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Booming research publications in China

Jing Shena,b*, Linqiang Zhengb*, Zhibin Heb*

a) Key Laboratory of Bio-based Material Science and Technology of Ministry of Education, Material Science and EngineeringCollege, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin 150040, China b) Department of Chemical Engineering & Limerick Pulp and Paper Centre, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, NB,E3B 5A3, Canada *Corresponding authors: Jing Shen (jingshen.china@hotmail.com); Linqiang Zheng (lzheng@unb.ca); Zhibin He (zhe@unb.ca)

ABSTRUCT

China has become a leading powerhouse in global research community. The boom of scientific and technical papers published by Chinese researchers in terms of both quantity and quality has been well received. However, concerns have been raised on current publication drives.

Keywords: China; Research output; Academic system; Scientific and technical papers; Researchers

1. RAPID RISE AS A “GLOBAL GIANT”

It is doubtless that China has become one of the key drivers in the development of global economy. As the world’s most populous country, China has the largest number of researchers (currently more than 1.5 million).1 In the global scientific and technical community, the role of China has become increasingly important.2 In terms of the number of published papers, China is leading the world and rapidly catching up with the United States (the biggest player), which is in line with the rapidly increasing research funding.3 Based on the data from “Scimago Journal & Country Rank”, a publicly available portal that

includes the journals and country indicators developed from the information contained in the Scopus® database (Elsevier B.V.), the top 10 countries contributing to scientific and technical publishing in 2015 are United States, China, United Kingdom, Germany, India, Japan, France, Italy, Canada, and Australia.4 From 1996 to 2015, China witnessed a significant increase in annual research output (see Fig. 1). Chinese authors now feature on around one-fifth of the world’s most cited papers, and the overall research quality is on the rise.1 Indeed, China’s rapid growth in high-quality research output is very pronounced, which consolidates the position as world’s scientific and technical powerhouse.5

Figure 1. Leading countries in terms of published documents in 1996 and 2015 (Source: Scimago Journal & Country Rank).

EDITORIAL

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2. PROBLEMS

Despite China’s important role in global research output, there is still room for improvement.1 Although the scholarly impact of the published papers is improving rapidly, it still remains below the world average, as reflected by field-weighted citation impact.1, 6-7

In the sector of science and technology, there has been a growing popularity in China to publish papers preferably in journals that are included in Science Citation Index Expanded™ (generally domestically abbreviated as “SCI”) (Web of Science). Currently, there are 8863 “SCI” journals across 150 disciplines, such as “paper and wood”. Every journal must meet the high standards of an objective evaluation process so that it can be included. Some previously indexed journals are now not included due to a reduction in their qualities. For most of these journals, only papers written in English are publishable. Papers written in Chinese or other languages but have English titles and abstracts are only publishable in a very small number of these journals. Chinese researchers have been encouraged to publish their research in these “SCI” journals (oftentimes using cash incentives), and the recent polices are basically directed towards journals with very high impact factors and high citations (particularly when Chinese initiatives of “world-class universities” and “first-class disciplines” are taken into account). Indeed, these policies are rather critical in scientific and technical advancement. However, the challenges related to the quality, impact, and sustainability of Chinese research need to be addressed.

In terms of competitive research grants, promotions, career development, and salaries, a high priority has been placed on the number of the indexed papers and the impacts/rankings (note that the data released by Chinese Academy of Sciences are widely used for the evaluation of rankings) of the journals in which papers are published. For example, Chinese universities tend to encourage their faculty members to publish, so as to enhance their rankings and financial supports from central government and/or local governments. In this context, most researchers tend to be keen on “hot” topics in their scientific and technical investigations, and probably only a minority of the published papers are based on innovative, cutting-edge research.8

Chinese researchers are now inclined to write English papers in international “SCI” journals. This inclination is undoubtedly helpful in increasing the visibility of research publications, improving English skills, and facilitating international collaborations. However, the skills of writing papers in Chinese are indeed challenged by the current situation, which is rather true for early-career researchers.

It is noteworthy that, for Chinese Ph.D candidates, the requirement of publishing “SCI” papers to win their degrees is now very common in many universities, which also places a big pressure on students and their advisors.9

There are currently a large number of researchers in

China. This number is still on the rise as China strives to move forwards in science and technology. China is now able to produce a huge number of scientific and technical papers. Thus, the “bar” for evaluating the credits/qualifications of researchers (particularly professors) have been raising, and journals with high impact factors are valued preferably. This “bar” is probably unfair to those conducting research in fields related to traditional industries (e.g., pulp and paper industry), which would impair their enthusiasms in technical development. In fact, the seemingly increasing pressure on early-career researchers to publish papers in international journals with high impact factors may hurdle the building of a scientific and technical culture that is favorable for young people to thrive in research. Their possible widespread switching to “hot” topics as an attempt to survive in their careers would not be beneficial to technical innovations in industrial sectors. Further, the pressure to rack up research publications in high-impact journals might indirectly “encourage” misconduct.10

In the context of existing Chinese academic evaluation systems which heavily center on the production of ‘SCI” papers, there are concerns related to “SCI”-induced “academic foam”, and “SCI” is even jokingly referred to as “Stupid Chinese Ideas”.11 The emergence of “academic black market” involving shady agencies, corrupt researchers, and compromised editors has been reported,12 which strongly deserves a revolutionary rethinking of the “delicate interactions” among research output, research integrity, and academic policies.

3. FUTURE OPPORTUNITIES

China has witnessed a significant enhancement in terms of the quality and quantity of research publications (particularly in the past decade), and is now consolidating the position as scientific and technical powerhouse.5 Although there are certain problems and worries related to the booming research contribution to the global scientific and technical community, China can have lots of opportunities to develop into a new phase, leading the way in innovative, pioneering research.

The number of distinguished researchers/experts in China is increasing rapidly, thanks to the Central Government’s strategic initiatives related to “Thousand Talent Plan”, “Ten-Thousand Talent Program”, among others. For example, the “Thousand Talent Plan” is actually a powerful recruitment program of global experts, which is designed to attract high-quality Chinese and non-Chinese professionals. On the basis of the implementation of these initiatives, the Chinese research community would be directed towards significant improvements as a result of enhanced “global visions”. Advanced, internationally-recognized concepts would be integrated into existing research and educational systems. It is noted that, if Chinese academic systems are switched to relying on researchers, other than policymakers,

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to set the agenda for innovation and discovery, a very promising future can be expected.3 Quality enhancement in higher education, international collaboration, and research transparency would spur more rapid improvement in research output. The improvement of research culture and research integrity is believed to be a critical task.13-15 It is expected that the jokingly-stated “Stupid Chinese Ideas” would very soon be substantially transformed into widely-recognized “Smart Chinese Ideas” and “Sophisticated Chinese Ideas”.

There has been a growing awareness of developing China’s high-quality journals for publishing cutting-edge research in recent years. For example, the new journal “National Science Review”, launched in 2015, is aimed at reviewing cutting-edge developments across science and technology in China and around the world. This journal accepts papers written in English, and it has received its first impact factor of 8.000 (Journal Citation Reports, Web of Science, 2016).

In addition to publishing papers in English, constructive initiatives must be implemented to encourage researchers to publish high-quality papers written in their own language, Chinese. For journals publishing papers written in Chinese, there exists a need for transformation, so that the impact of the papers can be maximized. Currently, papers published in these high-quality journals may have English translations of titles and abstracts. Possible strategies are to detail the English translations (e.g., table/figure captions and conclusions), add extra sections (e.g., research highlights) with English translations, and allow readers to get access to the published papers as easily as possible (or consider the concept of open access publishing).

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