Open AccessRetractions and post-retraction citations in the COVID-19 infodemic: is Academia spreading misinformation?
Author(s) -
Karen Santos-d’Amorim,
Rinaldo Ribeiro de Melo,
Raimundo ato Macedo dos Santos
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
liinc em revista
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 1808-3536
DOI - 10.18617/liinc.v17i1.5593
Subject(s) - misinformation , covid-19 , context (archaeology) , publication , library science , section (typography) , internet privacy , political science , world wide web , medicine , computer science , history , law , virology , disease , archaeology , outbreak , infectious disease (medical specialty) , operating system
The speed in producing information and the rush to publish scientific articles on COVID-19 in several knowledge areas have resulted in what is known as an infodemic also in the scientific field, potentially producing inaccurate information and sources of misinformation at scholarly communication. This has led to some articles being retracted or withdrawn due to unintentional errors or deliberate misconduct, but they continue to be cited. This article (i) gives an overview of the COVID-19 retracted articles and preprints, and (ii) analyses a set of post-retraction citations in the context of the COVID-19 infodemic. We analyzed 56 retracted articles and preprints by using the list available in the section on “retracted coronavirus (COVID-19) papers” in the Retraction Watch (RW) webpage. We found that 64.3% of these retractions were articles published in journals, 33.9% were uploaded in preprints servers, and 1.8% conference papers. We also analyzed 162 eligible articles out of 612 records identified by using the Google Scholar search engine. This research found that an article from The Lancet continued to be cited even after being retracted. In this case, we identified 214 post-retraction citations, of which 38% were negative (n=81), 32% were neutral (n=69), and 30% were positive citations (n=64)