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About Which No One Wants to Read?) EDITORIAL EDITORIAL On a subject no one wants to read about (about which no one wants to read?) May R. Berenbaum, Editor-in-Chief, PNAS Long before I developed an interest in entomology, I needless to say, the word no longer has a scientific had an interest in etymology—the study of word ori- definition or in fact utility in any scientific context at gins and evolution. An interest in word coinage is cer- all. Ironically, many components of the Binet test that tainly compatible with a career in science. As a matter made it subject to bias were based on word use or of course, scientists develop new concepts, discover new language facility. materials, invent new instruments, or describe new spe- So, scientific terms evolve in concert with evidence- cies, and have an ongoing need for new words to com- based knowledge. There are, though, other compo- municate with others about them. As scientific subjects nents of scientific communication—grammar, includ- have increasingly permeated popular culture, scientific ing syntax and diction, among them—that evolve at a words have crept into common parlance. According to much slower pace. Conforming to established stan- the Oxford English Dictionary, the popular science mag- dards of written language has long been a requirement azine Scientific American has been the source for the first of scientific communication and, at least in scientific English usage of almost 6,000 words, including many journals, editors have had a responsibility to oversee that were at first strictly technical scientific terms. On compliance. The scientific journal as it exists today this list are such familiar words as “bleach,”“clone,” originated in the 19th century (3), as did the set “computing,”“radio,” and even “editor” (1). phrase “editor-in-chief.” At that time, copyediting be- Although research advances can lead to word coin- came a publication bulwark—the process by which age, they can also lead to its devaluation. Psychologist confusing inconsistencies, time-wasting repetition, (and eugenics advocate) Henry Goddard (2), for ex- misleading inaccuracies, significant omissions, and ample, felt the need to identify “feebleminded” indi- any other departures from standard usage that may viduals who, when evaluated with an intelligence test distract a reader are, if not eliminated, then at least developed by Alfred Binet and minimized. Today, dozens of websites refer to various Theodore Simon to estimate versions of the “4Cs” (or occasionally the “5Cs”)of mental age, tested in the range copyediting, which include some combinations or per- of 8–12 years of age and there- mutations of clarity, coherency, consistency, concise- fore could not be classified as ness, comprehensibility, and correctness, but imbeciles (with a mental age of all converge on the “Cardinal C”—communication. 3–7) or idiots (with a mental age Copyediting done well in theory benefits the author, of 2 or younger). As Goddard (2) the publisher, and the reader. explained, “One of the most “Communication” remains in the vocabulary of scien- helpful things that we can do, tific publishing—for example, as a category of manu- would be to distinctly mark out script (“Rapid Communications”) and as an element of the limits of this class and help ajournalname(Nature Communications)—not as a ves- the general public to under- tigial remnant but as a vital part of the enterprise. The stand that they are a special goal of communicating effectively is also why grammar, group and require special treat- with its arcane, baffling, or even irritating “rules,” con- ment,[sic]—in institutions when tinues to matter. With the rise of digital publishing, at- possible.” The word he pro- tendant demands for economy and immediacy have posed was “the noun from the diminishedtheroleofcopyeditor.Thedemandsarepar- Greek word meaning foolish, ticularly acute in journalism. As The New York Times ‘moronia,’ and these children editorial board member Lawrence Downs (4) lamented, might be called ‘morons.’” This “...in that world of the perpetual present tense—post it word was originally coined now, fix it later, update constantly—old-time, persnickety May R. Berenbaum. strictly as a medical diagnosis; editing may be a luxury.... It will be an artisanal product, Published under the PNAS license. 4–6 | PNAS | January 7, 2020 | vol. 117 | no. 1 www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1920932117 Downloaded by guest on October 1, 2021 like monastery honey and wooden yachts.” Scientific Campbell (6) carried out an analysis of the copyediting publishing is catching up to journalism in this regard. function by comparing the text in the author’sversionand The seemingly exponential increase in the number the publisher’s version of 189 manuscripts selected at of scientific journals of late has intensified competition random from 23 journals published by Blackwell. The and incentivized efforts to economize on production greatest proportion of changes made as a result of the costs and speed up publication times for manuscripts. copyediting and proof-correction process, 42.7%, in- Eliminating