Authors’ names have ‘astonishing’ influence on peer reviewers

By Nicola Jones, Published on 11 October 2022

“A Nobel prizewinner is six times more likely than someone less well known to get a thumbs-up for acceptance, finds study.”

This article fascinated me, although it did not surprise me, and this status bias [1] is applicable in so many areas of our lives. As usual, females also need to put up with gender bias [2], as males are more likely to get published than females, if gender is know, and the reviewer is male.

It is becoming more and more obvious to me, too few people have far too much power, and many people are unknowingly being manipulated by those who should know better.

In dementia research, high-profile academics are probably more likely to be published, or to receive positive grant applications. News articles abound of how much money someone with a high profile in the area has been awarded in the latest round of grants; each year, it is often the same people.

This is great for them and their university rankings, but what if they are wrong, or their research is not helping?

I’ve also heard from multiple young emerging dementia researchers, with no or low-profiles, that it is very difficult for them to get ‘a foot in the door’.

In dementia-land, a similar bias is evident in dementia self-advocacy. For example, people with dementia or care partners who become heavily involved as volunteers with their national dementia charities, are more likely to be selected for media interviews, to attend high profile events or meetings at venues like Parliament Houses, to present the global figure of more than 57 million people with dementia, or their national country cohort, at other important meetings. They are also invited or ‘selected’ to be members of advisory groups, over others, and so on.

Some days, it looks like we advocates are being ‘pimped’, or ‘manipulated’, which has previously led me to an interesting area of research, on pimping, (not specific to pimping of people to become prostitutes) but to practices of pimping in medicine. In 1989 Brancati [3] defined the term pimping ‘as occurring when an attending physician (the Pimper) poses a series of difficult questions to a resident or medical student (the Pimpee), describing the origins of the term, which date back to 17th-century London. Koch’s series of “Pümpfrage” (pimp questions) were used on his rounds in the 19th century. The practice migrated to North America in the 20th century’. In 2009, Allan Detsky [4] claimed that ‘Pimping is indeed alive and well within academic medicine.’ 

The other issue that needs further consideration in the field of dementia self advocacy, and a topic for another blog or academic publication, is the issue of ethics, as they are ‘missing in action’ in dementia advocacy. I’ve published on the challenges of copyright, ethics and co production [5] before, and plan to again.

Back back to the topic of status bias. I’ve little doubt it happens in many sectors of advocacy and research.

Food for thought…

[1] Kim, JW & King, BG, 2014. ‘Seeing Stars: Matthew Effects and Status Bias in Major League Baseball Umpiring’, Management science, vol. 60, no. 11, pp. 2619–2644.

[2] Ross, E, 2017. ‘Gender bias distorts peer review across fields’. Nature, London.

[3] Brancati, F, 1989. ‘The Art of Pimping’, JAMA : the journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 262, no. 1, pp. 89–90.

[4] Detsky, AS, 2009. ‘The Art of Pimping (vol 301, pg 1379, 2009)’, JAMA : the journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 301, no. 17, pp. 1770–1770.

[5] Swaffer, K, 2016. ‘Co-production and engagement of people with dementia: The issue of ethics and creative or intellectual copyright’, Dementia (London, England), vol. 15, no. 6, pp. 1319–1325.