A.- Reason for retraction and investigation of retracted articles | ||||||||||||
Reason for retraction | 1970–2018 | 1970–2000 | 2001–2005 | 2006–2010 | 2011–2015 | 2016–2018 | ||||||
Medical Genetics N:690 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:892 n (%) (95% CI) | Medical Genetics N:55 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:95 n (%) (95% CI) | Medical Genetics N:91 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:122 n (%) (95% CI) | Medical Genetics N:159 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:255 n (%) (95% CI) | Medical Genetics N:326 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:301 n (%) (95% CI) | Medical Genetics N:59 n (%) (95% CI) | Non−Medical Genetics N:119 n (%) (95% CI) | |
Fabrication / falsificationa | 128 (18.6)g (15.7, 21.7) | 249 (27.9)g (25.0 to 31.0) | 17 (30.9) (19.1 to 44.8) | 28 (29.5) (20.6 to 39.7) | 19 (20.9) (13.1 to 30.7) | 47 (38.5) (29.9 to 47.8) | 55 (34.6) (27.2 to 42.5) | 86 (33.7) (27.9 to 39.9) | 33 (10.1)g (7.1 to 13.9) | 83 (27.6)g (22.6 to 33.0) | 4 (6.8) (1.9 to 16.5) | 5 (4.2) (1.4 to 9.5) |
Plagiarismb | 71 (10.3) (8.1 to 12.8) | 77 (8.6) (6.9 to 10.7) | 2 (3.6) (0.4 to 12.5) | 2 (2.1) (0.3 to 7.4) | 8 (8.8) (3.9 to 16.6) | 4 (3.3) (0.9 to 8.2) | 12 (7.5) (4.0 to 12.8) | 23 (9.0) (5.8 to 13.2) | 36 (11.0) (7.9 to 15.0) | 34 (11.3) (8.0 to 15.4) | 13 (22.0) (12.3 to 34.7) | 14 (11.8) (6.6 to 19.0) |
Duplicationc | 149 (21.6) (18.6 to 24.9) | 235 (26.3) (23.5 to 29.4) | 0 (0.0) (0.0 to 6.5) | 10 (10.5) (5.2 to 18.5) | 33 (36.3) (26.4 to 47.0) | 33 (27.0) (19.4 to 35.8) | 46 (28.9) (22.0 to 36.6) | 85 (33.3) (27.6 to 39.5) | 60 (18.4) (14.3 to 23.0) | 78 (25.9) (21.1 to 31.3) | 10 (16.9) (8.4 to 29.0) | 29 (24.4) (17.0 to 33.1) |
Unreliable informationd | 69 (10.0) (7.9 to 12.5) | 101 (11.3) (9.2─13.4) | 10 (18.2) (9.1 to 30.9) | 15 (15.8) (9.1 to 24.7) | 14 (15.4) (8.7 to 24.5) | 15 (12.3) (7.0 to 19.5) | 19 (11.9) (7.4 to 18.0) | 37 (14.5) (10.4 to 19.4) | 18 (5.5) (3.3 to 8.6) | 18 (6.0) (3.6 to 9.3) | 8 (13.6) (6.0 to 25.0) | 16 (13.4) (7.9 to 20.9) |
Authorship issuese | 63 (9.1) (7.0─11.3) | 106 (11.9) (9.8─14.0) | 8 (14.5) (6.5 to 26.7) | 12 (12.6) (6.7 to 21.0) | 7 (7.7) (3.1 to 15.2) | 18 (14.8) (9.0 to 22.3) | 10 (6.3) (3.1 to 11.3) | 34 (13.3) (9.4 to 18.1) | 27 (8.3) (5.5 to 11.8) | 34 (11.3) (8.0 to 15.4) | 11 (18.6) (9.7 to 30.9) | 8 (6.7) (2.9 to 12.8) |
Investigationf | 312 (45.2)g (41.5 to 49.0) | 275 (30.8)g (27.8 to 34.0) | 16 (29.1) (17.6 to 42.9) | 25 (26.3) (17.8 to 36.4) | 23 (25.3) (16.7 to 35.5) | 50 (41.0) (32.2 to 50.3) | 71 (44.7) (36.8 to 52.7) | 86 (33.7) (27.9 to 39.9) | 182 (55.8)g (50.3 to 61.3) | 97 (32.2)g (27.0 to 37.8) | 20 (33.9) (22.1 to 47.4) | 17 (14.3) (8.5 to 21.9) |
B.- Country of origin of authors of retracted articles | ||||||||||||
China | 296 | 213 | 0 | 1 | 10 | 4 | 32 | 49 | 222 | 104 | 32 | 55 |
Germany | 35 | 40 | 10 | 8 | 11 | 7 | 10 | 11 | 4 | 12 | 0 | 2 |
India | 13 | 61 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 16 | 3 | 27 | 3 | 14 |
Japan | 52 | 74 | 4 | 11 | 16 | 24 | 24 | 20 | 6 | 14 | 2 | 5 |
South Korea | 27 | 37 | 1 | 2 | 11 | 6 | 6 | 8 | 8 | 17 | 1 | 4 |
UK | 17 | 52 | 1 | 10 | 4 | 12 | 7 | 18 | 4 | 11 | 1 | 1 |
USA | 197 | 329 | 30 | 51 | 36 | 70 | 64 | 107 | 57 | 79 | 10 | 22 |
(A) or number of retracted articled with at least one author working in the specified country (B). 95% CI: 95% CI. Many articles were authored by individuals working in more than 1 of the specified countries. Most articles were retracted because of 2 or more reasons.
The reasons for retraction and investigation of retracted articles as per the Retraction Watch database’s nomenclature: (a) Falsification/fabrication of data, images and of results, and manipulation of results and of images; (b) Euphemism for plagiarism and plagiarism of article, data, images or text; (c) Duplication of article, data, image and of text and euphemism for duplication; (d) Unreliable data, image or results; (e) Breach of policy by author, concerns/Issues about authorship, forged authorship, lack of approval from author, breach of policy by author and objections by author; (f) Investigation by company/institution, journal/publisher, US Office of Research Integrity or by third party; (g) p<0.001.
*Comprises genetic articles with many other disciplines such as, for instance, anthropology, biology, biochemistry, botany, ecology, food science, microbiology, veterinary and zoology.
n, number of retracted articled because of the specified reason; N, number of retracted articles.