CHARACTERISTICS OF UNPUBLISHED RESEARCH AND REASONS
FOR FAILURE TO PUBLISH
Ellen J Weber,1 Michael L Callaham,1 Robert L Wears,2 Christopher Barton,3 and Gary P Young4
1Division of Emergency Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, Box 0208, L-138, San Francisco, CA 94143-0208, USA; 2Division of Emergency Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA;
3Department of Emergency Medicine, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA; 4Department of Emergency Medicine, Highland General Hospital, San Francisco, CA, USA
Objective: We hypothesized that authors of research rejected from a scientific meeting are less likely to pursue publication than those whose studies are accepted.
Design: Abstracts submitted to the major 1991 emergency medicine meeting and not published within 5 years were rated by 2 blinded reviewers for scientific characteristics,
study quality (overall scientific solidity), and originality. Authors of the 279 unpublished papers were sent questionnaires. Data was analyzed using Fisher's exact test and
Student's t-test with 95% CI for differences between means.
Results: A total of 493 abstracts were submitted to the meeting and 179 were accepted for presentation. Thirty-four percent (104) of rejected studies vs 61% (110) of those
accepted were ultimately published. Fifty-four percent (151) of investigators answered the questionnaire: 107 (35%) of those with rejected abstracts and 44 (25%) of those with accepted abstracts.
Thirty-five (23%) of the responding authors had completed a manuscript: 21% (20) of those rejected, 38% (15) of those accepted (P=.05). Study quality for abstracts with completed manuscripts
was 2.41 vs 2.50 for those without manuscripts (0.09, -0.27 -0.44). Originality of studies with manuscripts was 1.58 vs 1.56 for those with no manuscript (0.02; -0.23 -0.19).
Seventy-seven percent of abstracts with manuscripts had positive results vs 60% of those without manuscripts (P=.34). Effect size was 0.16 for abstracts with manuscripts vs 0.33 for
those without manuscripts (0.17; -0.20 -.54). Twenty-eight percent of authors (30) whose abstracts had been rejected from the meeting felt their results were not important or unlikely
to be published vs 5% (2) of those whose abstracts were accepted (P<.001). Logistic regression will be performed when results from a follow-up mailing to nonresponding authors are complete.
Conclusions: Objective differences do not explain why research is not published. Most authors never wrote a manuscript. Rejection of abstracts submitted to scientific meetings may
discourage manuscript preparation and submission to journals.
Return to Session Information
