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No interesting research topics available - should I quit and pay back my stipend?
I’m currently enrolled in Mechanical Engineering MSc program in the UAE. I’m on a scholarship program as a TA/RA. I just finished my first semester through which I suffered greatly but I ended up with a GPA of 3.75.
To find a research topic, we are required to choose 3 topics off a list and then be assigned one of them. All three of my choices were given to more suitable candidates. I will have to choose another topic. The problem is all the other topics are of absolutely no interest to me.
I don’t want to waste my time for two years doing something that I hate. I would rather quit now and start looking for a job instead of wasting my time. But if I quit, I will have to pay back the fees and probably my stipend, which could add up to 35,000 USD. This amount increases with every semester I spend in grad school, so I have to decide now whether to stay or leave.
I might be able to pay the 35,000 with the help of my family. But I would like to know if quitting could affect my job prospects and opportunities. What would you do if you were in my place?

This sounds like an abusive system. Why should you owe anything if you fulfilled your duties as an RA/TA?

Please keep in mind that to quit I would have to pay back the semester’s fees and probably any stipend I have received during the semester which could add up to 35,000 USD...

"Probably" the stipend? The "probably" makes me nervous -- I think you should start by quantifying exactly how much you would be on the hook for. It could be more than that, or maybe you misunderstand and this would be zero.

what would you do if you were in my place?

Impossible to answer, partially because I do not know what your "Plan B" is. You need to develop two detailed plans -- one for staying and one for leaving. Only then can you make a good decision.
I would also consider whether you have any professors you trust to discuss this with -- they may be able to help you find a third option.

I would like to...know if quitting could possibly affect my job prospects and opportunities

Of course not having a degree is worse than having a degree. Paying 35K USD and still not having a degree seems awful. Starting something and not being successful also doesn't look great. But again, the question is: what is the alternative? If you can transfer to a better program, or get an awesome job, then perhaps it is worth it. For sure you don't want to acquire more debt and then not finish.

In addition to the points raised by cag51, you should take into account the sort of work you would be doing if you quit the MSc program and take a job. Your reason for quitting is that the program would require you to work on topics that are of absolutely no interest to you. Though I don't know about your interests, I'd expect that many jobs also require you to work on topics that are of absolutely no interest to you. Are you reasonably confident that you could get a job in which you work exclusively on interesting topics? If not, then switching from your MSc program to a job may not really improve anything.

Doing research on a boring topic is often worse than working at a boring job.

@ElizabethHenning You may well be right, but I suspect that he reverse is also sometimes true. (I can't claim any expertise on that issue, because I've had the good fortune to avoid both types of boring.)


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Is gift authorship for PhD advisors rampant in academia?
I have had an issue with my PhD advisor where they were essentially attempting to coerce me into inappropriately adding them as a co-author on a paper that they had no part in. They agreed that they should not be an author according to ethical standards, but essentially threatened me that there would be "problems with my graduation" if I did not add their name to the paper. They have refused to collaborate with me on this paper as well as any future paper because they "are too busy" and "no professors really do research".
This appeared to be a very serious ethical breach to me, so I immediately went to the department chair to describe the situation, and started looking for a new PhD advisor. However, some of the reactions I got to the situation disturbed me. The chair of my department openly stated that all of my research is "owned" by my advisor (whatever that means) and implied that I was a bad student for not adding my advisor to the paper. He even went so far to suggest that I add my new advisor's name to the (finished) paper in order to start off on good terms! Another professor trivialized the problem, stating that compared to what many PhD students have to deal with gift authorship is "not that bad". A third professor stated that it was clearly unethical, but that it was unfortunately the norm.
It seems to me based on this small sample size (as well as hearing other PhD student's experiences) that gifting authorship to uninvolved PhD advisors is rampant. This is obviously a terrible practice. Is this behavior really rampant in academia? And if so, what happens to PhD students who refuse to participate in this practice?
A further point about my situation: I am in a theoretical scientific field where there is no lab, etc., so there is no complications arising from that sort of thing. Although even if I were working on a grant and using lab equipment gift authorship would be unethical.

This seems more of a rant than an actual question. On a purely practical level, is this something you would quit your PhD over?

What is described is a clear, classical conflict situation and the OP wants to know whether this is widespread. Looks like a valid question to me.

They have refused to collaborate with me on this paper as well as any future paper because they "are too busy" and "no professors really do research". — Time to find a new advisor. — The chair of my department openly stated that all of my research is "owned" by my advisor — Scratch that.  Time to find a new department.

It's unfortunately a rather widespread problem, yes. But is it rampant? I.e. out of control or spreading fast and unchecked?

A country tag or some other cultural context may be useful for this question.

This is actually in the US at a middling program.

Not answering the question, but: While it is annoying to have somebody who didn't contribute as a minor author, what does it actually cost you to include them?

Possible dupe of https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/19362/is-it-ethical-for-advisors-to-automatically-coauthor-papers?rq=1 and/or https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/130710/my-co-supervisor-wants-authorship-in-a-paper-he-didnt-contribute?rq=1
Note the answer to the second of those about journals' standards for authorship.

@Flyto: It costs a lot! A single author paper for a PhD student shows that the student is independently capable of carrying out this research, and does not depend on their advisor to be successful. This looks very good. In addition, if I add my advisor she could use the paper (in combination with other papers she is a gift author on) to aid her get grants, a salary increase, etc. that she doesn't deserve.

Your second sentence is kind of my point - yes, it benefits your advisor, and this might irritate you, but it doesn't actually cost you anything. But I accept your first sentence. A single author paper isn't terribly meaningful where I come from, but I imagine country and field norms are different on this.

This situation is not uncommon but not rampant, and depends very strongly on the culture of the institution, the department and the field of research, or even the individual thesis director.
There is some weak argument to be made that thesis directors provide resources (intellectual or otherwise) so they should be more or less automatically co-authors of work done by students.  If they are not then the resources going to the lab/research group through grants or other competitions might be jeopardized.   In other words, the resources you can access now are in part due to the past record of the supervisor so she/he needs to keep this up else these resources will not benefit the next generation of students.
There is also the argument that big names function as imprimatur in the sense that they will provide visibility to the work beyond what the junior authors could hope to provide.
Overall, I have always found both arguments not completely satisfactory.  While certainly a thesis director should help a student as much as possible, there are clearly situations where it is not necessary for a thesis director to co-sign a paper.  Likewise, it is entirely possible to highlight in a positive manner - in a grant application or otherwise - the fact that a student publish without his/her thesis director.

No, it is not the norm in my field (in the arts & humanities) in the UK. In fact, a supervisor whose students never published solo would be considered a failure.
For future reference (and for the benefit of prospective PhD students reading this), a good piece of advice when evaluating a potential supervisor is to look at his/her publications list, and analyse the authorship/co-authorship patterns:
[NB: applicable to the arts & humanities (I make no apology for this bias, since there are so many STEM-biased answers on StackExchange as matters stand)]

good sign: solo publications and publications with other academics of comparable seniority in the field;
fine/neutral: some publications co-authored with students (you should then check the publication records of these students -- ideally, they should also have published solo and/or with different collaborators as well);
red flag: all recent (last 10 years) publications co-authored with his/her students.

I should also stress that quantity of publications is less important than quality. If possible, try and read a few publications from a prospective supervisor before committing.

Is it rampant? I would say generally, no, but it occurs and it occurs too often. But different fields have different standards and some of them make sense even to those who say that it is wrong in general. That doesn't seem to be the situation in your case, of course, so I think your rant is justified.
But if an advisor makes it possible for you to do your research, through providing the lab (not your case, of course), and sets the general direction of research in that lab, and has "hired" you to carry on the work that s/he has defined for that lab, then it isn't so obvious that their name doesn't deserve to be on the papers produced in the lab. Of course, such fields also probably have conventions about the placement of names in the list. Often the "owner" of the lab is placed last on all publications, and that is understood for what it is.
But even in other cases, if a supervisor gives you a problem to solve and guides you a bit in its solution, does s/he deserve co-authorship. In mathematics we generally say no, but, even there, it isn't so clear that it isn't deserved. If a student can't come up with his/her own problem due to insufficient "seasoning" and insight, they may come to a significant result that would be outside their reach without the advisor. But, again, in theoretical math, at least, demanding co-authorship would be seen as a transgression, especially in a case that matches your description.
Rampant in academia? Probably not. Rampant in some corners? Perhaps. But look closer at the whole picture, not just the obvious bits.
Also, if a student is trapped in such a situation, it may just be self preservation to go along. Hold your nose, but get away quickly and don't look back. Find people with whom you can collaborate in a fair and just manner.

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Why are the final copies of thesis dissertations often required to be double spaced?
From http://thewallaceline.blogspot.com/2006/11/double-line-spacing-in-dissertations.html:

It is standard practice to require dissertations to be double-spaced. In the age of word processors, one wonders why this practice persists. This must surely be a legacy from the days when dissertations were typewritten and students were allowed to make corrections in situ rather than re-print. Word processors have eliminated that problem. Double-spacing might also be suitable for drafts which require annotation for editing, but final copies of dissertations are not used in this way and modern techniques such as commenting do this job.