one step in the production process long volved the accuracy of references. In addition to affect- considered integral—in-house copyediting (or, in some ing the potential impact of publications as reflected by cases, any copyediting at all)—has been embraced by citations, a significant concern among authors, such er- some journals as a way to gain a competitive edge. rors may bias literature reviews and metaanalyses via There’s sad irony in the fact that, as the scientific com- omission of critical data. As an example of how long munity increases demands for transparency, accuracy, citation errors can persist, due to some confusion and reproducibility, the words that help to achieve those around its official publication date in 1964, the classic commendable goals are now receiving so much less paper on plant–insect coevolution by Ehrlich and Raven scrutiny. Errors in syntax, word choice, spelling, and even (7) was often mistakenly cited as “Ehrlich and Raven punctuation, for example, can make descriptions of (1965)” soon after publication; this incorrect citation methods sufficiently mystifying that reproducing a has continued to appear in bibliographies for at least study with a high degree of fidelity can become an five decades (e.g., Grunzweig et al., ref. 8). impossible task. A few subject–verb disagreements in a manuscript with stellar scientific content should not Lingua Franca lead automatically to rejection, but text that is so In addition, the scientific research enterprise has compromised by awkward writing benefits neither become global. Scientists who are native English authors nor readers and can blunt the impact of the speakers frequently struggle with every aspect of scientific content. writing scientific papers in their own language, despite Years ago, PNAS extensively copyedited manu- having been exposed to the rudiments of English scripts to improve readability, but the process was as a written language throughout their formative costly and time-consuming, and, as PNAS staff mem- years. As English has become a lingua franca for sci- bers tell me, seemed to make authors more upset than entific communication, the proportion of papers writ- appreciative. To avoid changing the intended meaning ten in English by nonnative speakers without such of the authors or giving them extra work to do to verify lifelong familiarity with the language is increasing; the or object to extensive copyedits, PNAS now restricts its frequency of errors arising from less than complete copyediting to correcting grammatical and punctuation fluency is likely to increase as well. Between 2005 and errors, marking awkward or confusing phrases, and 2010, for example, submissions to journals that used maintaining consistent journal style. Costs are managed the ScholarOne manuscript submission system from with the use of standard style manuals rather than the United States increased 177% while the submis- creating a highly customized style for the journal. We sions from China increased 484%, with the United state in our Instructions for Authors: Language-Editing States’ share dropping 3.3% and China’s share in- Services: “Prior to submission, authors who believe creasing 5.5% (9). This trend creates challenges for their manuscripts would benefit from professional edit- ing are encouraged to use a language-editing service both native English readers and nonnative readers; (see list here). PNAS does not take responsibility for or understanding written English can depend on how endorse these services, and their use has no bearing on closely the text conforms to accepted usage for both acceptance of a manuscript for publication.” groups. The use of a lingua franca for science can Irrespective of the potential future of scientific jour- create biases and inefficiencies that under some cir- nals, which are, as more than a few editorial writers have cumstances might become life-threatening (e.g., ref. pointed out lately, “17th century institutions” (e.g., ref. 5), 10), but it has become a necessity for global in- it seems likely that the writtenwordwillremainthepri- formation exchange. That said, varying levels of fa- mary means of disseminating scientific knowledge for a miliarity with the lingua franca can create inequities long time. Accordingly, it is in the best interest of the and underrepresentation in areas of scholarship where scientific community to work toward improving the qual- data are urgently needed. Understanding global ity not only of published data but also of the language phenomena requires evaluation of evidence from all used to introduce, report, and interpret those data. affected regions, and incorrect English usage can lead If anything, unambiguous, logical, concise, and, yes, to omissions that can obscure or distort patterns. That grammatically correct writing has become more, not less, papers from critical regions published in languages important given recent changes in the scientific enterprise. other than English are frequently missed entirely is For one thing, citation analysis and digital search depend understandable, but relevant papers from regions of on accuracy.
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