Gender differences in authorships are not associated with publication bias in an evolutionary journal

Do Manuscripts by Female Evolutionary Biologists Spend Longer Under Review?

Women are under-represented in academia and in STEM careers, especially at senior positions and top institutions. This may be, at least in part, due to the many obstacles that they experience along the academic pipeline. There has been substantial debate as to whether women are treated unfairly during the peer review process. An analysis of over 9,000 research articles published in top Economics journals has recently shown that female-authored articles tend to spend 3 to 6 months longer under review (period from submission to acceptance), and to have more readable abstracts, than male-authored articles, suggesting that female-authored articles are held to higher standards. We set out to determine whether these trends were also present among 49,031 papers published in 11 Evolutionary Biology journals. We found that female representation among article authors substantially increased over the decades. The percentage of women is lower among corresponding authors than among all authors, especially of recent articles. In addition, female first authors were less likely to be corresponding authors than male first authors, and the gender of the first author correlated with the gender of the corresponding author. In some of the journals, female-authored articles spent significantly longer under review; however, most of the observed differences vanish after controlling for the date of publication and the number of authors. In addition, female-authored abstracts are not more readable. Our results suggest that the peer review process in the field of Evolutionary Biology is generally not biased against women.

Dissemination and outcome reporting bias in clinical malaria intervention trials: a cross-sectional analysis

BACKGROUND

Dissemination and outcome reporting biases are a significant problem in clinical research, with far-reaching implications for both scientific understanding and clinical decision-making. This study investigates the prevalence of dissemination- and outcome reporting biases in registered interventional malaria research.

METHODS

All malaria interventional trials registered on ClinicalTrials.gov from 2010 to 2020 were identified. Subsequently, publications that matched the registration were searched. The primary outcome measures were the percentage of registered studies that resulted in subsequent publication of study results, the concordance between registered outcomes, and reported outcomes. Secondary outcomes were compliance with WHO standards for timely publication (issued in 2017) of summary study results in the respective trial registry (within 12 months of study completion) or peer-reviewed publication (within 24 months of study completion) was evaluated.

RESULTS

A total of 579 trials were identified on ClinicalTrials.gov, of which 544 met the inclusion criteria. Notably, almost 36.6% of these trials (199/544) were registered retrospectively, with 129 (23.7%) registered after the first patient enrolment and 70 (12.9%) following study completion. Publications were identified for 351 out of 544 registered trials (64.5%), involving 1,526,081 study participants. Conversely, publications were not found for 193 of the 544 registrations (35.5%), which aimed to enrol 417,922 study participants. Among these 544 registrations, 444 (81.6%) did not meet the WHO standard to post summary results within 12 months of primary study completion (the last visit of the last subject for collection of data on the primary outcome), while 386 out of 544 registrations (71.0%) failed to publish their results in a peer-reviewed journal within 24 months of primary study completion. Discrepancies were noted in the reported primary outcomes compared to the registered primary outcomes in 47.6% (222/466) of the published trials, and an even higher discordance rate of 73.2% (341/466 publications) for secondary outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS

Non-dissemination remains a significant issue in interventional malaria research, with most trials failing to meet WHO standards for timely dissemination of summary results and peer-reviewed journal publications. Additionally, outcome reporting bias is highly prevalent across malaria publications. To address these challenges, it is crucial to implement strategies that enhance the timely reporting of research findings and reduce both non-dissemination and outcome reporting bias.

Gender differences in research fields of bioeconomy and rural development-based on sustainable systems in Latin America and Africa regions