How did this tradition get started? The ability to make corrections on the printed thesis in the days of typewriters sounds like a pretty good guess.

It seems like you asked and answered your question.

I have never heard of this convention. Is this indeed common? My dissertation was singled-spaced.

I little magic with LaTeX let me format my dissertation for the printer as required and in a neat and compact version for download.

Why would there be any corrections in the final copy of a document? These two attributes somehow seem mutually exclusive to me (as in, the final version by definition being the one that will be on file as is, without any further amendmends or changes)?

Why are the final copies of thesis dissertations often required to be double spaced?

Inertia.

How did this tradition get started?

From what I read, with typewriters:

Double spacing is an entrenched practice due to the era of typewriters [...]. Typewriters had a limited number of options for leading and double spacing was chosen as a default.

My understanding was that this is for the convenience of examiners, who may wish to annotate a printed copy while reading the thesis, for reference during the defence. In the UK, at least, where candidates may be expected to make corrections to their thesis after the defence, this is quite common. Annotation is much easier if there is plenty of whitespace on the page.

This would make sense for the draft copy that goes to the committee before approval, but not for the final libarry copy.

As Frack Demoncourt's answer says, this comes from the typewriter era (I did my undergraduate thesis then). A change in a page meant retyping it completely, so having extra leeway to add/delete a line was critical. Less text on the page meant less retyping in case of an error, also important. I remember my advisor was extra careful to suggest changes that didn't spill over to following pages.
Yes, the good old days. How do I miss them...
By the way, the local standard still specifies double spacing, printed on one side only. In practice, the librarians here are thrilled when my students turn in single spaced, double sided printed theses (less precious shelf space!).

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PhD after marriage
I am 28 year old international student (Male, if it matters for the question ahead) and am about to graduate with a Masters degree in a foreign country. I want to pursue a PhD and have a few offers. But I don't think I am in the right frame of mind to do so immediately. Financially, I want to pay off my debts and also have a sufficient balance in my bank account. Personally, I feel insecure that I have never been in a relationship before and would like to settle down with someone. Also, I Everywhere I see, people are in relationships I think that I need a source of support while doing my PhD. I wanted to know everyone's thoughts about this from the people in academia. Is it a good idea to do a PhD after marriage? So far, I've heard only negative things about it but I don't think I am ready yet. Are there people who have been in happy marriages while doing a PhD? Why is it hard to do a PhD and be married? And lastly, is me letting go of my opportunity in hand, while being unmarried a bad idea? Thanks.

I don't get how that even is of concern.

You are good to go. A good percentage of PhD scholars are married before starting their research or in the middle of their research. Some keep committed relationship in their lives during PhD. But you have to have a good understanding with your partner (or whatever you call it), then it is alright. I am married before my PhD and and soon will submit my thesis with 3-4 research publications in hand. So it depends on you how you manage everything.

While it is true that this depends on individual factors, I think it is a common enough concern in academia that it is worth keeping open and I've so voted.

"Financially, I want to pay off my debts and also have a sufficient balance in my bank account."
A PhD is not for you.

@Buffy: Well, if you want this to be answered in general, you can arguably write a book about it – i.e., the question you think deserves an answer too broad. This is demonstrated by the existing answers, which either focus on particular aspects or state that they can only scratch the surface. While there are certainly good questions to be asked about PhDs and marriage, these need to be more specific. This does not necessarily be about one individual’s experience but can focus on a particular possible problem, e.g. financial aspects, time devotion, etc.

Moreover, this question (and the existing answers) likely come with some inherent cultural assumptions about marriage. While there is nothing wrong with such assumptions per se, they need to be spelt out – otherwise everybody will talk about different things and the answers advice will not be helpful to the asker (and others) since it clashes with their assumptions on marriage.

Is it possible in your place to just start dating and look where it goes? Some sentances in the question look slighly odd to me - maybe it is just good to try, date and see how you like it?

I started my PhD 2 months after got married. In a year for 1st kid. Everything is fine. Now, after 8 years, I am a PhD in Astrophysics with 2 kids, working as ML engineer in big tech company.

@circassia_ai - Which country are you in? I think a PhD in EU is much more structured than in the US, in terms of work life balance

People enter graduate school unmarried and leave unmarried. They enter married and leave married. They enter single and leave married. And many also enter married and leave divorced. Graduate school is not some monastery, but just another type of job training, and like every type of training, it has its quirks.
Being married while in grad school has some benefits. To some people, it gives some structure, for example, you know you have to leave the lab/library/classroom by certain time to be home with your partner. It also brings a lot of complications. Lots of grad student partners complain that the grad student has a nice life, surrounded by interesting people, traveling to conferences, doing research that matters, while they (the partners) go to work every day and live so-so lives.
If you marry another graduate student, you might find yourself with a two-body problem when looking for jobs.
There are other issues which are particular to graduate school and how they affect grad students' relationships (or lack of thereof), but in general, it's just the same shit as everywhere else.

Let me add that all of those things also might apply if you are "just" in a relationship, not married.

If one is married and has young kids, that can put a lot of pressure on one’s spouse since a PhD program can take over one’s attention, even when one is “with” the family. Both the spouse and the kids can become resentful.

Thanks. Are you referring to the fact that I have to take care of the baby round the clock? In that case, I found that universities offer childcare facilities like https://hokiewellness.vt.edu/Employees/work-life/Child_Care.html. Would that take some weight off my shoulder or are you saying that it's going to be hard even with this arrangement?

My point was about the burden on one’s spouse. Whatever childcare you can arrange, a great deal still falls to the parents. So the less available you are—and grad students can be pretty unavailable for anything besides their studies—the more ends up in your spouse’s lap.

Let me add that there are a lot of phd students who take care of their kids (and work less), just as in any other job.

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What is the chances of me getting into top 20 university in US with low gpa? (ranking from US News)
Background
I'm a year 1 undergrad at The University of Hong Kong under the faculty of Engineering. My CGPA is 3.0-3.3/4.3 and converted to 3.5x - 3.6x/4.0 with WES GPA Convertor (free version, I did not pay 200USD). I plan to do my research throughout year 2 - 3, and apply for a PhD at the start of year 4.
I will also try to increase my CGPA.
Thoughts
I would like to apply for top 20 university in US such as Columbia University in the City of New York. Given my background, what is the chance of me getting in?
Thanks in advance!


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Do you think that publishing a documented script in R (e.g. on GitHub) can increase the chance of publication?
I am involved in environmental science. The data analysis for my following scientific paper is done 100% in R. I'm wondering if I should clean up my script before submitting the article for review and document it properly in English (which is not my native language), then upload it to GitHub and add information about it in the manuscript. Do you perhaps have any experience that adding the source code of your analyses has had a positive impact on the review process?

I don't know about environmental science, but in general the amount of benefit it gives ranges from zero (it makes no difference) to the maximum possible (publishing code is a requirement). Presumably there are many cases between those two extremes. It depends on the field and the journal and you should be able to get some idea by reading the journal's requirements.

I’m in the environmental sciences. Unless you are submitting to a journal that has a particular focus on code and analysis (e.g., an environmental modelling journal) it probably won’t make a difference. It might increase your chances if your written description of your method is difficult to follow but the code is straightforward, or if your results are so surprising that the reviewers will want to check for themselves.
If the code is useful to others for their own analyses and makes it easier for others to apply the same method, then it might increase your citation count after publication — but if that’s the case (since it is in R) you’ll get a bigger boost if you also publish it as a package through CRAN.

In general, you want your research to adhere to FAIR principles - which means (among others) that it needs to be reproducible by others. The best way of achieving that is also giving others access to any custom code you used.
Personally I also see another advantage: If you publish your code with the paper, then this saves you (or the corresponding author) work in the future. No digging through archives in "who did we do this again" mode, but clarity form the start: Here's the script, that's how we did it, no go try it yourself. I think it's great.


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'Decision on process' directly from with editor
I have submitted my original research manuscript to a reputed journal in Elsevier, initially it showed with editor and after 5 days it started showing decision in process.Its been 20 days since it showed decision in process.No mail, nothing.any idea?

https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/153925/can-i-predict-the-fate-of-my-manuscript-from-information-other-than-a-decision This might be the more appropriate target.


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How can I build a research profile now?
I'm gutted. I recently graduated with a non-thesis Masters degree and always wanted to do a PhD or at least a Masters thesis. I approached several professors to convert to thesis but it never worked out, due to the lack of funding. I have only done coursework and do not have any research experience or publications. I want to go and work in the industry for a while and come back to academica later, but I am afraid that I do not have any strong letters of recommendations now. How can I make up for it? Would work experience be valued and would letters of recommendation from my managers be okay? Thank you.

I think I and several others will be able to give you good answers.  But can you clarify the general direction of the research you want to do?  STEM, medical, social sciences, humanities, etc?  I think you will get the best possible answers that way.

