The renowned journal Science recently published an article about professor Juan Corchado and current Rector of the University of Salamanca (pictured above), whose actions will be remembered in both the university’s history and the broader scientific community for highly unethical conduct. His attempts to artificially inflate his citation count included creating fake profiles on ResearchGate, as well as publishing 50 articles in 30 conferences organized by his research group. In some of these articles, 90% of the references cited works authored by the newly appointed Rector: "Corchado had cited himself excessively in documents posted...on allegedly fake profiles on the social network ResearchGate, in one case including 100 references to past work in a four-paragraph paper".
In a strange and somewhat tone-deaf defense, Rector Corchado insists that 25 of the problematic papers were published under his name without his consent. He further contends that his critics overlook the significance of his achievement in founding a research group with hundreds of researchers, which has produced thousands of papers.
However, both of his arguments are fundamentally flawed. By claiming that his name appeared on 25 papers without his consent, he either admits to a lack of oversight regarding his own academic contributions or more likely attempts to distance himself from the problematic publications without accountability. And his argument that his critics fail to recognize the scale of his research group's output is a diversionary tactic. The quantity of work produced does not excuse unethical behavior like self-citation manipulation.
PS - This regrettable lack of ethics highlights the importance of the project by the University of Bern, which rewards those who manage to discover errors in articles, offering up to 3,000 euros for the discovery of serious errors that lead to the retraction of these articles https://19-pacheco-torgal-19.blogspot.com/2024/09/univ-of-berns-project-rewards-close-to.html
