Titles and abstracts of scientific reports ignore variation among species.
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 25537194.
- Also identified by DOI 10.7554/eLife.05075 and PMC identifier 4275570.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
An analysis of more than 1000 research articles in biology reveals that the name of the species being studied is not mentioned in the title or abstract of many articles. Consequently, such data are not easily accessible in the PubMed database. These omissions can mislead readers about the true nature of developmental processes and delay the acceptance of valid species differences. To improve the accuracy of the scientific record, I suggest that journals should require that authors include the name of the species being studied in the title or abstract of submitted papers.
Medical subject headings
- Abstracting and Indexing
- Publishing
- Science