This is not helpful to you now, but I think this question should serve as a warning to future students. Accepting a slot in A (that you don't want) in the hopes of being able to eventually transfer into B is a risky play.

@Anonymous - Thanks. It is in STEM, in computer engineering

An indication of where would be useful. In the US most PhD applicants don’t have a masters.

@JonCuster - in the US, Canada and Europe. Thanks

For the US and Canada, apply to a PhD program (well, more than one).

Thanks. So, you mean, without the thesis, it would be hard to apply in Europe?

I am not familiar with European requirements. Lots of questions here to search on though.

In Europe (Germany, Netherlands, Belgium) we don't have a "non thesis masters" and for a PhD you are expected to have at least a masters degree, and either a recommendation from your work, or high results for your threats.

In the United States at least the lack of research experience prior to starting a doctoral program isn’t an issue. Few applicants have serious experience at that point.
The doctoral program is where you get that experience. There are a few exceptions but most fields expect only a bachelor’s.
You will need good letters of recommendation attesting to your potential.

As long as your Masters degree is recognized and you are eligible to apply for a PhD, I do not believe you are gutted. The value of past experiences and recommendations will depend on the field/project you apply for.

But I don't have a Masters thesis. I would be going into the field of computer engineering.

@blazingcannon degree is what I meant. Modified answer

You're Not Gutted
You have at least two options here:
First, you can apply directly for a PhD on the strength of your master's degree.  A PhD is the customary place to gain research experience.  Is it better if you have some coming in?  Sure.  Is it a requirement?  Not in the United States.
Second, you can pursue some work in industry.  It doesn't have to be research oriented-- again, that would be great, but it isn't necessary.  But it should ideally be related to the kind of work you would want to do in industry, and it should lead to the same type of letters of recommendation you would get in academia.
I will give a concrete example:  I was accepted to a PhD program in STEM straight out of my master's degree, but it wasn't a good enough offer.  (There was no promise of funding of any sort.  I believe I correctly read that as, "Well... if you really want to... I guess we'll take your money.")
I took a 13 year side trip through industry at a major engineering company in States.  I did not do anything that could be considered as research, but I did work diligently on teams that produced very good work.  My letters of recommendation came from the then-chief engineer of the site, the now-chief engineer of the site, and some senior staff engineers. None of them had PhDs.  At least two of them supervised engineers who had PhDs.  I was accepted to an R1 institute without incident.
(I don't really recommend my route, but it is a possibility if for some reason a direct application doesn't work or isn't feasible.)


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Confusion on whom to get letter of recommendation from
I'm working as a research assistant in a mechatronics lab. My research and work is largely based on designing circuits, robotics and programming. My PI also works on mechatronics. But I've also worked with two other professors. For one of them, I had to develop circuits for electrochemical studies and for the latter, I worked in a clean room for photolithography. But their fields ( chemistry and MEMS packaging respectively) are way different from the field I want to apply for ( mechatronics and robotics). Will it affect my application if I use a letter of recommendation from them, since their primary field of research is different from mine?

Related: https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/156001/who-to-ask-for-letters-of-recommendations/156003#156003

If your ability in developing circuits for electrochemical studies sheds light on how good you would be designing circuits for mechatronics (and I suspect it does), definitely get a letter from them.
If all the professor can say that addresses your ability in mechatronics is "he was smart, diligent, and careful," then that's certainly better than no letter, but you might be better off with a letter from somebody closer to your field, even if you haven't worked directly with them.

When I review an application's letters of recommendation, I look at what the letters say about the candidate first and who wrote the letters second. This means that a really quality letter from someone that knows your work is the number one goal here. If these "out of department" professors can give you a quality recommendation, I would not hesitate to ask them. They are still going to be familiar with what graduate programs overall are looking for and their disciplines are still somewhat related to your program choice.
Overall, you should perhaps have one letter from a professor in the field you are apply to. However, a quality letter of recommend is the #1 goal here.


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Is GRE scores required before contacting potential advisors?
I am from India and want to pursue a PhD in robotics/control systems and am not quite sure on how to start applying. I have my GRE about a month away from now. Is it okay to start contacting/emailing professors before I take the test?
P.S- I have a bachelors degree. I have about a year of work experience, a year and a half research experience in a lab.

You can contact anyone, I think. But you need to give them a reason to reply back and to consider you. I doubt that many would care, initially, about your GRE, but might want to know how you've done in relevant coursework or other research. I don't think I'd ever care about the GRE specifically, though my university might. The GRE is about your general level of knowledge, not your research potential.
But, don't send out mass emails to people along with your CV. You will be ignored. Make sure you have some knowledge of their interests and that you can speak to how your background and interests fit with theirs.

Is it okay to not have any publications at the time of emailing? I have completed a research project, to which my current advisor has asked me to write a patent. The project is currently undergoing trials to complete its productisation.

You can always contact the person. What response you get depends on their analysis. Publications are good, of course. For some, maybe essential. But not for everyone.


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What are some examples of research that does not solve a existing problem (maybe the problem is not obvious yet) but present a unique discovery?
Do you need a problem to find a new discovery? Are there any publications that solely exist to classify parts of existing theories without targeting a real-world problem?

What about things discovered that solve a problem that was not the target of the original work?

Viagra leaps to attention as it was originally being tested for cardiovascular diseases...

You seem to think of only strictly scientific/mathematical research here.

Welcome to Academia SE. As it stands, your question suffers from two problems: 1) It is not clear what exactly you are looking for. Your second question seems to be different from your first one. 2) Your question is very broad having a huge amount of possible answers (as I understand it, I could present almost all of my own papers here). — If you can, please [edit] it to amend this.

It is a bit unclear what you mean or whether you are only interested in applications of research when you say "real-world".
Almost all research starts out without a well defined problem that is known in the literature. There are classic unsolved problems, of course, and people work on those, but graduate students are advised to avoid them. If a problem has been known for a while it has probably been worked on and the solution is (a) likely pretty hard and (b) the field hasn't yet developed the base to make a solution accessible. If hundreds of people have looked at a problem without a solution it is probably pretty hard.
The Four Color Theorem is instructive. Can you color every planar map with only four colors so that adjacent regions have different colors. The theorem has now been proven, but until computers came along the proof was pretty inaccessible. The proof is also unsatisfying to many mathematicians, since the analysis of a large set of cases that the proof requires looks pretty boring. Perhaps someone someday will have the insight for an elegant proof. But for a doctoral student to stake his/her future on finding that proof would be a tactical mistake.
Most research starts out with someone simply wondering about a question they have based on their readings. They don't find the question stated somewhere most likely, but they are puzzled by something and wonder if they can resolve their puzzlement somehow. "How do people balance themselves?" "How do bats find insects in the dark?" "Why do large dinosaurs have holes in their skulls?" "How does the local behavior of a real valued function affect the global behavior?"
A lot of research (doctoral level) starts out with an advisor giving a recent paper to a student with instructions to read it and then answer the question "What do you think about that?". Not very well formed. A research question might arise from their discussion. Is it correct? Can it be extended? Can it be combined with this other thing? Suppose look at what happens if we change this assumption?
The research grows out of those questions by finding some methodology that can get close to an answer.
But if you are only interested in applications, I think that the original researchers in most fields don't think much about that. Some do, of course, but more are interested in the pure knowledge that can arise.
The original researchers about bat echolocation weren't thinking about radar and how to catch speeding automobiles. That came later.
Most pure mathematicians study math for the ideas. My own dissertation was so esoteric that I assumed (not quite fifty years ago) that it would never find application in the real world. My results were unique, but not useful, most likely.. After thirty years or so, I was proven wrong when someone else found a "real world" use for what I did purely for the intellectual challenge (and the degree, of course). And I was surprised to see the application appear.
Applied mathematicians, on the other hand, do start with a given problem, but, again, it is probably a problem that they formulate themselves, rather than one that they found already fully formed in the literature.
Likewise, people in product development start with an idea for a useful product and work to create it. But that is a bit different from research as an intellectual activity. But no one looked in the literature for the problem "How do you create an iPod?" back in the day. The creation of the problem itself was an important part of the process. _

There was the guy who was late to his lecture and wrote down the problem on the board... Spent 3 weeks doing the “homework” ... When he submitted the solution the prof was rather surprised - that “homework” was him explaining an unsolved problem :) iirc it was CalTech or MIT... but the moral don’t be late...

Feynman noticing the periodicity of wobble and rotation of a dinner plate.  The fractional quantum Hall effect.  HTSC cuprates.  Initial discovery of superconductivity.  Michaelson Morely.  Many discoveries of new plants and animals.  Penicillin. Teflon.  The discovery of the Americas.

I would add lasers. In the 1960's nobody knew how many cats would enjoy chasing a spot of light.

Check out the book Laser by Nick Taylor.  It was a big innovation but I'm not so clear that it was really something people were not seeing as a path to pursue.  The discovery was contested.  And it was building on designs and ideas in interferometry.  And people did see the value in a coherent light source.

