Media attention plays a crucial role in advancing the careers of scientists, enhancing their reputation, and making it easier for them to attract collaborators and students.
However, according to a recent article published in "Quantitative Science Studies," there's a discrepancy in the mention of authors' names in news coverage related to scientific research, with less likelihood of East Asian and African scientists' names being cited in reports referencing their studies.
One of the authors of the study, Dr. Peng Hao, a postdoctoral researcher at Northwestern University in the United States, mentioned that he himself had been excluded from news coverage of his research. However, for individual scientists, the mention of their names in news coverage is "very meaningful," as it is crucial for career development, academic recognition, and in some cases, the professional mobility of foreign scientists.
Maite Taboada, a distinguished professor at Simon Fraser University in Canada, whose lab developed a gender-tracking website, pointed out that journalists' decisions about which scientists to mention in their reports are not only significant for the scientists themselves but also have a broader impact on how the public perceives scientists. From the public's perspective, they glean from these reports who are considered important researchers, which scientists and universities excel in scientific research, and who serve as role models for young people considering a career in science.
In a recent study published, the research team compiled a list of 223,587 news articles published by 288 US media outlets between 2000 and 2019, citing 100,486 research papers, using Altmetric, a database tracking online mentions. Then, the researchers examined whether these news articles mentioned the names of the first author, last author, and corresponding author.
The study found that overall, there was a 41% probability of each scientist being mentioned. However, according to an algorithm considering the most likely country of origin for given names and surnames, individuals with Chinese and African names were least likely to be mentioned, with slightly better representation for non-Chinese East Asian names. The most likely to be mentioned were English names, as well as names from Eastern Europe, India, and the Middle East.
Geography may be a factor, the study found. When the analysis was restricted to US scientists, researchers found that scientists with East Asian and African names were still less likely to be mentioned, although the difference was not as significant as when studied globally.
Wudan Yan, a science and society journalist, stated that due to deadline constraints, journalists are more likely to conduct interviews in their own time zone or nearby time zones. Additionally, biases may exist, such as whether a scientist has an accent or fluency in English, which could influence journalists' decisions on whom to contact regarding relevant work.
Taboada added that journalists' professional networks could also influence the selection of interviewees, often boiling down to who the journalists know or who their network knows.
The researchers noted that they did not capture the true ethnicity or English fluency of the researchers, and their method of identifying name origins may have resulted in some misclassifications.
However, according to Natalie Davidson, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Colorado, the study is still valuable. Davidson co-authored a similar paper last year, finding underrepresentation of East Asian names in news coverage by "Nature," as people often form biases based on a person's name alone, which is precisely the issue this study seeks to address.
Related Paper Information: https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00297