Using bibliometric analysis of large-scale publication data is a simple approach to exploring gender-related trends, especially gender equality in academic publishing. The aim of this study is to investigate gender trends in the fields of bio-economy and rural development sciences in two under develop regions as Latin America and Africa. This study examines gender differences in these fields in order to: (1) recognize the contribution of female researchers in bioeconomy and rural development, (2) explore the relational structure of gender aspects in academic publications, (3) identify trends in female authorship in these scientific research fields over time, and finally (4) identify gender potentials for women to become more visible in these fields of study. To achieve these objectives, we used bibliometric tools to analyses 1891 publication records in bioeconomy and rural development. After cleaning the database of full names of authors of academic publications relevant to the field studies, we performed a series of statistical analyses in R and SPSS software, such as Lotkas distribution, network analysis, co-authorship analysis and spatial distribution of authors in the study. The results show that the number of male authors is almost three times higher than the number of female authors, suggesting that women are under-represented in the fields studied. Men occupy the most important position of authorship in scientific articles; publications with corresponding male authors were found in 1389 out of 1891 publications related to the bio-economy and rural development. In terms of geographical regions, publications with female authors were more prevalent in European and North American areas, with a small exception in some developing countries such as Argentina and South Africa. In terms of research networks, from the total number of authors evaluated, only 23% are female authors on the map of research influence. This indicates that there is a significant gap to be filled in the promotion of scholarly impact through the sharing of knowledge and expertise among authors.

Primary Author Characteristics Associated With Publication in the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management

CONTEXT

Scientific journals are the primary source for dissemination of research findings, and this process relies on rigorous editorial and peer-review. As part of continuing efforts by the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management (JPSM) to advance equity, diversity, and inclusion, JPSM's leadership requested an external evaluation of their publication decisions.

OBJECTIVES

1) Describe primary author characteristics associated with final decisions to accept or reject manuscripts submitted for publication; 2) Report on whether there are potential publication biases in the JPSM editorial or peer-review processes.

METHODS

Data consisted of self-reported primary author demographic characteristics associated with manuscript submissions between June 18, 2020, and December 31, 2022. Characteristics included region of residence, race, gender, and ethnicity. A multiple logistic regression model was used to estimate adjusted odds of rejection for each author characteristic.

RESULTS

A total of 1940 submissions were evaluated. Compared to authors residing in North America, authors residing in Asia had six-fold greater odds of rejection, authors residing in Europe had four-fold greater odds of rejection, and authors residing in other regions had two-fold greater odds of rejection. Female authors submitted 1.7 times more papers than males, but there was no difference in acceptance rates of their papers in adjusted analysis.

CONCLUSION

In this analysis of publication decisions by the JPSM, there were differences in acceptance rates by region of residence, ethnicity, and race but not by gender. Asian authors and authors residing in regions outside of North America had greater odds of rejection compared to White or North American authors.

Gender equity in the scientific nursing journals indexed in Journal Citation Reports: A cross-sectional study

Background

Scientific activity has been connected to the proven inequality between women and men. To examine the state of gender equality in nursing research by analyzing the representation of male and female as editors and as authors of articles published in scientific journals.

Method

A cross-sectional study was carried out between September-2019 and May-2020. All the scientific publications published in 115 nursing journals indexed in the Journal Citation Reports in the years 2008, 2013, and 2017 were chosen as analysis units. The main variables studied were gender of the “journal editor”; gender of the “first author”, “last author”, “corresponding author”, and “first author in funded articles”. Descriptive and inferential analysis was performed.

Results

The proportion of male editors in 2008, 2013, and 2017 was 23.3, 19, and 18.5% respectively, with a male/female ratio of 1:3, 1:4 and 1:5. Male editors are mainly found in the journals of the first quartile (Q1 = 33.8%, ratio1:2), compared to the journals of the fourth quartile (Q4 = 6.6%, ratio1:14), p < 0.01. The male authorship position was “last author” (30.9%, ratio1:2), “corresponding author” (23.3%, ratio 1:3), “first author” (22.1%, ratio 1:4) and “first author in funded articles” (21.8%, ratio 1:4). Furthermore, in 19.5%, of the articles there were more male authors. The percentage of articles with male authorship increased from 2008 to 2017, “first author” (21.1–23.4%; p < 0.01), “last author” (30.0–31.1%; p = 0.22), “corresponding author” (22.5–24.2; p = 0.01), and “first author in funded articles” (18.1–25.9%; p < 0.001).

