方舟子的Blog

Wu Ni

2010年1月13日SciDev.Net

两名中国大学的讲师在一家国际期刊上发表的70篇论文因涉嫌造假被撤销，他们随后被学校开除。

中国南部江西省井冈山大学的讲师钟华和刘涛2007年在《晶体学报：E分卷》发表了这些论文。但是，这家期刊上个月（12月19日）宣布论文存在造假，十天后，两名讲师被学校开除公职。

这是中国一连串科学欺诈事件中最新的一起。中国在2006年制定了打击不端行为的规定来应对这个问题，并在2009年进一步描述了七种学术不端行为及其惩罚后果。

但是，多年来在中国打击学术造假的批评人士方舟子说，评估研究者工作成果的方式需要深刻的变革。

方告诉SciDev.Net，中国大学和学术机构过于注重发表论文的数量而非其质量。

“研究人员要得到奖励和晋升，很大程度上基于他所发表论文的数量，这成为促使研究者造假的危险的激励方式。”他说。

井冈山大学的一位发言人说，造假事件的发生源于两位讲师“缺乏道德正直”，称学校对此全不知情。

但是方说，大学也有责任，因为它设定了一个量化的标准来评估研究者的工作。

他特别指出井冈山大学2006年发布的一份通告。通告说，研究者在科学引文索引（SCI）收录的刊物上发表一篇论文可获得5000元人民币（约733美元）的奖励。SCI监控顶级期刊。

方说，在一些大学，发表一篇被SCI收录的论文的奖励能达到1万元（约1466美元）。如果在《自然》和《科学》之类的顶级期刊上发表论文，研究者可获得高达10万元（约14，660美元）的奖励。

武汉科技学院化学系的教授李伟说，影响力较小的大学更热衷于对发表论文给予经济刺激，但是，几乎在所有大学，发表论文的数量和研究者的晋升关系密切。

“尽管中国政府宣布对学术造假零容忍，实际上，很少有研究者因为不端行为受到严惩。大学倾向于袒护那些学术地位高的造假者，担心他们的权力和学校的声誉。”方说。

中国曾表示，希望在2020年成为一个科学研究的超级大国。

Chinese scientists dismissed after 70 suspect papers

Wu Ni

13 January 2010 SciDev.Net

[BEIJING] Two Chinese university lecturers have been dismissed after 70 papers they published in an international journal were revoked because of alleged fraud.

Hua Zhong and Tao Liu, lecturers at Jinggangshan University in south China’s Jiangxi Province, published the papers in 2007 in Acta Crystallographica Section E. But last month (19 December) the journal announced that the work was fraudulent and the lecturers were dismissed from their posts ten days later.

The incident is the latest in a spate of scientific fraud cases in China. The country tried to deal with the problem in 2006 by drawing up rules for tackling misconduct (see China sets up rules to combat scientific misconduct) and updating these by describing seven acts of academic misconduct, and their resulting penalties, in 2009 (see China issues another crackdown on scientific misconduct).

But Fang Zhouzi, a critic who has been fighting academic fraud in China for years, said that a profound change was needed in the way researchers’ work is evaluated.

Fang told SciDev.Net that Chinese universities and academic institutions attach too much importance to the quantity, rather than quality, of published papers.

“A researcher is rewarded and promoted largely based on the number of published papers, which poses dangerous incentives for researchers to commit fraud,” he said.

A university spokesperson said that the fraud had arisen because of the lecturers’ lack of moral integrity, saying that the school was fully unaware of it.

But Fang said that the university has responsibility because it sets a quantitative standard for evaluating researchers’ work.

He highlighted an announcement by Jinggangshan University in 2006, which stated that a researcher could be rewarded with 5,000 Chinese yuan (US$733) if publishing a paper in a journal catalogued by the Science Citation Index (SCI), which monitors leading journals.

Fang said that the award for publishing a paper catalogued by SCI can, in some universities, reach 10,000 yuan (US$1,466). And if the paper is published in top publications like Nature or Science, the researcher can be awarded as much as 100,000 yuan (US$14,660).

Li Wei, a chemistry professor from Wuhan University of Science and Engineering, said that less influential universities are more keen on financial incentives for publishing papers, but in almost all universities, the number of published papers is closely related to the promotion of a researcher.

“Although the Chinese government declares zero tolerance on academic fraud, in practice, few researchers are seriously punished for their misconduct. Universities tend to cover for those offenders with high academic status for fear of their power and the reputation of the school,” said Fang.

China has said that it wants to be a research superpower by 2020.