Merriman, R;
Galizia, I;
Tanaka, S;
Sheffel, A;
Buse, K;
Hawkes, S;
(2021)
The gender and geography of publishing: A review of sex/gender reporting and author representation in leading general medical and global health journals.
BMJ Global Health
, 6
(5)
10.1136/bmjgh-2021-005672.
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Abstract
Introduction Diverse gender and geographical representation matters in research. We aimed to review medical and global health journals' sex/gender reporting, and the gender and geography of authorship. Methods 542 research and non-research articles from 14 selected journals were reviewed using a retrospective survey design. Paper screening and systematic data extraction was conducted with descriptive statistics and regression analyses calculated from the coded data. Outcome measures were journal characteristics, the extent to which published articles met sex/gender reporting guidelines, plus author gender and location of their affiliated institution. Results Five of the fourteen journals explicitly encourage sex/gender analysis in their author instructions, but this did not lead to increased sex/gender reporting beyond the gender of study participants (OR=3.69; p=0.000 (CI 1.79 to 7.60)). Just over half of research articles presented some level of sex/gender analysis, while 40% mentioned sex/gender in their discussion. Articles with women first and last authors were 2.4 times more likely to discuss sex/gender than articles with men in those positions (p=0.035 (CI 1.062 to 5.348)). First and last authors from high-income countries (HICs) were 19 times as prevalent as authors from low-income countries; and women from low-income and middle-income countries were at a disadvantage in terms of the impact factor of the journals they published in. Conclusion Global health and medical research fails to consistently apply a sex/gender lens and remains largely the preserve of authors in HIC. Collaborative partnerships and funding support are needed to promote gender-sensitive research and dismantle historical power dynamics in authorship.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | The gender and geography of publishing: A review of sex/gender reporting and author representation in leading general medical and global health journals |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1136/bmjgh-2021-005672 |
| Publisher version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-005672 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2021. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute for Global Health |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10128598 |
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