Conclusions

Men are over-represented in the editor role in the most prestigious nursing journals. There are a higher proportion of male authors in the main positions of authorship.

Does writing style affect gender differences in the research performance of articles?: An empirical study of BERT-based textual sentiment analysis

“Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls” is essential to reduce gender disparity and improve the status of women. But it remains a challenge to narrow gender differences and improve gender equality in academic research. In this paper, we propose that the impact of articles is lower and writing style of articles is less positive when the article’s first author is female relative to male first authors, and writing style mediates this relationship. Focusing on the positive writing style, we attempt to contribute and explain the research on gender differences in research performance. We use BERT-based textual sentiment analysis to analyse 87 years of 9820 articles published in the top four marketing journals and prove our hypotheses. We also consider a set of control variables and conduct a set of robustness checks to ensure the robustness of our findings. We discuss the theoretical and managerial implications of our findings for researchers.

Bias Amplification in Gender, Gender Identity, and Geographical Affiliation

In the quest for greater equity in science, individual attitudes and institutional policies should also embrace greater diversity and inclusion of minority groups. This viewpoint calls for a broader definition of gender bias in STEM to include gender identity and for increased attention to the issue of bias amplification due to geographic affiliation in the field of computational chemistry and chemoinformatics. It briefly discusses some active interventions to tackle bias on gender, gender identity, and geographic affiliation in STEM.

The Influence of International Collaboration on the Scientific Impact in V4 Countries

Several strategies are used by researchers and research facilities to increase their scientific production and consequent research quality. Bibliometric records show that coauthorship and the number of participating organizations in research publications are steadily increasing; however, the effect of collaboration varies across disciplines, and the corresponding author’s country appears to influence research impact. This finding inspired our research question for this study: How does international cooperation affect scientific impact, and does the affiliation of corresponding authors influence citation impact indicators at the level of individual publications? To this end, we provide a comparative evaluation of research articles published in Q1 journals among Visegrad Group countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) in Medical and Health sciences between 2017 and 2021. The study investigates the relationship between collaboration type (national vs. international) and scientific impact (impact factor of the journal and category normalized citation impact or research papers), as well as the impact of the country of the corresponding author’s affiliation on quantitative quality of individual papers. We show that Q1 research papers in international collaboration have a higher scientific impact than papers published in national partnerships. Moreover, the corresponding authors’ country of affiliation significantly affects scientific impact.

Unequal opportunities in Italian cardiovascular research: focus on gender

BACKGROUND

Despite unanimous calls for more equitable access and support to female researchers, there are persistent barriers to women's career progression and professional fulfillment. These discriminative hurdles undermine female gender in science and have detrimental effects on research activities and female professionals and patients. There is no data on women's outlook in cardiovascular research in Italy, which limits appropriate remedial actions. We aimed at providing an updated perspective on top Italian cardiovascular researchers, focusing on women versus men comparisons.

METHODS

Top Italian cardiovascular researchers were retrieved from a dedicated and validated Scopus query. Researchers' sex was assigned according to the given name with a consensus process. Several metrics were compared, including global rank, total cites, total cites adjusted by academic age, H-index, and self-citation percentage. Bivariate and propensity score-adjusted analyses were used for inferential purposes.

RESULTS

Our analysis shows the existence of a gender gap: the number of scientific articles published by Italian male researchers in their careers is significantly higher than their female counterparts (P=0.002). For men, the year of first publication is earlier (P=0.001); they also published more articles as a single author, or single + first author or single + first + last author. Men's papers cited at least once were more than those of women (P≤0.001), and the total number of citations was significantly higher for men (P=0.002). These results remain significant both in the analysis excluding self-citations as well as in the analysis including self-citations. The single-year analysis (2019) confirms the significance of the career analysis, adding that men have a higher rank based on composite score (P=0.041, or P=0.005 if including self-citation). Finally, men have a higher percentage of self-citation in 2019 than women (P=0.008).

CONCLUSIONS

The gender disparity is still a limiting factor in Italian cardiovascular research. Despite career advancement, women continue to be underrepresented. Men retain more leadership positions in academia and maintain the edge for scientific work productions. More efforts are needed to ensure equity between men and women.

