Published errors and errata in library and information science journals
| Date | 01 July 2019 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/CC-12-2018-0024 |
| Published date | 01 July 2019 |
| Pages | 61-67 |
| Author | Mohammadamin Erfanmanesh,Marzieh Morovati |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Collection building & management |
Published errors and errata in library
and information science journals
Mohammadamin Erfanmanesh
Department of Library and Information Science, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and
Marzieh Morovati
Department of Knowledge and Information Science, Kharazmi University, Tehran, Iran
Abstract
Purpose –This paper aims to investigate the characterization of corrections to the papers published in Library and Information Science (LIS) journals
during 2006-2015. It studies the frequency and location of the published errors, time interval between the publication of the original papers and
their corrections, as well as associations between journals’impact factors (IF) and their correction rates.
Design/methodology/approach –The population of the study comprised of 369 errata published in 50 LIS journals. The data were obtained from
Clarivate Analytics’Web of Science (WoS) and Journal Citation Reports.
Findings –The results of the study revealed a correction rate of 0.37 per cent for LIS journals, which is substantially lower than that of 124 subject
categories with at-least one erratum in the WoS. Among the countries with the highest number of errata in LIS journals, the USA ranked first,
followed by China and England. However, the greatest share of errata to overall LIS publications of the country was seen in Kazakhstan, Russia and
Botswana. Results showed that no statistically significant relationships existed between the journals’IF and their correction rates. The highest
proportion of errors published in LIS literature was occurred in authors’information, references, tables and figures. Moreover, the averag e time from
publication of the original articles to their corresponding errata was found to be 8.7 months.
Social implications –Correcting the unintentional mistakes in scholarly articles is an ethical responsibility of researchers and journal editors.
Originality/value –The current research tries to investigate the characteristics of errata in the LIS field.
Keywords Library and information science, Corrections, Errata, Erratum, Peer-review process, Published errors
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Peer-review is a mechanism for the quality control and the
elimination of errors in scholarly journals. Traditional method
of peer-review and editorial process has been criticized for
various reasons, including biases, subjectivity and publication
delay, but any alternative approach to the quality control has
yet been found (Haustein, 2012). Although many mistakesare
detected during the review processthere is still a possibility that
the errors remain undiscovered, which negatively affects
scholarly literature. One standard approach for correcting
unintentional published mistakes and erroneous literature is
the issue of errata to avoid the dissemination of errors and to
maintain the integrity of the scientific literature.Erratum (also
known as correctionor corrigendum) is published when a small
portion of an otherwise reliable publication proves to be
misleading because of an honest error that originates in either
research or publication process (Da Silva and Dobránszki,
2017). When researchers detect mistakes or flaws in their
previously-published articles that affect the content or
understanding of the work, they would issue a notice of
correction to briefly describe the error and to document the
changes or emendations to an earlier article.Some instances of
errors are including typographical or grammatical errors,
mislabeling of figures, incorrect references and misspelling of
authors’nameor affiliation.
Usually, the erratum is made freely available to notify all
readers and is linked to the correctedarticle. The responsibility
to correct errors lies mainly with the authors. In some special
cases, the erratum will be issued by the journal editors,
publishers, institutional officials or publishing ethical
committees when the authors are unresponsive or
uncooperative in correcting the errors (Scarlat, 2017). In case
of serious intentionalerrors such as plagiarism, fraud, duplicate
publication, fabrication, falsification or other types of research
misconducts, the article should be retracted instead of
corrected. It is evident that the fraction of undetected or
unreported errors in scientific literature would be extremely
greater than the corrected errors and in many cases, the errors
noticed by the researchers are probably never officially
reported. Da Silva (2016) believes that leaving the literature
uncorrected, when errors aredetected should be categorized as
an unethical editorial behavior.It should be mentioned that the
policies regarding correction announcements vary among
journals and some titles lack formal correction guidelines. In
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/2514-9326.htm
Collection and Curation
38/3 (2019) 61–67
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 2514-9326]
[DOI 10.1108/CC-12-2018-0024]
Conflict of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Received 10 December 2018
Revised 23 February 2019
Accepted 4 March 2019
61
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