@PatriciaShanahan you don’t need a laser - cats will chase torch beams no problem, cheaper and less dangerous...

The example that popped into my head was the discovery of the muon, about which I. I. Rabi famously quipped, "Who ordered that?" No one had predicted that any such particle would exist, and we still have no idea why it exists (more precisely, why there are three copies of all of the fundamental fermions). They were looking for pions, which happen to have a similar mass but are otherwise unrelated.
Since their discovery muons have seen a few practical applications, such as muon tomography.

Probably very common in mathematics, e.g., the Radon transform which was first described in 1917 and found its major applications in the 1960s with the invention of computer tomography.


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How should I avoid someone patenting technology in my paper/poster?
I am working on a paper in the field of AI. I've developed a new technology that allows many state of the art benchmarks to be improved on. I want to make sure that when I publish the paper, anyone/company that wants to use the technology can do so free of charge with no strings attached. My fear is that someone will patent the work soon after I publish the paper and prevent this from happening. Should I patent the technology myself before publishing? Is there a better solution?

If it's valuable tech, you should talk to the IP office at your institution, or a personal attorney.  You should not depend on input from well-meaning internet contributors

Be careful with the advice given here. Especially in the US. I think the concept of prior art has been weakened recently. The USPTO grants rights to the "First to File" successfully, not necessarily the inventor. If an idea has been exploited previously it counts as prior art (I think, but IANAL). But having the idea may not count for much. As @ScottSeidman suggests, talk to a patent lawyer for correct advice rather than speculation which may be obsolete. Law varies by place and by time. Beware.

@Buffy - First to File does not mean you can take somebody else's presentation and file on their specific idea (note that it needs to be specific though - extensions to it are just fine!). It just means that establishing just when something was conceived is not needed anymore.

@JonCuster, ideas, as such, have little protection. You don't patent ideas.

@Buffy - true, 'idea' was not the correct word. The point still stands on First to File vs prior art though.

@JonCuster, again, IANAL, but if I understand it correctly, if you put a patentable idea (invention, process, ...) out there (in the US) you have a certain amount of time to file a patent. If you let that lapse, anyone can file. If you are a lawyer, then correct me if I'm wrong. All I urge on the OP is caution.

All I know is that my company's lawyers spend a lot of time tracking when something will be or has been presented, thus establishing a bar date. I agree that the OP should consult their institution's lawyers as well (I've found the patent lawyers much easier to talk to than, say, the employment lawyers).

You need not patent your invention. The requirements of a patent are that it is new, useful and non-obvious. To another person your published work is considered prior art. If someone else tried to patent your work the patent office would reject it as anticipated.
Of course this assumes the patent office finds your work. The inventor could fail to disclose it and the patent office could fail to find it in search. In such a case you can typically submit your work to the relavent patent offices to have the patent/patent application invalidated/rejected.

The patent office is really bad about issuing invalid patents, so don't be surprised if your publication is not found (especially if published in a small, niche journal).  There is now a "post-grant review" process, though, where anyone can file a request to review a recently-issued patent without having to sue the patent holder in court.  This is the easiest way to get an improperly-issued patent killed, but you only have 9 months after the patent is issued to do it.

There is actually a stackexchange where patent examiners ask us, stackexchange experts, if a patent they are currently examining is "obvious" or has prior art. I've submitted prior art myself when one question involves a technology I worked with years ago. Granted not all USPTO examiners use the site but for those that do they need your help. See https://patents.stackexchange.com/

Here's an example call for prior art - https://patents.stackexchange.com/questions/5857/call-for-prior-art-us-patent-7-888-125-theranos-duke-v-stanford

In addition, especially since the OP believes the research will be useful in the field, publicize it. That helps both the basic dissemination of the technique and the likelihood that it will be identified as prior art.

"new and non-obvious" - there is a patent for a mousetrap consisting of a wooden plank with a stone on it, upheld diagonally by a small twig which is bound to a bait with a piece of string. If the mouse moves the bait, the string pulls the twig from under the plank, and the plank falls down and kills the mouse. And they got a patent for it in China. I'm completely sure this has been used since millennia, even before recorded history.

Creating prior-art yourself may save you from a compeptitor patenting the same idea. Problem: patent and therefore publish idea X, or don't publish the idea and face the risk of a competitor patenting a very similar idea X'. One solution, publish idea X in a very obscure journal, that virtually nobody knows/reads/takes serious. If a competitor invents idea X' and tries to publish it, you can refer to your idea X, which has already been published.

@vsz: Laws vary by country, but even if the patent is granted, it still has to be defended against someone who decides to infringe it. Just because a silly patent exists doesn't mean the patent holder will be able to enforce it in court.

In countries I'm familiar with, there is the concept of prior art, and scientific publications are a common form of it. Basically, if you make this information public it would invalidate any patent filed based on it* after time of publication. If someone were to obtain such a patent, it can then be challenged by any competitor. So you should just make your results available, and as clearly described as possible. An arXiv posting may be a good idea to establish priority.
However, the public nature of arXiv isn't necessarily required. At least in the US "circulation at a relevant scientific conference" has been considered prior art in the past. It's less clear to me if a poster would provide sufficient evidence of prior art. You may want to consult a patent lawyer (your university likely has one) about that.
*It and (mostly) only it, that is. If someone were to make a significant invention on top of your results, that can still be patentable. But at that point it's no longer your invention.

I want to make sure that when I publish the paper, anyone/company that wants to use the technology can do so free of charge with no strings attached.

Why not put the code up on a public repository such as GitHub with the appropriate license? This will immediately void the need to patent it yourself, and significantly reduce the risk of someone successfully patenting it.
Regarding the actual patenting concerns, the other answers are good, but I'd like to add that if you do find out that someone has patented your work (such as was the case in this question), you are not alone, assuming that you work with a university. Your work is (partially) owned by the academic institution you developed it under, and they do not take kindly to their proprietary rights being infringed upon (to put it mildly). If you are legitimately concerned about your work being patented (or already encounter it as a patent somewhere), let your university handle it. They have lawyers that specialize in this, and they will make absolutely sure that the violators will have an unpleasant time.

Should I patent the technology myself before publishing?

If you do, then you'll need to involve your university (assuming that your work is part of a thesis/you are a faculty member). They will be very reluctant to have you make any part of the work publicly available for the same exact reasons I wrote above - they wouldn't want anyone claiming there is prior art, even if it's yours! Thus, patenting the work will do the exact opposite of what you intend to achieve.

Putting the code on GitHub adds no further security than publishing a paper would provide. In fact, GitHub is a really bad way of proving prior art since it’s hard/impossible to prove a publication date from it (commit timestamps are modifiable and, at any rate, aren’t publication times!). You can try to submit it as evidence of prior art but a competent patent attorney won’t be happy with it, and a patent examiner might dismiss it outright. Furthermore, the choice of license is irrelevant for patentability.

File an application yourself.  Preferably both US and EU ("WO").  This is the best method.  Unless you genuinely think you've got lightning in a bottle, you're better off weedling your company or school (IP dept) into funding and writing it.  In all likelihood, you benefit more from the CV bullet and the plaque than from the commercial invention.
Publish it.  In a good, well read journal.

Note: Method 1 is preferable.  Method 2, or even just your poster, just "gives you an excuse to sue".  But likely won't stop someone else from getting awarded a patent.  (A lot of people have the wrong ideas about patents...the true test of patent commercial import comes during litigation.)  Method 1 is much more pre-emptive.

Method 1 is also much more expensive.

Much more expensive means around US$10000 to US$30000, for people who aren't familiar with the process. And it's actually no better at all then a publication in a reputable journal.


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I have been accepted to an event where a keynote lecturer is a plagiarist
After some decades an event on my research area was announced in my city, so I decided to send my abstract, which was accepted.
However, they recently sent me the programme and among the keynote speakers was a person whose doctoral thesis contains uncontroversial plagiarism. (About 30 pages of his thesis are just a translation from two papers written in English by other scholars into the language in which the thesis was written.) There are no legal charges against this lecturer. Instead, the plagiarism was revealed by an apparently anonymous source about two or three years ago through a mailing list.
I know that at least some of the organisers of the event were in such mailing list, so they do not ignore the charges and had the chance to test whether they were true or not.
I have considered that maybe the best option to withdraw my lecture from the event explaining exactly why to the organisers. This, though, would not help at all, since they already know and do not care. Else they wouldn't have invited him as keynote speaker.
Other option that somebody suggested me is that I use some minutes of my lecture to publicly denounce him. (It just happens that my regular lecture starts right after his keynote lecture finishes.) But there are three problems with this:

When publicly denounced, this lecturer threatened to prosecute the source for defamation. (He's also lawyer.) I currently do not have a job nor a regular income that would allow me to face a prosecution, let alone to prosecute him.
It is very likely that most of the people that are going to the event already know. In such case, and since this is fairly yesterday news, I do not expect that there be any important reaction.
I am about to enter in the phase of defending my thesis, and this lecturer works in my institution as invited professor. Unscrupulous as he is, he may try to retaliate against me by using his power to delay my thesis dissertation. (I do not know how much power he has.)