Academic medicine's glass ceiling: Author's gender in top three medical research journals impacts probability of future publication success

INTRODUCTION

In December 2017, Lancet called for gender inequality investigations. Holding other factors constant, trends over time for significant author (i.e., first, second, last or any of these authors) publications were examined for the three highest-impact medical research journals (i.e., New England Journal of Medicine [NEJM], Journal of the American Medical Association [JAMA], and Lancet).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Using randomly sampled 2002-2019 MEDLINE original publications (n = 1,080; 20/year/journal), significant author-based and publication-based characteristics were extracted. Gender assignment used internet-based biographies, pronouns, first names, and photographs. Adjusting for author-specific characteristics and multiple publications per author, generalized estimating equations tested for first, second, and last significant author gender disparities.

RESULTS

Compared to 37.23% of 2002 - 2019 U.S. medical school full-time faculty that were women, women's first author publication rates (26.82% overall, 15.83% NEJM, 29.38% Lancet, and 35.39% JAMA; all p < 0.0001) were lower. No improvements over time occurred in women first authorship rates. Women first authors had lower Web of Science citation counts and co-authors/collaborating author counts, less frequently held M.D. or multiple doctoral-level degrees, less commonly published clinical trials or cardiovascular-related projects, but more commonly were North American-based and studied North American-based patients (all p < 0.05). Women second and last authors were similarly underrepresented. Compared to men, women first authors had lower multiple publication rates in these top journals (p < 0.001). Same gender first/last authors resulted in higher multiple publication rates within these top three journals (p < 0.001).

DISCUSSION

Since 2002, this authorship "gender disparity chasm" has been tolerated across all these top medical research journals. Despite Lancet's 2017 call to arms, furthermore, the author-based gender disparities have not changed for these top medical research journals - even in recent times. Co-author gender alignment may reduce future gender inequities, but this promising strategy requires further investigation.

Study design quality of research on dogs published in peer-reviewed journals

BACKGROUND

In the past it has been criticised that only a low proportion of well-designed and well-reported studies in some medical specialities is available. The objective of this study was to systematically evaluate the quality of literature about canine medicine published in peer-reviewed journals in relation to six specific veterinary medicine specialities.

METHODS

A literature search was conducted and 25 studies per speciality were selected. The quality of the articles (n = 150) published between 2007 and 2019 was evaluated with a validated checklist.

RESULTS

In articles related to all specialities, deficits were found, such as not adequate number of animals in 60.0% of the studies. In 88.0%, information about housing and feeding of the dogs were not specified. In 69.4% of the prospective clinical studies, an ethical approval was reported, and written informed consent of the owners was obtained in 46.2%.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings revealed extensive deficits in the design and reporting of studies in canine medicine. The demand for improvement is obvious and should be addressed by authors, reviewers and journal editors in the future. Our results underline that practitioners should critically appraise the quality of literature before implementing information into practice.

Woman authorship in pre-print versus peer-reviewed oral health-related publications: A two-year observational study

Objectives

Women in oral health science face similar societal issues and challenges as those in other STEMM careers, and gender disparities continue to exist as evidenced by fewer women represented as first and last authors in scientific publications. Pre-prints may serve as a conduit to immediately disseminating one’s work, bypassing the arduous peer review process and its associated inherent biases. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to 1] compare the gender of first and last authors in pre-print versus peer reviewed publications, 2] examine the composition of first and last author pairs as stratified by publication type, and 3] examine the correlation between woman authorship and institutional geographic location and publication metrics stratified by publication type.

Methods

The keyword “oral health” was used to search for publications in BioRxiv and Pubmed in the years 2018 and 2019. Gender of first and last authors were determined, and its frequency was considered as the primary outcome. Additionally, the geographic location of the author’s associated institution and publication metrics measured by Altmetrics score were extracted. Data was descriptively summarized by frequencies and percentages. Chi-square analysis was conducted for categorical variables which included the relationship between gender and publication type as well as gender and region of author’s associated institution. Binomial regression analysis was conducted to analyze the relationship between gender and Altmetrics.

