Retractions and Democracy Index Scores Across 167 Countries
Notice bibliographique
Résumé
Ahmad Sofi-Mahmudi,<sup>1</sup> Hesam Salmabadi<sup>2</sup> <h4>Objective</h4> To evaluate the association between countries’ democratic status and scientific article retraction rates while exploring potential factors influencing this association. <h4>Design</h4> This retrospective cohort study analyzed publication and retraction data from 2006 to 2023. Data sources included the Retraction Watch Database for retraction data (n = 64,264 retractions), the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index for democratic status, and SCImago for country-specific publication outputs (n = 59,385,751 publications). Our primary outcome was retraction rate (retractions per 10,000 publications) rather than absolute retraction counts, to account for varying publication volumes across countries. Using bayesian hierarchical negative binomial regression models with multiple imputations for missing data, we examined the association between the democracy index and article retractions while controlling for key confounders, including gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, research investment as percentage of GDP, English language proficiency scores, corruption control, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, press freedom, and international collaboration rates, across 167 countries. <h4>Results</h4> The analysis of 167 countries demonstrated a median democracy index score of 5.71 (range, 1.05-9.81) and a median scientific publication retraction rate of 5.3 per 10,000 publications (range, 0-214.8). Higher democracy scores were associated with lower retraction rates (adjusted coefficient, −0.46; 95% credible interval [CrI], −0.59 to −0.32) after controlling for confounders (<b>Figure 25-1106</b>). Among institutional factors, rule of law showed a positive association (0.40; 95% CrI, 0.17-0.63), whereas corruption control demonstrated a negative association (−0.54; 95% CrI, −0.72 to −0.36) with retraction rates. The association between democracy and retractions remained stable across periods (interaction coefficient, −0.03; 95% CrI, −0.46 to 0.39), although press freedom effects varied significantly between the 2006 to 2012 and 2013 to 2023 periods (interaction coefficient, −1.40; 95% CrI, −1.77 to −1.03). GDP per capita (0.09; 95% CrI, 0.01-0.17) and government effectiveness (0.21; 95% CrI, 0.01-0.41) were positively associated with retraction rates, suggesting better detection and correction mechanisms in wealthier, more effectively governed countries. https://assets.underline.io/markdown_image/1/image/7d8b6c98d8de5538c342378e51b17ad2.png <h4>Conclusions</h4> Democratic status shows a negative association with scientific article retraction rates, although this association is complex and mediated by institutional factors. The findings suggest that while democratic societies may have lower rates of problematic research requiring retraction, they also demonstrate stronger institutional capacity for detecting and addressing research misconduct. <h4>Affiliations</h4> <sup>1</sup>Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, a.sofimahmudi@ gmail.com; <sup>2</sup>Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Quebec in Trois-Rivières, Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada. <h4>Conflict of Interest Disclosures</h4> Ahmad Sofi-Mahmudi is an employee of Cytel Canada Health Inc. <h4>Additional Information</h4> We used Claude, 3.5 Sonnet (claude-35-sonnet-20241022) through its website for refining the analysis codes. Also, it was used as a grammar and flow checker of the abstract.
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Comment cette classification a été obtenuedéplier
Prédiction distillée sur la base complète
Imitation des enseignantsNi prévalence calibrée, ni vérité terrain. Validation humaine à venir. Apprise à partir de 10 348 étiquettes directes de Codex et de 10 348 étiquettes directes de Gemma. Le mode candidate est l'union des têtes enseignantes seuillées; le consensus est leur intersection. Ces sorties portent le statut machine_predicted_unvalidated et ne sont ni des étiquettes humaines ni des étiquettes directes de modèles de pointe.
Scores Codex et Gemma par catégorie
| Catégorie | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Métarecherche | 0,005 | 0,004 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens strict) | 0,002 | 0,002 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens large) | 0,001 | 0,000 |
| Bibliométrie | 0,003 | 0,008 |
| Études des sciences et des technologies | 0,007 | 0,029 |
| Communication savante | 0,004 | 0,003 |
| Science ouverte | 0,003 | 0,002 |
| Intégrité de la recherche | 0,001 | 0,002 |
| Charge utile insuffisante (le modèle a refusé de juger) | 0,006 | 0,007 |
Scores machine (provisoires)
Les deux têtes enseignantes du modèle étudiant, lues sur ce travail. Un score ordonne la base pour la relecture; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie, et le statut de validation accompagne chaque rangée tel quel.
Scores de référence d'un modèle non mature (critères de maturité non atteints, 7 itérations). Un score ordonne; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · tel quel depuis la passe de notation : score_only signifie que le nombre peut ordonner les travaux, et qu'aucune étiquette de catégorie n'en découleClassification
machine, non validéePrédiction automatique; les deux têtes enseignantes s’accordent sur ce qui est montré ici.
Le détail, modèle par modèle et score par score, se trouve en fin de page sous « Comment cette classification a été obtenue ».