SELF-CITATION—WHERE'S THE LINE?
A recent post on书香厨房raised some interesting points about the ethics surrounding citation, and specifically self-citation. Previously, COPE has discussed related issues surrounding文献的期刊和编辑和预印本的引用. 在这个论坛上，我们想扩大讨论范围，包括一些与学术出版物中作者自引有关的问题。
Questions for discussion:
Where is the line between what’s appropriate in terms of self-citation, and what’s not?
如果作者没有引用他们以前的任何作品，这可能被认为是一种不恰当的欺骗，表明现在的作品是新颖的，与过去的作品无关。但另一方面，太多引用同一作者以前的作品也是不合适的，被认为是操纵作者自己的h指数的潜在企图。那线在哪？
同侪评论员的责任是什么？
虽然期刊通常期望审稿人会从头到尾地阅读一篇论文，但同行审稿人实际花了多少时间来查看参考文献列表？而且即使他们确实看了参考文献列表，也会因为作者引用了太多自己的作品而大声疾呼，特别是在他们的报告中，评审员要求作者在评审员的作品中添加参考文献，这是否有失偏颇？
Should journals have specific policies about self-citation, and the peer review of reference lists?
Is there a certain number, or percentage, of references in a given work that can or should be a limit in referring back to the authors’ own publications? Is there any guidance journals or publishers can give to authors about what is considered “appropriate” vs. “excessive”? Are there, or should there be rules about changing reference lists during revision, in particular in adding more self-citations if not specifically requested by the editors/reviewers?
The Forum is open to COPE members who need to再保险gister到11月10日星期五。对本次讨论的评论如下：
This will be discussed at the next COPE Forum on Monday 13 November 2017. Please do leave any comments below, whether or not you are planning on joining the meeting
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This is a very difficult and delicate issue. In general, I would expect some self-citation since most work is built off previous studies by the same group. When this gets to be "too much" is difficult to assess. For the APS journals, we directly ask the referees "Are there appropriate and adequate references to related and previous work?" We definite want to insure that the work is properly placed within the context of previously published work.
For a primary research article, all types of citation should be used to justify the need to do the current research and to put the findings into the context of existing evidence. That could legitimately involve self-citation, and, in some very niche fields, it could involve quite a lot of self-citation. So for original research, I don't think it's appropriate to put a percentage on it. For review papers and opinion pieces, one could be a lot more critical.
In looking for appropriate peer reviewers, an editor can probably get a feel for whether or not the authors are dominant in the field or whether they are omitting others' work. But reviewers are probably better placed to assess this, and so I think an instruction phrased along the lines of Dan's is a good one.
I agree with both Dan and Zoe on this. I think this issue may be more straightforward in the sciences where as mentioned, research is an iterative process and the full picture can only be viewed with an understanding of previous work by the author and other colleagues doing similar work. In the humanities, and social sciences, there is likely some difference, although, a scholar could easily develop a highly focused research trajectory requiring a lot of self citation. Even in that situation, there is a need to cite contradictory work to flesh out the arguments. There is a need for careful review of the content and the references in the peer review process, but there is also a need for careful consideration by the editor to determine if the citations are appropriate. I do not believe any kind of "rule" is possible limiting the percentage of self-cites. One other factor to consider is the education of early career researchers and doctoral students on the purpose of citations. I don't remember learning anything like that in my education - it was very much an individual situation depending on the professors. Above all, students need to understand the importance of accuracy of citations and references.
我认为我的补充意见将涉及教育评论员围绕自我引用和平衡，他们寻找他们的审查文件。参考文献需要像提交文件的其他部分一样进行检查。