More transparency in reviewing is called for

Editor—The recent calls for boycotting Israeli science assume that Israeli authors are as likely to publish as others.¹ In fact, nations are differentially represented in scientific journals.

The total number of publications from a given country might be expected to correlate positively with the number from that country in any given journal. Data on the publication trends during 1973-2002 show for the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Science significantly positive correlations for 34 among 40 countries. The six exceptions (15%) could be explained in terms of cold war politics, small samples, etc. Publication trends in Nature were similar for most countries, implying similar professional criteria in all three journals (figure).

Figure 1.

Numbers of publications by authors from three countries in Nature and Science, 1973-2002

However, 19 countries (47.5%), including Israel, are underrepresented in Nature as compared to Science and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during 1973-2002.² Editorial bias is an unlikely cause: it wouldn't remain consistent over 30 years. This implies that hidden prejudices affect publication chances of scientists from some countries in some journals. Recent boycotts therefore appear even more as attempts to justify old biases and bring them into the open.

Information on rejection rates could prove or disprove these suspicions. These are available online for the BMJ (bmj.com/advice/ms_breakdown.shtml), whose publication trends resemble those of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The BMJ's country-based rejection rates correlate consistently between years, and with the number of medical doctors per head, but not other socioeconomic indices (gross domestic product per head, longevity, urbanisation, population density). This indicates that country associated BMJ rejection rates echo scientific quality resulting from different medical education systems.

Potential conclusions are not optimistic: country associated prejudices in some journals indicate that other prejudices (institutional, etc) probably affect more than believed professional decisions; and now even some dare voice that they consciously use prejudices in professional decisions. Editorial boards have the responsibility to detect and fight biases. Although non-scientific criteria might be acceptable publication criteria, these must be objective, published, and applied across the board.