Results

Woman first authors comprised 40.3% of pre-prints and 64.5% of peer reviewed publications [p<0.05]. Woman last authors comprised 31.3% of pre-prints and 61.5% of peer reviewed publications [p<0.05]. When analyzing the relationships between first and last author, the Man-Man pairing represented 47.7% of the pre-print publications and the Woman-Woman pairing comprised a majority of the of the peer review publications at 47.5%. All results were statistically significant with a p-value <0.05. No significant correlation was found between region of institution or Altmetrics and gender of first or last authors [p>0.05].

Conclusion

For the first time in oral health science, it was found that women show higher representation as first and last author positions in peer reviewed publications versus pre-prints.

Lack of Equity in the Cardiology Physician Workforce: A Narrative Review and Analysis of the Literature

The gender and racial diversity in the cardiology workforce in Canada does not reflect that of the population we serve. As social awareness of the principles of equity, diversity, and inclusion rises, our profession must rise to meet the challenges they present. We detail contemporary examples of publication bias in the cardiac sciences literature and describe the factors that led to oversight in the peer-review process. We performed a narrative review to summarize the published literature on equity and diversity among cardiac physicians. We also summarize the challenges faced by women and racial-minority physicians when pursuing and thriving in a career in cardiology, and the systemic barriers to their success. In the past decade, social justice movements have advanced. Professionalism standards are changing, and awareness and understanding of these advances in terminology is imperative for all physicians. In this review, we summarize key language and concepts, with cardiology-specific examples, and propose a new paradigm of professionalism.

Collaboration enhances career progression in academic science, especially for female researchers

Collaboration and diversity are increasingly promoted in science. Yet how collaborations influence academic career progression, and whether this differs by gender, remains largely unknown. Here, we use co-authorship ego networks to quantify collaboration behaviour and career progression of a cohort of contributors to biennial International Society of Behavioral Ecology meetings (1992, 1994, 1996). Among this cohort, women were slower and less likely to become a principal investigator (PI; approximated by having at least three last-author publications) and published fewer papers over fewer years (i.e. had shorter academic careers) than men. After adjusting for publication number, women also had fewer collaborators (lower adjusted network size) and published fewer times with each co-author (lower adjusted tie strength), albeit more often with the same group of collaborators (higher adjusted clustering coefficient). Authors with stronger networks were more likely to become a PI, and those with less clustered networks did so more quickly. Women, however, showed a stronger positive relationship with adjusted network size (increased career length) and adjusted tie strength (increased likelihood to become a PI). Finally, early-career network characteristics correlated with career length. Our results suggest that large and varied collaboration networks are positively correlated with career progression, especially for women.

Gender issues in fundamental physics: A bibliometric analysis

I analyze bibliometric data about fundamental physics worldwide from 1970 to now, extracting quantitative data about gender issues. I do not find significant gender differences in hiring rates, hiring timing, career gaps and slowdowns, abandonment rates, citation, and self-citation patterns. Furthermore, various bibliometric indicators (number of fractionally counted papers, citations, etc.) exhibit a productivity gap at hiring moments, at career level, and without integrating over careers. The gap persists after accounting for confounding factors and manifests as an increasing fraction of male authors going from average to top authors in terms of bibliometric indices, with a quantitative shape that can be fitted by higher male variability.

Gender parity in scientific authorship in a National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centre: a bibliometric analysis

OBJECTIVE

Scientific authorship is a vital marker of achievement in academic careers and gender equity is a key performance metric in research. However, there is little understanding of gender equity in publications in biomedical research centres funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). This study assesses the gender parity in scientific authorship of biomedical research.

DESIGN

Descriptive, cross-sectional, retrospective bibliometric study.

SETTING

NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre (BRC).

DATA

Data comprised 2409 publications that were either accepted or published between April 2012 and March 2017. The publications were classified as basic science studies, clinical studies (both trial and non-trial studies) and other studies (comments, editorials, systematic reviews, reviews, opinions, book chapters, meeting reports, guidelines and protocols).

