The Becker Blog

Apparently it is in China – if you get caught.

Chinese academia ghost-writing ‘widespread’

This BBC article claims that “More than $100m (£63m) changes hands in China every year for ghost-written academic papers, according to research by a Chinese university.”

As I see it, the only thing that really distinguishes this crime from the all too common practice of claiming authorship for everything one’s own grad students do is that the grad students weren’t yours.

There are plenty of academics who routinely add their names to everything their grad students publish. I personally know a science department where a good number of the faculty get most of their publications without ever having to write a word. Yet THAT practice rarely gets questioned. WHY? They didn’t do the work. They merely paid to support the grad student. If I follow that same logic, does that mean any publication I get while being paid by the university must bear the name of the person who approves my paycheque?

I realize there is huge pressure to publish, but the truth is, if people stopped bowing to that pressure and actually claimed credit ONLY for the work they actually did, then the problem would sort itself out as most of the so-called “high fliers” do very little of their own work or writing.

Academia needs to get back to real, honest work. Honestly is supposed to be our most cherished value. Most academics these days are as corrupt as the students they claim to despise – you know those who cheat their way through school.

If Academics actually practiced what they preached, we’d be far better off.

SHEESH!

I get a lot of papers to review in Game Studies; Serious Games; Educational Games., etc.

I used to learn a lot from reading these papers.

Not anymore.

Not only is much of what I read “old news” (i.e. it’s been done or discussed and mostly published before), but FAR too many of the papers I read now don’t even cite the other works. What’s going on?

I am finding more and more submissions (journals, conferences, etc.) from authors who have not done a thorough lit review. Many papers I’ve read appear to come from authors who are relatively new to the field, did a quicky lit. search (1st 2 screens in google scholar, or for many of the Education papers I see, it looks as though they simply went to 2 or 3 education websites (AERA, AACE, AECT) and searched a subset of the journals there. This leaves people with a fairly restricted view of what’s been done and what is known.

What’s the problem? Do people not know how to perform a lit. review anymore? Do they not care? Are they naive enough to believe they’re the first ones who thought of this?

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I seem to be on a bit of a Rant-kick today.

Perhaps it is partly because I am now finished my dissertation and have successfully defended it. I don’t feel the same need to placate.

Many of the conferences I follow have not only a substantial web presence, but they now also support online submission, review, and registration to a greater or lesser extent. Some work very well and others are very amateurish.

I have a few suggestions:

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