From ‘publish or perish’ to ‘publish with purpose’: perspectives from young adults with lived and living experience on transforming academic publishing in patient-oriented research
Bibliographic record
Abstract
This commentary article critically assesses the inclusion and recognition of young adults with lived and living experiences (YALLE) in academic publishing. Stemming from our involvement in a health research study, this analysis interrogates the disparity between the stated importance of YALLE contributions in health research and their actual recognition, specifically in academic publications, which serve as the principal “currency” in research. This tokenism limits the potential for their unique insights to substantially enrich the discourse and dissemination of knowledge. Set against a backdrop of systemic biases and structural barriers, this discussion underscores the persistent minoritization of YALLE, despite increasing nominal recognition within academic and health research communities. The commentary begins by placing the engagement of young adults in health research within its current context, showing that this inclusion often remains superficial, serving more as a symbolic gesture toward inclusivity rather than fostering genuine participatory research. It critiques the implicit biases within institutional frameworks that continue to shape research culture detrimentally, thus stifling the transformative potential of research led and partnered by young adults. The core of the narrative addresses the complex challenges faced by YALLE, including discrimination, underrecognition, and inadequate participatory roles in research processes. These issues are magnified by the prevalent “publish or perish” culture in academia, which prioritizes the quantity of scholarly output over the quality and inclusivity of research contributions. The commentary advocates for a crucial shift in academic publishing to genuinely appreciate and integrate the contributions of young adults. We call for a transition from a “publish or perish” model to a “publish with purpose” approach, which necessitates rethinking what is considered valuable knowledge and who is acknowledged as its creators. This shift aims to cultivate an academic culture where knowledge is treated as a communal resource, and publications are used as tools to advance societal understanding and progress. This commentary discusses how young adults who have direct personal experiences with health issues are often left out when their research studies are published in academic journals. Journals are important because they share new discoveries and ideas with scientists, doctors, and the public, helping everyone understand more about health problems and treatments. Unfortunately, even though these young adults offer valuable insights from their own lives and have many other skills to contribute, they are rarely included or given opportunities to be included as authors in the final published articles. The commentary calls for changes in how academic research is done. It suggests that research should not just be about producing a lot of papers quickly—which has been called “publish or perish” but should focus on making sure that everyone who contributes, especially young adults, is recognized and valued. This would make research more inclusive and the results more helpful and relevant to everyone in society.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.010 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.003 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.021 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".