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

Gender of authors, defined as a binary variable comprising either male or female categories, in six authorship categories: first author, joint first authors, first corresponding author, joint corresponding authors, last author and joint last authors.

RESULTS

Publications comprised 39% clinical research (n=939), 27% basic research (n=643) and 34% other types of research (n=827). The proportion of female authors as first author (41%), first corresponding authors (34%) and last author (23%) was statistically significantly lower than male authors in these authorship categories (p<0.001). Of total joint first authors (n=458), joint corresponding authors (n=169) and joint last authors (n=229), female only authors comprised statistically significant (p<0.001) smaller proportions, that is, 15% (n=69), 29% (n=49) and 10% (n=23) respectively, compared with male only authors in these joint authorship categories. There was a statistically significant association between gender of the last author with gender of the first author (p<0.001), first corresponding author (p<0.001) and joint last author (p<0.001). The mean journal impact factor (JIF) was statistically significantly higher when the first corresponding author was male compared with female (Mean JIF: 10.00 vs 8.77, p=0.020); however, the JIF was not statistically different when there were male and female authors as first authors and last authors.

CONCLUSIONS

Although the proportion of female authors is significantly lower than the proportion of male authors in all six categories of authorship analysed, the proportions of male and female last authors are comparable to their respective proportions as principal investigators in the BRC. These findings suggest positive trends and the NIHR Oxford BRC doing very well in gender parity in the senior (last) authorship category. Male corresponding authors are more likely to publish articles in prestigious journals with high impact factor while both male and female authors at first and last authorship positions publish articles in equally prestigious journals.

Women Are Underrepresented and Receive Differential Outcomes at ASM Journals: a Six-Year Retrospective Analysis

Despite 50% of biology Ph.D. graduates being women, the number of women that advance in academia decreases at each level (e.g., from graduate to postdoctorate to tenure track). Recently, scientific societies and publishers have begun examining internal submissions data to evaluate representation and evaluation of women in their peer review processes; however, representation and attitudes differ by scientific field, and to date, no studies have investigated academic publishing in the field of microbiology. Using manuscripts submitted between January 2012 and August 2018 to the 15 journals published by the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), we describe the representation of women at ASM journals and the outcomes of their manuscripts. Senior women authors at ASM journals were underrepresented compared to global and society estimates of microbiology researchers. Additionally, manuscripts submitted by corresponding authors that were women received more negative outcomes than those submitted by men. These negative outcomes were somewhat mediated by whether or not the corresponding author was based in the United States and by the type of institution for United States-based authors. Nonetheless, the pattern for women corresponding authors to receive more negative outcomes on their submitted manuscripts held. We conclude with suggestions to improve the representation of women and decrease structural penalties against women.IMPORTANCE Barriers in science and academia have prevented women from becoming researchers and experts that are viewed as equivalent to their colleagues who are men. We evaluated the participation and success of women researchers at ASM journals to better understand their success in the field of microbiology. We found that women are underrepresented as expert scientists at ASM journals. This is, in part, due to a combination of both low submissions from senior women authors and more negative outcomes on submitted manuscripts for women compared to men.

Article placement order in rheumatology journals: a content analysis

OBJECTIVES

To analyse variables associated with article placement order in serial rheumatology journals.

DESIGN

Content analysis.

SETTING

Original articles published in seven rheumatology journals from 2013 to 2018.

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES

The following data were extracted from 6787 articles: order number of article in issue, gender of first and last author, geographical region, industry funding, research design and disease category. Cumulative density function plots were used to determine whether article placement distribution was different from the expected distribution. ORs for articles published in the first three places of an issue compared with the last three places were calculated. Altmetric Score and downloads were meta-analysed.

