Fewer senior authors of non-COVID-19 research accepted by journals are women

Key takeaways:

• Fewer women were first and senior author on submissions than men.
• The pandemic did not change the number of women who submitted research.

Acceptance rates of research unrelated to COVID-19 during the pandemic differed between men and women senior authors, according to study results published in Annals of the American Thoracic Society.

“Despite improvement in recent years, we know that gender gaps continue to exist in academic leadership positions and scholarly activities within the field of pulmonary and critical care medicine,” Kelly C. Vranas, MD, MCR, assistant professor in the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Oregon Health & Science University, told Healio. “Because publication of peer-reviewed research is crucial to career advancement, it is important to better understand whether gender differences in submission and acceptance rates of original pulmonary and critical care research exist, as this may impact opportunities for career advancement among women. Given evidence that COVID-19 disproportionately impacted the female workforce, we were particularly interested in studying gender differences in academic publishing in the field of pulmonary and critical care during the pandemic, especially because this workforce was at the frontline of caring for critically ill patients with COVID-19.”

In addition, Vranas and colleagues were interested in how the pandemic impacted publication of non-COVID research.

In this study, Vranas and colleagues analyzed 8,332 research submissions between January 2018 and December 2020 from four pulmonary/critical care journals to see if the pandemic had an impact on journal acceptance rates, especially in terms of author gender.

To evaluate gender disparities among submissions, researchers first collected gender of the first, senior and corresponding author. Next, they assessed how the pandemic altered the number of women in the position of first or senior author on manuscripts unrelated to COVID-19 through interrupted time series regression models.

Lastly, Vranas and colleagues analyzed how author gender was related to manuscript acceptance rates in multivariable logistic regressions.

Submissions

Of 839 submissions with a focus on COVID-19, gender was found for 800 first authors and 777 last authors. For research unrelated to COVID-19, researchers found the gender of 7,120 first authors and 7,100 last authors out of a total of 7,493 submissions.

Accounting for all submissions, 39.9% of first authors were women, while only 28.3% of senior authors were women. This demonstrates that women hold a minority of these positions, Vranas told Healio.

Notably, researchers identified geographic variation in the number of submissions unrelated to COVID-19 authored by first and senior authors who were women. They found that women in Africa had the highest proportion of women who authored manuscripts unrelated to COVID-19 (first author, 54%; senior author, 47%). In contrast, South America and Asia had the smallest proportion of women in the first author position (South America, 35%; Asia, 37%). Similarly, along with North America and Europe, South America and Asia also had the smallest proportion of women in the senior author position (range, 26%-29%).

When assessing how the pandemic impacted the presence of women in either author position, researchers observed that the proportion of women authors did not change for research related or unrelated to COVID-19, which Vranas said was somewhat surprising.

Journal acceptance

No matter the gender of either author position, researchers observed that non-COVID-19 research had lower odds of being accepted during the pandemic period following adjustment for author world region, journal and subject category (first author adjusted OR = 0.46; 95% CI, 0.36-0.59; senior author aOR = 0.46; 95% CI, 0.37-0.57).

“These results suggest that during the pandemic, journal editors may have shifted their focus to include more COVID-19-related research at the expense of non-COVID-19-related topics,” Vranas told Healio. “Although this makes sense in the midst of a public health emergency, our findings highlight the pandemic’s collateral impact on non-COVID research as well. Academic institutions should keep this finding in mind when assessing publication records as a measure for promotion, since scientists whose research focuses on non-COVID areas of study may have had a more difficult time publishing their work over the last several years.”

For accepted studies unrelated to COVID-19, more men than women were senior authors (14.4% vs. 13.2%), and women in this position had a reduced likelihood for receiving journal acceptance in adjusted analysis (aOR = 0.84; 95% CI, 0.71-0.99).

“We found that non-COVID-19 manuscripts with female senior authors were 15% less likely to be accepted compared to non-COVID-19 manuscripts with male senior authors,” Vranas told Healio. “It is important to consider the cumulative effect of these differences on women over time, who already lag behind men in reaching senior positions within academic medicine, receive less research funding in science and medicine and who are underrepresented in peer review processes and editorial boards of academic journals.”

Unlike senior author gender on research unrelated to COVID-19, first author gender was not related to acceptance likelihood. Additionally, for studies on COVID-19, acceptance likelihood was not related to author gender, according to researchers.

“As there are no plausible biological mechanisms for why manuscripts with female senior authors would be accepted less frequently than those with male senior authors, it is important to consider unconscious bias as one possible mechanism for our findings,” Vranas told Healio. “Potential interventions to minimize unconscious bias include real-time data collection that will allow journals to track, analyze, and publish gender statistics for submissions and acceptance; implementation of deliberate strategies to improve women's participation on editorial boards and in the peer review process; and the establishment of a double-blind review process within academic publishing.”

For more information:

Kelly C. Vranas, MD, MCR, can be reached at vranas@ohsu.edu.