Finally, you may be surprised as to how a whole academic community could care so little about this case. But I have to say that when the news about his plagiarism came, I myself didn't dare to publicly speak disapproving his behaviour because of what I said in the third point. Still, it was surprising to me that, although I know that several professors disapproved of his actions, apparently none of them publicly manifested their disapproval. I later knew that this wasn't the first time that something like this happens in my institution.
I'd like to know what is the most ethical or less unethical thing to do in this case. One thing is for sure, though. I do not think it would be right for me to go to that event, and speak after him as if he were a respectful scholar. And I am not going to.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

Your feeling of outrage may not be felt quite as intensely by many of the participants and protesting no matter how public or damaging to yourself, may not have much impact on others unfortunately - https://theconversation.com/moral-injury-violating-your-ethical-code-can-damage-mental-health-new-research-115654  The plagarist is very personal to you as he is in your department. The personal rawness will not be felt by others, the same way as family violence is very hushed, it seems unlikely that the plagiarism will be dealt with as he is already an invited speaker...

What really matters here is what your goal is. Is your goal to: (A) cause there to be some sort of disciplinary action/reaction against this person; or (B) to make sure that your own name is not tarnished by association with this person in the future.
If you are hoping for (A) I believe that you have answered your own question. It does not appear that any action will be taken against this person based on anything you do in relation to this conference. The discipline is covering this up and everyone is going along with it and as an early career researcher, you are not influential enough to change this. It's sad, but it's true. However (B) is entirely possible for you. If you believe that one day this person will be publicly shamed and denounced fully by the discipline, it is not unreasonable for you to not want your name associated with theirs. This might mean withdrawing from the conference and specifically asking that your name be removed from any material online about the event. Indeed, you don't even need to say why you are pulling out of the event if that includes a risk that it will get back to the person in question.
In this situation, I think (B) is a reasonable concern and a reasonable reason to not speak at a conference. I also think that you are tangentially associated with this person so are unlikely to experience any negatives from speaking after them at the event. Ultimately, with risk of association low, it comes down to your own ethical stance and if you feel sharing a stage with this person violates that.

Thanks, @GrotesqueSI. I hope I could aim for (A) in the most civilised manner, but you have already pointed out how unlikely is it for me make any impact. But more than trying to denounce him, or avoid any association with him, what I don't want is to recognise him as a respectful scholar. I feel that going to an event where he's a keynote speaker is to give him that recognition.

By presenting your work you are not recognising him as respectful person. You are just presenting your work. Dot. So go. @Ifba

Would speaking at a conference where someone is the keynote speaker count as a meaningful academic association in some context? Or maybe it would depend on the size of the conference.

You have a very good point, @Alchimista. I want to be clear that I would never judge anyone who would rather present their work without saying a word on the matter. (Except if it was a fairly respected scholar, in which case "judge" wouldn't be the right verb.) Although I am beginning in my career, this year I'm having the opportunity to present my work in several other events. Perhaps that's why I'm more willing to sacrifice my talk in the aforementioned event.

Your question is really silly. You are going to attend a lot of events in future in your career. Are you going to check on every keynote speaker on whether they have plagiarised in any of their works? Secondly, its not your obligation to bring to light, this plagiarism in public. There is a system, and the advisor and review committe of the plagiarised thesis are the ones who should be really concerned with this. Its their business/headache. You are asking, Can I buy other people's headache?

People who think academic dishonesty is not their problem are part of the problem.

@GrotesqueSI Has the person already been accused and pronounced guilty? If not, making such a highly visible accusation is dangerous. A conference is simply not the time or place for it. What if it is determined not to be plagiarism? Now an accusation has been made that can be/would be VERY detrimental to their career. A defamation lawsuit would be only the beginning. Praise in public, chastise in private. Ensure the supposed plagiarism is or has been brought up in the proper forum, then let things happen in their time. Note this not "not my problem."

@CGCampbell I don't believe you read my response to this question. Nowhere and in no way did I suggest the person who posted this should make any sort of accusation. Indeed, I suggested that if they did choose to pull out of the conference, they should consider not indicating specifically why to avoid retaliation. I though the poster's question was legitimate, and I thought this answer calling the question "silly" was rude and unhelpful.


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How to refer to works that I did not read
In the context of my thesis research I have recovered the data of some important old papers whose data is sometimes referred by the name of its authors, but that are never explicitly cited.
I though it important to refer all the data of these papers somewhere, but if  were to I include them in the bibliography/references section, I may be giving the impression that I have read them.
How should I point to these works that I do not need to read, but that some readers of my work might be interested in reading? I know the answer might depend on the citation format I'm using or the type of publication. But I haven't seen any explicit indications for doing this kind of citation.
Thanks in advance for your help.

How did you get to know the data without reading them?

Thanks for the question, @Alchimista. The data is referred by other authors as "X's equations", "Y's proof" or "Z's axiomatisation", and then an equation, proof, or axiomatisation is provided without referring to the original source. It looked as if everybody knew what the source is, or as if everybody forgot it. I know several cases of this and I've been able to track the original source in some cases. However, when I found the source material, I could often tell that I didn't need to read it myself.

Ok, you likely refer to well established facts or even pillars in your field. You won't necessarily cite Newton all the times. Adopting the same method of the authors from which you got the information seems legitimate. Or just cite a few if you can be sure. Once a finding came to surprise in my field. When I looked at the first really seminal paper of it, everything was there! Just everyone cited the paper for more then a decade without actually reading it :) as it was established. But some info were "lost".

By the way, the word "data" usually refers to empirical data, gathered by some sort of observation or experiment.  It's not usually used to refer to facts or statements of a theoretical nature (equations / proofs / axiomatizations).  So that choice of words may be misleading answerers a little bit.

You skim those papers to verify that the data is indeed there and then you cite them as a source of the data. If you have the time or they are otherwise relevant, read the papers to figure out that the data is suitable for your purposes and there are no glaring problems there.
Sometimes, everyone cites something because everyone else has been doing so, but the citation might be wrong (in detail or completely).

An explicit citation is useful, because it lets you and others verify the result.
Checking that the cited paper includes what you suppose it includes is even more helpful, since it might just be a rumour that the thing is included there.
Reading more of the paper would be even more useful, since it might have qualifications that have been omitted by the citing literature, or methodological issues, or whatever else. Mentioning these with the citation would be good.
Some papers that cite the original might contain errata, important qualifications, etc. Hence, it might be worthwhile to check what cites the classical papers, especially if there is something by the same author(s) on the same idea.

I think all of the steps above increase the value of the work, but all of them also take time. Up to you to decide where to cut off the process and how far to go in vetting the data-to-be-used.
But consider also the next new (PhD) student who would like to use the same data? What would you like to have known or had when using it? If it was non-trivial to track down the data, then certainly provide a reference, for example, so that the next generation will have an easier time.

No one standard has been set for citing data sources. However, a quick search shows that citing data sources is generally done the same way you cite a paper. See here, here or here.
These links provide guidelines and examples. The following quote is from the first link:

Remember that the purpose is to help your reader re-trace your steps -- more information is better than less!

Which I think is a good guide line.
In order to ensure that you do not give the impression that you fully read a paper, you can simply do something like:

The used data is obtained from [citation] and has be preprocessed...

A further discussion on whether or not you should cite a paper you did not read can be found here, but that does not go into using the data from the paper only.

Essentially you cite the sources you use, something like: "...Jones's equation, as described by Smith[1]..." if you only read Smith's textbook.
However for important results, it's worth really trying to track down the original, skimming it, and citing it properly.  It may well take some tracking down; don't leave it until the last minute in case you need an interlibrary loan of a paper copy.
As an example, a couple of the results referred to in my thesis were published in German.  My German isn't up to fully reading poorly scanned papers, but I can check that a figure caption is what it claims to be, or decipher the context and terms of an equation. I therefore cited both the German paper and one that explained and applied it nicely in English.  If you can possibly get your hands on a copy of the original I suggest you do something similar.