RESULTS

Article placement order did not associate with author gender or geographical region but was associated with funding source and research design. In addition, articles about rheumatoid arthritis were more likely to be ordered at the front of issues (p<0.001). Articles about crystal arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, vasculitis, pain syndromes and paediatric rheumatic diseases were more likely to be ordered at the end of issues (all p<0.001). Association of article placement order with disease category was observed only in journals with tables of contents grouped by disease. Articles ordered in the first three places had higher Altmetric and download rates, than articles in the last three places.

CONCLUSIONS

Author gender and geographical region do not influence article placement order in serial rheumatology journals. However, bias for certain disease categories is reflected in article placement order. Editorial decisions about article placement order can influence the prominence of diseases.

Gender Disparities in Invited Commentary Authorship in 2459 Medical Journals

Importance

In peer-reviewed medical journals, authoring an invited commentary on an original article is a recognition of expertise. It has been documented that women author fewer invited publications than men do. However, it is unknown whether this disparity is due to gender differences in characteristics that are associated with invitations, such as field of expertise, seniority, and scientific output.

Objective

To estimate the odds ratio (OR) of authoring an invited commentary for women compared with men who had similar expertise, seniority, and publication metrics.

Design, Setting, and Participants

This matched case-control study included all medical invited commentaries published from January 1, 2013, through December 31, 2017, in English-language medical journals and multidisciplinary journals. Invited commentaries were defined as publications that cite another publication within the same journal volume and issue. Bibliometric data were obtained from Scopus. Cases were defined as corresponding authors of invited commentaries in a given journal during the study period. Controls were matched to cases based on scientific expertise by calculating a similarity index for abstracts published during the same period using natural language processing. Data analyses were conducted from March 13, 2019, through May 3, 2019.

Exposure

Corresponding or sole author gender was predicted from author first name and country of origin using genderize.io.

Main Outcomes and Measures

The OR for gender was estimated after adjusting for field of expertise, publication output, citation impact, and years active (ie, years since first publication), with an interaction between gender and years active.

Results

The final data set included 43 235 cases across 2549 journals; there were 34 047 unique intraciting commentary authors, among whom 9072 (26.6%) were women. For researchers who had been active for the median of 19 years, the odds of invited commentary authorship were 21% lower for women (OR, 0.79 [95% CI, 0.77-0.81]; P < .001) compared with men who had similar scientific expertise, number of publications, and citation impact. For every decile increase in years active, the OR decreased by a factor of 0.97 (95% CI, 0.96-0.98; P < .001).

Conclusions and Relevance

In this case-control study, women had lower odds of authoring invited commentaries than their male peers. This disparity was larger for senior researchers. Journal editors could use natural language processing of published research to widen and diversify the pool of experts considered for commentary invitations.

Gender differences in peer review outcomes and manuscript impact at six journals of ecology and evolution

The productivity and performance of men is generally rated more highly than that of women in controlled experiments, suggesting conscious or unconscious gender biases in assessment. The degree to which editors and reviewers of scholarly journals exhibit gender biases that influence outcomes of the peer-review process remains uncertain due to substantial variation among studies. We test whether gender predicts the outcomes of editorial and peer review for >23,000 research manuscripts submitted to six journals in ecology and evolution from 2010 to 2015. Papers with female and male first authors were equally likely to be sent for peer review. However, papers with female first authors obtained, on average, slightly worse peer-review scores and were more likely to be rejected after peer review, though the difference varied among journals. These gender differences appear to be partly due to differences in authorial roles. Papers for the which the first author deferred corresponding authorship to a coauthor (which women do more often than men) obtained significantly worse peer-review scores and were less likely to get positive editorial decisions. Gender differences in corresponding authorship explained some of the gender differences in peer-review scores and positive editorial decisions. In contrast to these observations on submitted manuscripts, gender differences in peer-review outcomes were observed in a survey of >12,000 published manuscripts; women reported similar rates of rejection (from a prior journal) before eventual publication. After publication, papers with female authors were cited less often than those with male authors, though the differences are very small (~2%). Our data do not allow us to test hypotheses about mechanisms underlying the gender discrepancies we observed, but strongly support the conclusion that papers authored by women have lower acceptance rates and are less well cited than are papers authored by men in ecology.