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Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study
BACKGROUND: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to a large volume of publications, a barrage of non-reviewed preprints on various professional repositories and a slew of retractions in a short amount of time. METHODS: We conducted an e-survey using a cloud-based website to gauge...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
The Korean Academy of Medical Sciences
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7358067/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32657090 http://dx.doi.org/10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e256 |
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author | Gupta, Latika Gasparyan, Armen Yuri Misra, Durga Prasanna Agarwal, Vikas Zimba, Olena Yessirkepov, Marlen |
author_facet | Gupta, Latika Gasparyan, Armen Yuri Misra, Durga Prasanna Agarwal, Vikas Zimba, Olena Yessirkepov, Marlen |
author_sort | Gupta, Latika |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to a large volume of publications, a barrage of non-reviewed preprints on various professional repositories and a slew of retractions in a short amount of time. METHODS: We conducted an e-survey using a cloud-based website to gauge the potential sources of trustworthy information and misinformation and analyzed researchers', clinicians', and academics' attitude toward unpublished items, and pre- and post-publication quality checks in this challenging time. RESULTS: Among 128 respondents (mean age, 43.2 years; M:F, 1.1:1), 60 (46.9%) were scholarly journal editors and editorial board members. Social media channels were distinguished as the most important sources of information as well as misinformation (81 [63.3%] and 86 [67.2%]). Nearly two in five (62, 48.4%) respondents blamed reviewers, editors, and misinterpretation by readers as additional contributors alongside authors for misinformation. A higher risk of plagiarism was perceived by the majority (70, 58.6%), especially plagiarism of ideas (64.1%) followed by inappropriate paraphrasing (54.7%). Opinion was divided on the utility of preprints for changing practice and changing retraction rates during the pandemic period, and higher rejections were not supported by most (76.6%) while the importance of peer review was agreed upon by a majority (80, 62.5%). More stringent screening by journal editors (61.7%), and facilitating open access plagiarism software (59.4%), including Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based algorithms (43.8%) were among the suggested solutions. Most (74.2%) supported the need to launch a specialist bibliographic database for COVID-19, with information indexed (62.3%), available as open-access (82.8%), after expanding search terms (52.3%) and following due verification by academics (66.4%), and journal editors (52.3%). CONCLUSION: While identifying social media as a potential source of misinformation on COVID-19, and a perceived high risk of plagiarism, more stringent peer review and skilled post-publication promotion are advisable. Journal editors should play a more active role in streamlining publication and promotion of trustworthy information on COVID-19. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7358067 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | The Korean Academy of Medical Sciences |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-73580672020-07-19 Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study Gupta, Latika Gasparyan, Armen Yuri Misra, Durga Prasanna Agarwal, Vikas Zimba, Olena Yessirkepov, Marlen J Korean Med Sci Original Article BACKGROUND: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led to a large volume of publications, a barrage of non-reviewed preprints on various professional repositories and a slew of retractions in a short amount of time. METHODS: We conducted an e-survey using a cloud-based website to gauge the potential sources of trustworthy information and misinformation and analyzed researchers', clinicians', and academics' attitude toward unpublished items, and pre- and post-publication quality checks in this challenging time. RESULTS: Among 128 respondents (mean age, 43.2 years; M:F, 1.1:1), 60 (46.9%) were scholarly journal editors and editorial board members. Social media channels were distinguished as the most important sources of information as well as misinformation (81 [63.3%] and 86 [67.2%]). Nearly two in five (62, 48.4%) respondents blamed reviewers, editors, and misinterpretation by readers as additional contributors alongside authors for misinformation. A higher risk of plagiarism was perceived by the majority (70, 58.6%), especially plagiarism of ideas (64.1%) followed by inappropriate paraphrasing (54.7%). Opinion was divided on the utility of preprints for changing practice and changing retraction rates during the pandemic period, and higher rejections were not supported by most (76.6%) while the importance of peer review was agreed upon by a majority (80, 62.5%). More stringent screening by journal editors (61.7%), and facilitating open access plagiarism software (59.4%), including Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based algorithms (43.8%) were among the suggested solutions. Most (74.2%) supported the need to launch a specialist bibliographic database for COVID-19, with information indexed (62.3%), available as open-access (82.8%), after expanding search terms (52.3%) and following due verification by academics (66.4%), and journal editors (52.3%). CONCLUSION: While identifying social media as a potential source of misinformation on COVID-19, and a perceived high risk of plagiarism, more stringent peer review and skilled post-publication promotion are advisable. Journal editors should play a more active role in streamlining publication and promotion of trustworthy information on COVID-19. The Korean Academy of Medical Sciences 2020-07-08 /pmc/articles/PMC7358067/ /pubmed/32657090 http://dx.doi.org/10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e256 Text en © 2020 The Korean Academy of Medical Sciences. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
spellingShingle | Original Article Gupta, Latika Gasparyan, Armen Yuri Misra, Durga Prasanna Agarwal, Vikas Zimba, Olena Yessirkepov, Marlen Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title | Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title_full | Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title_fullStr | Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title_full_unstemmed | Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title_short | Information and Misinformation on COVID-19: a Cross-Sectional Survey Study |
title_sort | information and misinformation on covid-19: a cross-sectional survey study |
topic | Original Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7358067/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32657090 http://dx.doi.org/10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e256 |
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