text:
Transitioning back to science after working outside of the field?
I went to university studying Immunology but university as a whole was rough for me because I was a poor international student (on scholarship) and my mental health was really bad in general. I graduated with 3.29/4 cGPA, 0.01 point away from minimum requirement of most grad schools in Canada but most of my bad grades actually came from my last two years of study, which definitely doesn't help. I also didn't have any research experience. I tried multiple times to get it during my second, third, and final year, only one professor ever got back to me and she just gave me pointers to improve my application. Funny enough, I actually put myself into one of the most difficult undergrad programs at my uni because they promised research opportunities for their students only to be rejected from that exact same opportunity because they told me that my cGPA was too low for their research work. At the end, I graduated with bad grades AND no research experience at all.
I have since been working odd jobs in admin and project management that have nothing to do with my interests. Just a job to pay the bills kind of thing and also a job to help secure my immigration. At least fortunately, I became a permanent resident of Canada few months back and I definitely have better grasps of my own mental health/time management/maturity. Anyway, even prior to becoming PR, I have always wondered if it's still possible for someone like me to transition back to science. It's been 3 years now and I thought with getting a PR (more doors open), I should probably start looking into ways for me to get back into science.
The thing is, with no research experience and mediocre grades, I feel like I'm stuck and unable to find my way in. I want to volunteer but labs will most likely prefer to take in undergrads/actual students. Sad thing is because I've never done research, I really don't know if I like it or if I'm just romanticizing it. If it's any indication, I really enjoy the planning phase of projects at my company and quite well known for my attention to detail (admin wizard here). Plus, there have been many incidents where my bosses, mental health counsellor commented on how I am logical minded and tend to be problem solving. On my own reflection, I specifically know that I need to go back to science because my small talk conversation with colleagues at work involves me explaining to them genetics and HIV pathogenesis! I remember HIV pathogenesis out of all only because my coursework at university heavily focused on that and I'm myself HIV-positive so HIV topics are very 'dear' to me. My YT channel subscriptions are full of science+geography channels that I binge-watch when I'm sad/depressed/after work.
I'm even looking at professional healthcare degrees but my grades are probably more heavily weighted there. All the schools I'm looking at seems to require 2-3 LOR and I don't think any of my professors remember me lol (large institution). I'm contemplating taking a non-degree year to improve my cGPA but I'm scared if it will just be a waste of money. I'm turning 27 this year and I just feel so stressed out.
Is it even feasible for someone like me to get my foot back in?

Related, but not Canada https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/38237/how-does-the-admissions-process-work-for-ph-d-programs-in-the-us-particularly

Graduate school is not a career.  Ask yourself what career you want to have; then investigate how other people got there.

I’m not familiar with Canada’s system, but would doing a Postgraduate Diploma or a Master’s Degree be a viable option as an on-route to a PhD? Often universities only care about your results from your highest level of qualification.

For the record, it's quite common to see PhD students who had a job during a few years and went back to university for the PhD. Professional experience is often seen positively (at least when applying for PhD), and it can sometimes compensate poor results as a student years before.


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Is it appropriate to "shop" through high-impact journals before sending the paper to more specialized journals?
I have recently finished writing my first paper for my PhD study. I believe I have made some discoveries, but by comparing my manuscript to previous work, I think the advance is not very big and the work should be published on specialized journal in my field.
However, my supervisor does not agree with me and he really wants to try publishing it on a high-impact journal. I have talked multiple times with him, listing the novelty and limitations of my study, as well as the journals that previous work mostly published on. But he put my suggested journals on the last positions of his list, saying that he hope my work should be read by more people. Other students in my lab told me that they have met similar scenarios before.
Up to now we have tried Nature Communications, eLife and Current Biology, all being rejected without full scale peer-review. The review editors in one journal point out some limitations in my study, and we addressed them before submitting again; the other two turned my manuscript down without pointing specific problems.
My questions are:

Is it appropriate to "shop" through high-impact journals (all getting desk rejections) before submitting to specialized journals, with modifications made if specific suggestions have been received?
How can I talk to my mentor to reduce publication time for my future papers?

If your papers are always accepted the first place  you send them, that means you are aiming too low.  Let's face it: how valuable is that "time" you save?  More valuable than a publication in a top journal would be?

@GEdgar: if somebody else publishes the same result while you're trying for a better journal, that time was very valuable. (Caveat: this might be a bigger risk for abstract topics than for more experimental ones, and is partially mitigated by publishing preprints.)

Judging the value of work is subjective, and can differ significantly between different researchers.
There is not harm in trying high-impact journals if some experienced people (like your mentor) consider it worth-while. But if you tried three different journals and get more or less immediate rejections, you should probably aim lower. Otherwise you just waste time in waiting for another five rejections (and you also waste the time of the editors/reviewers).
Maybe, after three rejections, you can discuss this topic with your mentor again, mentioning that you don't want to wait another three years for your paper to be published.

I think you should sort of "know" what goes where. And I think you do.  I understand the desire of the supervisor to collect some nicer coups, but he's likely wasting time.  Doesn't sound like the papers are even borderline, in terms of required notoriety.
I don't think what he's doing is evil.  Just a waste of time.  Personally, I would trust your instincts and insist on the journal to submit to, when you are the primary author.
There's nothing wrong with the more decent specialty journals.  You can lay high quality bricks of the science edifice here.  But Nature/Science are very driven for news flash.  Unless you have a breakthrough (or can portray it as one), you don't belong there.  "We aren't interested in reports of cuprates that don't superconduct" was a terse, understandable explanation from one of them.
Of course this desire for flash has gotten the glossy pubs into trouble at times. Some trends of bad papers and fraud in nanoscience, devices, psychology.  But that's another issue.  If you do have a real breakthrough, don't let the Schoen scandal hold you back from going into a big journal.

On the other hand, there is a certain amount of luck involved in the whole process. And that is especially true for an editor's decision to reject or send to peer review -- a different editor may decide differently. And unfortunately, the journal that you publish do matter in many fields. So I would not recommend a PhD student to rely solely on their intuition about what goes where. Sometimes it absolutely makes sense to aim a littler higher than what you believe may be the appropriate venue for your work.

Is it appropriate to "shop" through high-impact journals (all getting desk rejections) before submitting to specialized journals, with modifications made if specific suggestions have been received?

It may not be a wise thing to do from the point of view of of your own self-interest, but generally speaking it is allowed, and considered appropriate, to submit your paper to any journal that lists itself as accepting submissions.
At the same time, I think your adviser’s behavior is somewhat inappropriate not because of how he is treating the journals but because of how he is treating you. He seems to be pressuring you to agree to a publication strategy that maximizes his own self-interest rather than yours, and maybe even disingenuously claiming that he’s doing it for your sake when he knows that rapid publication may be more important to someone at your career stage than a tiny chance of getting into a top journal. That is not helpful, and not how a good advisor should behave in my opinion.

How can I talk to my mentor to reduce publication time for my future papers?

Tell him what’s important to you. Express willingness to hear his advice on where to publish and indicate that you are grateful for the advice, but at the same time, know that you are well within your rights to disagree with him on submission venues and to insist on pursuing the path that is right for you.
In any case, the focus should be on reaching a decision that works for you, him (assuming he’s a coauthor) and any other coauthors. The supposed ethical issues associated with submitting to multiple top journals, which you raise as the main premise of your question, shouldn’t be a part of the discussion, since that’s not where the real problem lies.

Spot on. I have one quite decent paper that never got published because I listened to my former supervisor and a co-author who insisted on targeting generalist & top-rated journals. It's been five years (!) with three or maybe four desk rejections, and more fighting with editors in appeal against rejections with reviews that did not say that the paper was wrong (they mostly said that it was not really sexy). This paper now lives as a preprint... Your supervisor may not be helping you there.

The problem, you are probably not aware of yet, may be in the funding mechanism in your country.
In some places the researchers, and your advisor is in that position, are paid according to the number of papers published multiplied by the impact factor. This rules their sallary and the funding of their research programmes.
This policy directly forces writers to, as you say, shop through high-impact journals and then step down to lower-tier ones. Because there is a huge difference between publishing one Nature-worth paper and N Journal-that-publish-even-Lorem-Ipsum-worth papers.
Getting your paper in the high-impact journal gives your advisor more money per result to feed his family - the lab you are working in, obviously. Your suggestions were good, otherwise they wouldn't even appear in the list - they are just pennies for sure.

Since you are asking about one paper specifically and have been rejected by the big names, the question is a bit moot. The paper was aimed wrong. The fact that they were desk rejections makes this clear.
Whether it is a good policy in general, however, may depend on the field. If everyone aimed low on every publication, then Nature would have nothing to publish.
You have a dilemma going forward. I think you were wise to follow your advisors advice this time as good relations with an advisor giving advice are always valuable.
However, repeatedly sending out papers to the highest quality journals when they may not be a good fit is risky. For one thing the several papers going to Nature, say, will likely hit the same editor, and you will get a reputation for creating useless noise (from their standpoint). The second reason is that if a paper gets by an editor and goes to review it may be reviewed, yet again, by the same person who previously suggested rejection when you submitted it elsewhere. The sets of reviewers used by journals aren't disjoint. This is especially true in some narrow specializations when the number of appropriate reviewers is small.
So, I think that you were fine doing this once, and thereby pleasing your advisor, I wouldn't make a life habit of it. Try to send papers to journals that, based on the content analysis of both your paper and what is generally published there, has a fairly good chance of acceptance. This doesn't mean you should aim low. Try to aim accurately.


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Applying to a psychology PhD with only neuroscience research experience
I am currently unsure whether I want to do my PhD in psychology or neuroscience so I'm applying to both programs. The issue is that all of my previous research experience is exclusively in neuroscience. Within my psychology applications, do I need to explain why I only have neuroscience experience in my statement of purpose? If so, how should I go about doing this? I was a psychology major and I became interested in neuroscience during my second year, so that's why how I chose my first experience. I chose my second experience because they hired me due to my initial experience so I didn't have a lot of leeway with this one. I am still unsure which subject I prefer however.

