ArticleEnvironmental engineering science2017
Academic Research in the 21st Century: Maintaining Scientific Integrity in a Climate of Perverse Incentives and Hypercompetition.
Article in Environmental engineering science, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 120 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
120 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Prevalence and severity of mental health problems in early-career researchers: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Nature human behaviour · 2026Pooled it
- Cognitive Effects of MDMA in Laboratory Animals: A Systematic Review Focusing on Dose.Pharmacological reviews · 2019Pooled it
- How contemporary academic structures constrain scientific creativity and hold back early-career researchers.Nature human behaviour · 2026Review
- What Retractions Tell Us About Research Integrity in Mexican Academia.Developing world bioethics · 2026Article
- Thinking Outside the Black Box: Seven Guidelines for GenAI Use in the Ecological Sciences.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Why Radiomics Rarely Reaches the Clinic: Reproducibility, Validation, and Evidence Gap-A Critical Narrative Review.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Why researchers cut corners: motivations, pressures, and personality in questionable research practices.Research integrity and peer review · 2026Article
- Scientific retractions: causes, processes, and implications for research integrity.Naunyn-Schmiedeberg's archives of pharmacology · 2026Review
- Lost in a Sea of Information: The Microplastics Publication Deluge.Environmental science & technology · 2026Review
- Aligning incentives for open science in biomedical research: Navigating funder and institutional perspectives.Journal of Parkinson's disease · 2026Review
- From Practice to Policy: Promise and Constraints of Contemplative Ethics Interventions in Science.Mindfulness · 2026Article
- Graduate Students Find Content of Responsible Conduct of Research Coursework Useful.Science and engineering ethics · 2026Article
- Impacts of Responsible Conduct of Research Education on the Career and Practice of Graduating Fellows.Journal of empirical research on human research ethics : JERHRE · 2026Article
- The Shifting 'Self' of Science's Self-Governing Capacity: Four Decades of Research Integrity Discussions inSocial studies of science · 2026Article
- Understanding of Authorship Guidelines and the Frequency of Authorship Misuse: A Descriptive Cross-Sectional Study in the State of Qatar.Journal of empirical research on human research ethics : JERHRE · 2026Article
- Time, Quality, and Integrity: Temporal Autonomy as a Missing Link in Research Assessment Reform.Science and engineering ethics · 2026Article
- The publish or perish, publish and perish, publish then perish, and now retract and perish cultures in academia.Naunyn-Schmiedeberg's archives of pharmacology · 2026Article
- Unlocking the benefits of transparent and reusable science for climate risk management.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Data from the Researcher Mental Health Observatory STAIRCASE Survey.Journal of open psychology data · 2026Article
- Perceived barriers for accessing international research funding among Latin American researchers.PloS one · 2026Article
60 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
- Commented on by
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Over the last 50 years, we argue that incentives for academic scientists have become increasingly perverse in terms of competition for research funding, development of quantitative metrics to measure performance, and a changing business model for higher education itself. Furthermore, decreased discretionary funding at the federal and state level is creating a hypercompetitive environment between government agencies (e.g., EPA, NIH, CDC), for scientists in these agencies, and for academics seeking funding from all sources-the combination of perverse incentives and decreased funding increases pressures that can lead to unethical behavior. If a critical mass of scientists become untrustworthy, a tipping point is possible in which the scientific enterprise itself becomes inherently corrupt and public trust is lost, risking a new dark age with devastating consequences to humanity. Academia and federal agencies should better support science as a public good, and incentivize altruistic and ethical outcomes, while de-emphasizing output.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.