Non-normative strategies of scientific communication

Eka­te­ri­na A. Koval
Mid­dle-Vol­ga Insti­tute (branch) of Russ­ian State Uni­ver­si­ty of Jus­tice (MOJ Rus­sia RPA) in Saran­sk

Non-nor­ma­tive strate­gies of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion

Abstract. The arti­cle focus­es on the prob­lem of val­ue and nor­ma­tive devi­a­tions allowed by sub­jects of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion. The arti­cle aims to ana­lyze the strate­gies of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion that go beyond the nor­ma­tive and enable the for­ma­tion of “insti­tu­tions of dis­trust” in the mod­ern aca­d­e­m­ic com­mu­ni­ty. To achieve this aim, it is nec­es­sary to inves­ti­gate the caus­es and con­di­tions that con­tribute to vio­la­tions of the norms and require­ments imposed on the pro­ce­dure for pub­lish­ing aca­d­e­m­ic papers. In addi­tion, it is nec­es­sary to char­ac­ter­ize the neg­a­tive con­se­quences of such vio­la­tions for sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ty and iden­ti­fy strate­gies for solv­ing prob­lems in the field of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion. The main method used is an analy­sis of a non-nor­ma­tive con­tent of the com­mon aca­d­e­m­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion strate­gies, such as a pre­sen­ta­tion and a strug­gle for recog­ni­tion. These strate­gies become the case main­ly through the pub­li­ca­tion of research papers. Inter­ac­tions between sub­jects of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion can be both nor­ma­tive and non-nor­ma­tive, hav­ing attrib­ut­es of an infor­ma­tion con­fronta­tion. Non-nor­ma­tive strate­gies of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion hin­der the accel­er­a­tion of sci­en­tif­ic progress and pro­voke the emer­gence of var­i­ous forms of “gray” prac­tices, such as abun­dant quo­ta­tion, self-pla­gia­rism, hon­orif­ic author­ship, etc.  In order to pre­vent the “insti­tu­tions of dis­trust” in that pub­lic seg­ment where sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tions take place, we need a com­bi­na­tion of dif­fer­ent mea­sures. It is nec­es­sary to adopt opti­mal cri­te­ria for assess­ing the effec­tive­ness of the scientist’s activ­i­ty, to cre­ate con­di­tions for improv­ing the cul­ture of sci­en­tif­ic research, to intro­duce into sci­en­tif­ic and aca­d­e­m­ic envi­ron­ments an atti­tude to any aca­d­e­m­ic dis­hon­esty as inap­pro­pri­ate. To ful­fil these tasks, we sug­gest attempt­ing to apply a com­mu­ni­tar­i­an approach based on the view of a val­ue-nor­ma­tive orga­ni­za­tion of com­mu­ni­ties. It is nec­es­sary to facil­i­tate a mega­logue between authors, edi­tors, pub­lish­ers, review­ers, rep­re­sen­ta­tives of state bod­ies and oth­er per­sons inter­est­ed in pre­vent­ing the non-nor­ma­tive strate­gies of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion.

Key­words: sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion, com­mu­nica­tive strate­gies, pla­gia­rism, “gray” prac­tices, aca­d­e­m­ic com­mu­ni­ty, insti­tu­tion­al dis­trust, mega­logue.

DOI: 10.5840/dspl20181219

Ref­er­ences:

  1. Bobko­va, E.M. “Dover­ie kak fak­tor tselost­nos­ti obshch­est­va” [Trust as fac­tor for soci­etal integri­ty], Sot­si­o­logich­eskie issle­dovaniya [Soci­o­log­i­cal Stud­ies], 2014, no. 10, pp. 70–75. (In Russ­ian)
  2. Bog­dano­va, I.F. “Onlaynovoe pros­transt­vo nauch­nykh kom­mu­nikat­siy” [On-line space of sci­en­tif­ic com­mu­ni­ca­tion], Sot­si­ologiya nau­ki i tekhnologiy [Soci­ol­o­gy of Sci­ence and Tech­nol­o­gy], 2010, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 140–161. (In Russ­ian)
  3. Brandt, M.J., Wetherell, G., Hen­ry, P.J. “Changes in Income Pre­dict Change in Social Trust: A Lon­gi­tu­di­nal Analy­sis”, Polit­i­cal Psy­chol­o­gy, 2015, no. 36, pp. 761–768. DOI: 10.1111/pops.12228.
  4. Bre­tag, T., Mah­mud, S. “Self-pla­gia­rism or appro­pri­ate tex­tu­al re-use?”, Jour­nal of Aca­d­e­m­ic Ethics, 2009, no. 7 (3). pp. 193–205. DOI: 10.1007/s10805-009‑9092-1.
  5. Etzioni, A. “Cre­at­ing Good Com­mu­ni­ties and Good Soci­ety”, Con­tem­po­rary Soci­ol­o­gy, 2000. vol. 29, iss. 1, pp. 188–195.
  6. Heck­ler, N.C., Forde, D.R. “The Role of Cul­tur­al Val­ues in Pla­gia­rism in High­er Edu­ca­tion”, Jour­nal of Aca­d­e­m­ic Ethics, 2015, vol. 12, no. 1, pp. 61–75. DOI: 10.1007/s10805-014‑9221-3.
  7. Kur­ba­to­va, M.V., Kagan, E.S. “Otsen­ka ste­peni znachi­mosti effek­tov vnesh­nego kon­trolya dey­atel­nos­ti pre­po­da­vate­ley vuzov” [Sig­nif­i­cance assess-ment of the exter­nal con­trol effects of lec­tur­ers], Zhur­nal insti­tut­sion­al­nykh issle­dovaniy [Jour­nal of Insti­tu­tion­al Stud­ies], 2015, no. 3, vol. 7, pp. 122–143. DOI: 10.17835/2076–6297.2015.7.3.122–143. (In Russ­ian)
  8. Mamae­va, S.A. “Kom­mu­nika­tivnye strate­gii uchenykh” [Com­mu­ni­ca­tion strate­gies of sci­en­tists], Nauch­naya peri­odi­ka: prob­le­my i resh­eniya [Sci­en­tif­ic peri­od­ic: prob­lems and solu­tions], 2011, no. 3(3), pp. 6–12. (In Russ­ian)
  9. Mer­ton, R.K. Nau­ka i demokratich­eskaya sot­sial­naya struk­tu­ra [Sci­ence and Demo­c­ra­t­ic Social Struc­ture], in: R. Mer­ton Sot­sial­naya teoriya i sot­sial­naya struk­tu­ra [Social The­o­ry and Social Struc­ture]. Moscow: AST, Khran­i­tel Publ., 2006, pp. 767–781. (In Russ­ian)
  10. Reutov, E.V., Reuto­va, M.N. “Nedover­ie v ustanovkakh i prak­tikakh nase­leniya” [Dis­trust in the atti­tudes and prac­tices of the pop­u­la­tion], Sot­si­o­logich­eskie issle­dovaniya [Soci­o­log­i­cal Stud­ies], 2015, no. 6, pp. 126–132. (In Russ­ian)
  11. Quah, C.H., Stew­art, N., Lee, J.W.C. “Atti­tudes of Busi­ness Stu­dents To-ward Pla­gia­rism”, Jour­nal of Aca­d­e­m­ic Ethics, 2012, vol. 10, iss. 3, pp. 185–199. DOI: 10.1007/s10805-012‑9157-4.
  12. Sure­da-Negre, J., Jones, K.O., Comas-For­gas, R. “Ethics and Pla­gia­rism in Sci­en­tif­ic Com­mu­ni­ca­tion”, Comu­nicar, 2016, no. 48. Avail­able at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/304703724_Ethics_and_Plagiarism_in_Scientific_Communication (accessed on: 25.01.2018).

Comments are closed.