You ask how you should go about applying. Just do it. The evaluation of whether your background is lacking or not will be made be any a committee at any institution you apply to. We can't judge that here. And, your record is what it is.
But the committee will e looking for indicators of success so make sure that your materials and statements indicate a high likelihood of success, not the possibility of failure. In particular use positive terms in describing your background. Don't say "Sorry, I only studied neuroscience...". Say, "I have a strong research background in neuroscience". That is to say, leave out words like "only".
I don't know the fields at all, but on the face of it I would think that (a) any research experience at all is a plus and (b) neuroscience gives you pretty good insight into some of the problems in psychology.
In some places there is an opportunity in doctoral studies to take additional courswork to fill in any gaps. This would be true in the US, for example.
Keep it positive. Knock 'em dead.

There are many fields in psychology that have a close relationship with neurosciences such as cognitive psychology, pharmacology, rehabilitative psychology etc. So it is worth exploring and explaining how your previous experience in neuroscience will enrich and support your future ambition in psychology.
You have done some psychology subjects by the sounds of it, so you do have some relevant experience. Just remember though, for most countries, there are strict regulation around clinical practice and becoming a registered psychologist. A research psychology PhD would not meet those requirements, so do your research.


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Does journal access significantly influence choice in which journal to publish in?
The University of California has been out of contract with Elsevier this year following disputes on higher costs and reduced rights to a number of journals.
My lab has published numerous papers in various Elsevier journals, many of which are highly considered in their respective fields, but my principal investigator has opted for other journals following the breakdown of the contract. I am a proponent of open-access, but I am wondering whether journal access has influenced your decision to publish in specific journals. I am also interested in the rationales for continuing to publish in closed access journals vs. other journals.
I could see the number of citations and h-indices being factors that heavily influence the decision.

In Germany there are similar issues with Elsevier. I and also other researchers I know tend to look for alternatives now. One thing is that we want to be able to access our own papers and the other thing that we do not want to support Elsevier due to the difficulties encountered when trying to find an agreement with them.

Hmm. Folk are voting to close as "primarily opinion-based", and that is true, but many good questions on this site are opinion-based; we naturally tend to get more of that than sites such as Stackoverflow or Engineering where there is a Right Answer. I urge some restraint in close-voting.

Is your lab a part of the University of California? The answer to this question significantly changes the situation and might even change the question ("does journal X being less available in general influence your choice of journal" vs "does journal X being unavailable to your lab influence your choice of journal")

If you care about getting a job in industry at any point, then you should publish in a way that a person in industry can read your work.

I've asked many professors why they submit to journal X instead of journal Y. Reasons given include:

Geographic location (e.g. British astronomers are more likely to submit to Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society simply because that's a British journal)
Impact factor
Scope (certain journals are more theoretical than others, certain topics are just historically published in certain journals, etc)
Habit / familiarity (if I am familiar with a journal's style, publishing there saves time)
Personal knowledge of the editors
Open access (although the professors I spoke to were not concerned about whether their paper would be OA; they were more concerned about publishing in subscription journals, just so they wouldn't have to figure out the open access APC)

Journal access is never cited.
As for why publish open access vs. closed access, see: Why do tenured professors still publish in pay-walled venues?

Great points. I also believe these are the main points that I would personally  consider when deciding on a journal to submit to.
I am not sure why my professor has opted to publish in another journal upon learning about the access restriction even though he was initially enthusiastic about submitting our manuscript, which I had formatted already, to an Elsevier journal.
Nice to get a sense of what the rest of the academic community thinks about this though.

As far as I know, the choice of a journal has no demonstrated effect on citations. (Having your paper in a preprint archive does boost citations though.) Some people seek journals with high impact factors or high prestige when this can improve their career prospects, although judging a paper from the journal it appears in is widely considered as bad practice. A number of researchers do care about publishers' practices with respect to pricing and open access, cf the longstanding boycott of Elsevier. They do this for the moral reason of helping improve the system, even though this can be detrimental to their careers. (Not very detrimental in most cases, as there are so many journals out there.)

+1. If you just care about having citations, it doesn't matter where you publish, as long as the preprint is on the arXiv. If you want the citations to be correct, though, then you need to update your arXiv preprint with the final version (post-referee, possibly pre-editorial), since otherwise most people will cite the journal article but in reality refer to the arXiv preprint.

I think in the times of internet "journal access" is not really the practical bottleneck anymore that someone can and will read your paper somehow, rather the criterions Allure has listed.
The bigger technical bottlenecks for someone to spot and download your paper are:

is the journal indexed by google scholar, scopus, ISI, sci-hub (lawsuit with Elsevier to my knowledge)...
can someone easily find your research via above tools by few keywords without search operators (most people still don't use operators!!!)
do you actively disseminate your publications on researchgate, private/institute website, conferences, so researchers could become aware of it

So these points will converge to "access/visibilty" of your paper and the main bottleneck is that there is much more noise around the information you want to find nowadays and often you cannot restrict yourself to reading half a dozen journals in your field to stay up to date, especially on interdisciplinary news. I have changed and strengthened very much my kind of literature search  over the past decade due to this fact.
For a young researcher it's in my opinion also more important to bring your results to more journals at the beginning of your career, get invited to review for them and not look too much on impact and accessibilty, you have to build a network and I think professors can have very different search and readings habits in their limited time in comparison to someone working solely on one topic (postdoc, PhD). At least my Professor and me often recommend very complementary papers to each other :-) I often read much more experimentally linked literature, while he interdisciplinary/thematically.

I totally agree. I did not think journal access was a huge issue - researchers will find ways to read their papers of interest regardless of whatever are pay-walls and restrictions are put in place. I was taken aback by my professor's decision to opt for another journal especially since he suggested the specific Elsevier journal from the start and I had already formatted the manuscript for submission. I'm not fazed, however. As you mentioned, my focus as an early-career academic should be on simply disseminating our work and building my network.

Not directly, but it's correlated. Many researchers (myself included) are reluctant to work with publishers that charge outrageous prices. And if a publisher charges outrageous prices, it's likely that my university/lab won't pay for it. Elsevier is, indeed, the perfect example for this.
That is, of course, assuming everything else is equal, which it never is. But the business practices of publishers are definitely part of the equation when deciding where to publish.

I don't publish in Elsevier (or referee or edit for them) because they're the most prominent of the evil parasitic publishers, and I want them to be utterly defeated so that international conglomerates will no longer see academic publishing as an easy way to giant profits and we can return to the situation where publishing is in the hands of people who care about knowledge.


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Re-posted faculty position. Worth waiting? (and two-body problem...)
I applied for a faculty position at a state research (not so intensive) school in June. Since the position requires both a clinical degree and a research degree, their application pool is not likely to be large.
Then, in mid-August, I emailed a search committee chair to update my CV with a new publication, and the person said he would be in touch soon...  At first, I got optimistic when I read his reply, but decided not to think much about it.
In late August, they re-posted the position on their website...  It was the same posting, so my application materials were still there...  I thought I would get at least a phone interview opportunity but haven't heard from them since I sent my updated CV.  It's likely that they think I am not good enough for their position or do not meet their requirements...? Or internal candidate? or preferred candidate?
I really want to get this position...and I don't know what to do at this point.  My spouse is also in academia, and this might be my only chance to live with him...  Is there a chance that I hear from them this month or November?  Or should I just stop hoping and try to find jobs out of state...

If they had an internal or preferred candidate, then it seems unlikely that they'd re-post. Surely they'd keep applications open for the shortest possible time?

I really want to get this position...and I don't know what to do at this point.

There is not much you can do at this point. The search committee has your application materials, and will get back to you if the position is relevant.

My spouse is also in academia, and this might be my only chance to live with him...

This might be in your favor. Did your spouse recently get hired? Could they try and negotiate for a spousal hire for you? It is possible that you may be able to negotiate a position for you if your spouse's faculty wants them to stay. It may not be the most ideal position for you, but it will be something. After all, it is more than reasonable that your spouse leaves if you aren't unable to get your career started at your current location. If they want to avoid that, they need to help you figure it out.

Is there a chance that I hear from them this month or November? Or should I just stop hoping and try to find jobs out of state...

You might never hear from them, you might hear from them tomorrow. We can't answer that. However, you should most definitely keep looking for alternatives, and assume you have nothing from them until they send an offer letter for you to sign. If I were in your position I'd look for positions wherever I can. I would also explore how open my spouse is to relocating if need be.
Good luck!

I’ll add that in my opinion, while it isn’t good news that they reopened the call after your submission, it’s not an obvious sign you won’t get the job or that you’re not under consideration.

Thank you for your comment!  He has been hired for 2 years, so he cannot make a negotiation at this point. And, unfortunately, his institution doesn't have a department that fits me.  I started applying for other positions out of state... and hope that him and I live together one day...

