clinicians in the respective language of their country are not cited because the addresses of such publications do not engage in research. Clinical disciplines (especially highly specialized disciplines such as trauma and hand surgery) thus attain appreciably lower impact factors for their journals than basic disciplines and interdisciplinary clinical sectors which lead the ranking of journals. The period covered in calculating the impact factor is only 2 years. Very modern and widely disseminated organs of publication with a short information halflife are favored. From the 10 objectively most often cited and most important journals for the scientific society, only 2 are to be found amongst those with the highest impact factor. The impact front-runner from 1995 has a very low absolute number of citations. The impact factor provides limited statistical information on a journal in its special field. Using it for this purpose presupposes knowledge of rules, limitations and constraints. Its uncritical use as a general currency of science is fundamentally unscientific. In addition, this leads to the specialists in the field knowledge of the universities being disregarded in favor of a pseudo-objective parameter determined elsewhere. At all events, correction factors for the impact factor have to be applied in respect to the different disciplines. The faculties should reach agreement on relevant (also on German language) organs of publication. The impact factor is not suitable as an indicator of the research activity and the quality of a researcher or an institution. Besides careful human judgement and other classical methods of decision making, the Science Citation Index can contribute to the individual evaluation.