How to write and publish a scientific paper - Barbara Gastel, Robert A. Day 2022
Definition of a scientific paper
What is a scientific paper?
Some preliminaries
Without publication, science is dead.
—Gerard Piel
Definition of a scientific paper
A scientific paper is a written and published report describing original research results. That short definition must be qualified, however, by noting that a scientific paper must be written in a certain way, as defined by tradition, editorial practice, scientific ethics, and the interplay of printing and publishing procedures.
To properly define a “scientific paper,” we must define the mechanism that creates a scientific paper—namely, valid (that is, primary) publication. Abstracts, theses, conference reports, and many other types of literature are published, but such pieces do not normally meet the test of valid publication. Further, even if a scientific paper meets all the other tests, it is not validly published if it is published in the wrong place. That is, a relatively poor research report, but one that meets the tests, is validly published if accepted and published in the right place (a primary journal or other primary publication); a superbly prepared research report is not validly published if published in the wrong place. Most of the government literature and conference literature, as well as institutional bulletins and other ephemeral publications, do not qualify as primary literature.
Many people have struggled with the definition of primary publication (valid publication), from which is derived the definition of a scientific paper. The Council of Biology Editors (CBE), now the Council of Science Editors (CSE), arrived at the following definition (Council of Biology Editors 1968, p. 2):
An acceptable primary scientific publication must be the first disclosure containing sufficient information to enable peers (1) to assess observations, (2) to repeat experiments, and (3) to evaluate intellectual processes; moreover, it must be susceptible to sensory perception, essentially permanent, available to the scientific community without restriction, and available for regular screening by one or more of the major recognized secondary services (e.g., currently, Biological Abstracts, Chemical Abstracts, Index Medicus, Excerpta Medica, Bibliography of Agriculture, etc., in the United States and similar services in other countries).
At first reading, this definition may seem excessively complex, or at least verbose. But those who had a hand in drafting it weighed each word carefully and doubted that an acceptable definition could be provided in appreciably fewer words. Because it is important that students, authors, editors, and all others concerned understand what a scientific paper is and what it is not, it may be helpful to work through this definition to see what it really means.
“An acceptable primary scientific publication” must be “the first disclosure.” Certainly, first disclosure of new research data often takes place via oral presentation at a scientific meeting. But the thrust of the CBE statement is that disclosure is more than disgorgement by the author; effective first disclosure is accomplished only when the disclosure takes a form that allows the peers of the author (either now or in the future) to fully comprehend and use that which is disclosed.
Thus, sufficient information must be presented so that potential users of the data can (1) assess observations, (2) repeat experiments, and (3) evaluate intellectual processes. (Are the author’s conclusions justified by the data?) Then, the disclosure must be “susceptible to sensory perception.” This may seem an awkward phrase because in normal practice, it simply means to be published; however, this definition provides for disclosure not just in terms of printed visual materials (printed journals and the no longer widely used media called microfilm and microfiche), but also in nonprint, nonvisual forms. For example, “publication” in the form of audio recordings, if that publication met the other tests provided in the definition, would constitute effective publication. And electronic journals certainly meet the definition of valid publication. What about material posted on a website (for example, preprints)? Views have varied and can depend on the nature of the material posted. For the most current information, consult materials from professional organizations and journals in your field.
Regardless of the form of publication, that form must be essentially permanent. Therefore, scientific papers receive digital object identifiers (DOIs): internet addresses that persist even if, for example, a journal’s URL changes or the journal ceases publication. Primary scientific publications also must be made available to the scientific community without restriction (for example, in a journal that is openly accessible online or to which subscriptions are available), and they must be made available to information-retrieval services (for example, Biological Abstracts, Chemical Abstracts, and MEDLINE). Thus, publications such as newsletters, corporate publications, and controlled-circulation journals, many of which are of value for their news or other features, generally cannot serve as repositories for scientific knowledge.
(“Types of Scientific Paper” by xkcd [xkcd.com]. Used by permission.)
To restate the CBE definition in simpler but not more accurate terms, primary publication is (1) the first publication of original research results, (2) in a form whereby peers of the author can repeat the experiments and test the conclusions, and (3) in a journal or other source document readily available within the scientific community. To understand this definition, however, we must add an important caveat. The part of the definition that refers to “peers of the author” is accepted as meaning prepublication peer review. Thus, by definition, scientific papers are published in peer-reviewed publications.
This question of definition has been belabored here for two reasons. First, the entire community of science long labored with an inefficient, costly system of scientific communication precisely because it (that is, authors, editors, and publishers) has been unable or unwilling to define primary publication. As a result, much of the literature has been buried in meeting abstracts, obscure conference reports, government documents, or books or journals of minuscule circulation. Other papers, in the same or slightly altered form, have been published more than once; occasionally, this is due to the lack of definition as to which conference reports, books, and compilations are (or should be) primary publications and which are not. Redundancy and confusion result.
Second, a scientific paper is, by definition, a particular kind of document containing specific kinds of information, typically in a prescribed order. If the graduate student or the budding scientist (and even some scientists who have already published many papers) can fully grasp the significance of this definition, the writing task might be a great deal easier. Confusion results from an amorphous task. The easy task is the one in which you know exactly what must be done and in exactly what order it must be done.