I have been unemployed for almost 9 months since graduation and even gave up on two offers because the places were not close to where he was or he could not find position near where I received offers...  but being unemployed for 9 months exhusted me to the point that I am having a difficulty falling in a sleep every night...  Anyways, thank you for your comments!

@costt I think that your spouse may still have some options to negotiate, but only if you two are willing to relocate for your career. While the advice of random strangers on the internet doesn't count for much, I personally believe that the happiness of a couple is the minimum of the happiness of any one of them. If you are deeply unhappy where you two are, a relocation should be on the table.

At a minimum you need to ask whether your application is still active. Don't assume that it is, though it may be. But reposting the position may mean a lot of things including the possibility that none of the current application pool is desirable and they want to start over.
If your application is no longer active, you may just need to submit it again.
There may be other reasons for the reposting, including a simple mistake or an administrative requirement. But if you don't ask, you may never know.

"If your application is no longer active, you may just need to submit it again."  Highly improbable.

@Buffy thank you for your comment.  When I log into their application system, the job posting link attached to my application is the one that has been re-posted.  That's how I guessed my application is still active with their re-posted posting.  Good suggestion.  I was just afraid that the search committee would feel bothered if I contact him again because I already contacted him to inquire about status once and then also to update him with my publication records.  So emailed him twice already...  But I guess I need to try one more time since there is nothing to lose for doing that.

@Anonymousp why do you think it is highly improbable


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Recommendation letter advice
I'm soon going to apply to some M.Sc. in Europe and I asked my current supervisor at work - he was a professor until a couple of years ago - to write a reference letter for me. My function at the company is currently related to what he used to teach as a professor so I thought it would be a good idea to ask him. He accepted, but added that he is extremely busy as of now and suggested I write the letter myself, after which he will read it.
My issue is I don't really know how to write a recommendation letter that doesn't sound like the student wrote it :). Any pointers?

As Buffy mentioned the issue of student writing a LoR is contraversial. You can read more on this webpage. Apart from ethics, I would like to point out the practicality. You will be writing a LoR for the first time and it is about you. You will probably overthink about what to say trying to be humble and not to undersell at the same time. You probably won't have a good sense of which of your qualifications should be pointed out with regards to field you are applying. Overall, you will be doing something (writing a lor), first time away, in a way it was never intended, under less than ideal situation. The result will likely be "meh". I can make few suggestions.

Ask if you can help your boss with his work so he will have some time for you.
Possibly find another recommendationç
Consider applying in a later date, giving your boss more time to work on a letter. (perhaps in the spring term).
You also can try to get a third person (possible colleague) write you a recommendation and let your boss edit it. It might bypass some of the issues. Not all. Ethics are still questionable. But it is an option.

First, I'll note that a number of people here think that this practice is unacceptable. I'm not that strong on it, though think your reservations are important.
The supervisor didn't have you as a student, presumably, so can't speak to many of the qualities you will need for graduate study. All he has direct knowledge of is your performance at the job and your work ethic. That can be important, but isn't enough. Make sure that you also have letters from academics who knew you earlier.
But, instead of writing a draft of a letter, you could just create a list of bullet points that include things that you want to remind the writer of. Things you did on the job. Contributions you made, some of which he may not be aware of. In this way you let the wording be his, but help assure that he doesn't forget the things you'd like included. It also eases his work load.
But, it would be good to check with him on this before you finalize it. You could, in fact, take him a draft of such a list, complete or not, and ask if it is enough.


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Course on Moodle - how to download all student interactions?
My institution uses Moodle as online learning platform. I am enthusiastic at Moodle capabilities, and suspect this had a positive effect on my class. Would like to prove it (or disprove it) by looking at all possible ways students interact with the platform. My understanding is that Moodle stores internally its data through a database powered by MongoDB. Anybody knows how to access that database directly? Would like to avoid having to gather all independent data piecs from separate GUI clicks.

For those with admin privileges in moodle they can access the log features to see anybody's activity in moodle. For a teacher this feature is available to see student activity at the course level only. The activity can be  viewed by student and or by the activity selected (forum, assignment, etc). The information provided isn't very deep. Just a time stamp with the student and what they did. However aggregating this info can provide some insights.

After logging into your Moodle account, choose on the course you wish to download data. Click on the Gear icon to the top right, you will find 'Backup'-> now you can check all the student data and download to your local drive. Use the same menu to import the backed-up file for future use.
Refer to Course Backup

If you wish to see the way the interactions are done to your course, you will find the log that Moodle generates informative.
Just go to the gear icon for the course of choice and view the logs.  Filter the same to your requirement.
If you export the logs to a spreadsheet, much greater analytics can be got.
Best Wishes, JSP

There is a really cool way of working out in this regard.
Please check https://docs.moodle.org/37/en/Configurable_reports
Dabbling around with just a little, you will be able to do it easily.
Do let me know if you need additional help.   Initially, it is a little frustrating.  But after you get the hang of it, it is a piece of cake.
Knowledge of SQL is important.
Best Wishes,
JSP

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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Pre-print split into 2 manuscripts
I have a pre-print that was submitted and rejected from a journal. We are now splitting the pre-print into 2 publications (one review paper and one theory paper).
I was wondering what to do in this situation - should I just have the pre-print DOI carry over to whichever is published first? Is there a way to keep the pre-print associated with both future publications?
The pre-print is already receiving citations.
Any thoughts are appreciated.

Where is this pre-print published? Arxiv?

Possibly related (depending on the answer to Federico Poloni's question): Is there an issue with splitting up papers already posted on ArXiV?

@FedericoPoloni Yes PsyArxiv

This is Shayn from Crossref's support team.  I can only officially speak to preprint repositories that register DOIs through Crossref (e.g. bioRxiv, chemRxiv, Research Square, SSRN, etc.).   If they're registered through DataCite (arXiv, Zenodo, etc.) or another DOI Registration Agency, there may be different practices or guidance.
Crossref's perspective is that, whenever a work is changed in a way that would impact interpretation or credit, the new, updated version should get a new DOI.  It essentially becomes a new and distinct thing. That new DOI should then be related to the original item's DOI in their metadata records.  (the preprint repository should be able to handle that)
So, in this case, each of your two new preprints should get a new and distinct DOI.  The original DOI should not be re-used.  The original DOI should continue to refer to that original preprint, which is a distinct (though related) work from either of the new ones.  But, they should be connected in their metadata using an inter-work isVersionOf relationship.  DataCite has a similar relationship for versioning in their metadata schema as well.
The citations will be split amongst them, but in this case it's appropriate that they're split.  Your original preprint and your new preprints are not the same work, so citations against them should be distinct.  Someone citing one of them is not actually citing the others.

+1 for monitoring this site and providing knowledgeable answers to questions like this one.

@Shayn - Thank you for this helpful and detailed response. The pre print is on PsyarXiv


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Can I use snippets from books on various subjects to make analytical reading questions?
Is it okay to use short excerpts (under 200 words) from psychology, history, philosophy books, etc. to create reading comprehension questions for my test prep book? I'd focus on main ideas, making inferences, and identifying transition words.  Can I use quotes from recent books, or would that cause copyright problems?

While copyright law varies around the world, in most places you can do this as there is a standard permission in copyright law for such things ('teaching exception') most places.
But if your country doesn't completely subscribe to the Berne Convention then you may need local guidance. Note also that not every place accepts the exception as it is "permitted" not required within the rules.
Addendum: I didn't mention plagiarism as it is unlikely that anyone would assume you were presenting your own creative thoughts in the snippets. I've also assumed that you aren't going to publish the exam.
You could, however, put in a footnote indicating you will provide sources on request. And if you publish the exam you should add citations as you would in any publication.

OP doesn't refer to teaching. OP states purpose as "to create reading comprehension questions for my test prep book." Is this book for commercial purposes? If yes, I think there is indeed a copyright question here.

@Eggy, “test prep book” probably does imply a teaching context. But yes, publishing would raise issues of copyright.

There are plenty of test prep books being sold in bookstores. Amazon brings up over 20,000 results for the search term "test prep books."

OP should state the purpose of the test prep books so the question can be answered properly.


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Minor Revision Response Waiting Period
I've submitted a paper to a Q2 journal of economics after which I've got a response 5 months later recommending minor revision. I have then submitted the revised manuscript which I believe has incorporated the necessary changes outlined by the reviewers. However, it's been approximately 6 weeks since I last submitted the revised manuscript and the current status is still "Awaiting Reviewer Scores". I really don't know how to interpret the long waiting period knowing that many say a response after a minor revision submission is usually expected to be in less than 4 weeks or even 2 weeks.

The paper likely went back out to reviewers. Have patience.

Sorry, no one on the internet can tell you what you want to know. See the above post for some discussion on this topic.

It can always happen that invited reviewers don't reply to invitations or don't deliver a review that they promised, leading to delay. Variance of waiting times is huge and 6 weeks is by no means particularly long (unless it's a journal that values speed over quality, for which reasons it will quite likely be of low quality because reviewers may be unqualified and/or pressured into not taking time to thinking things through properly).