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Does sociology recognise document analysis as a method?
I have found, that some Slavic sociologies (namely Czech and Russian) recognize "document analysis" as a research method,(1)(2)(3)(4) but I was not able to determine, whether such a term or method exists in English or global sociology. The Czech Sociological Encyclopedia created by the Czech Academy of Sciences mentions(1) some translations of document analysis (in the Czech language analyza dokumentu ) to other languages. So in English, it should be "document analysis" or "document research" in French "analyse des documents" and for example in German "Dokumentenanalyse". I was not able to look into the references, which are provided as a source for this article, so first I searched for the term via Web of Science and ProQuest. Then I read some of the sources and it seem to me, they used these words as a description of what they did, not as a name for a certain method. And for example, The Practice of Social Research by Earl Babbie(5) doesn't mention it at all.
So from my literature review of Czech scientific literature, "document analysis" in sociology is not a literature review. Authors like Hendl,(4) Surynek,(3) or Russian Rutkevich(6) (translation) point out that it is a "surface" study of primary documents, which one may later study via content analysis, to get in touch with the documents and determine the research question. It is close to "indication analyses" determined by Czech information science literature, e.g. Kovar,(7) as a study of a document to provide some information about the document (for example to add meta information to the library database).
== References ==

(1) Burianek, Jiri. 2018. Analyza dokumentu. Institute of Sociology,
Czech Academy of Sciences. Source:
https://encyklopedie.soc.cas.cz/w/Anal%C3%BDza_dokument%C5%AF
(2) Disman, Miroslav. 2002. Jak se vyrabi sociologicka znalost.
Karolinum. Prague. ISBN 80-246-0139-7 p. 131
(3) Surynek, Alois; Komarkova, Ruzena and Kasparova, Eva. 2001. Zaklady sociologického
vyzkumu. Management Press, Prague. ISBN 80-7261-038-4 p. 130-140
(4) Hendl, Jan. 1999. Uvod do kvalitativního vyzkumu. Karolinum. Prague.
ISBN 80-246-0030-7 p. 64-65
(5) Babbie, Earl. 2014. The Practice of Social Research. Cengage Learning. Boston. ISBN: 978-1-305-10494-5
(6) Rutkevich, Michail Nikolayevich. 1980. Prirucka pro sociology. Svoboda. Prague. p. 370 (translated from рабочная книга социолога. 1977. Nauka, Moscow)
(7) Kovar, Blahoslav. 1974. Obsahova analyza dokumentu. UVTEI, Prague. p. 16-19

Note: Originally I wanted to place this question to Polics SE, because as there is no sociology SE, I have followed the answers on Meta,(I, II, III) that sociology topics belong here. But as I wasn't able to determine which tag to use, I am leaving the question here with tags methodology and social-science which seem to be appropriate for this topic.

Short answer: content analysis (Babbie, 2021) of 'documents'.
Refer to Altheide (1987) for ethnographic approach to document analysis.

Documentary analysis or document analysis is a worthwhile 'method' when it is justified in the methodological approach.

I'll refrain from the discourse of philosophy, methodology and methods being lumped together or substituted for eachother

When looking at Earl Babbie (The Practice of Social Research), it might be worthwhile to also looked at Saunders et al. (I think it's currently in the 9th edition).
There are instances of document analysis being referred to or used as or used within content analysis. I'm not in support though.
One might get a hint of why this came to be if we look at how context analysis was examined in Kohlbacher (2006).
In-between, Kohlbacher made mention of document and record analysis.
Babbie (2021, fig 11.1) is not far off.
Rubin and Babbie (2016, p. 339) made reference to document analysis

Babbie, E. R. (2020). The practice of social research. (15th ed). 15 Ed. Cengage learning.
Kohlbacher, F. (2006). The use of qualitative content analysis in case study research. In Forum qualitative sozialforschung/forum: Qualitative social research (Vol. 7, No. 1, pp. 1-30). Institut fur Klinische Sychologie and Gemeindesychologie.
Saunders, M., Thornhill, A., & Lewis, P. (2023). Research Methods for Business Students. (9th ed).
Rubin, A., & Babbie, E. R. (2016). Empowerment series: Research methods for social work. Cengage Learning.
Altheide, D. L. (1987). Reflections: Ethnographic content analysis. Qualitative sociology, 10(1), 65-77.


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Is it worth it for a Ph.D. student to publish reflectional essays?
First of all, I have to say, that English is not my native language so I am not sure if the term "reflectional essay" is correct. I found it in the dictionary. So let me explain first what I mean.
By this designation, I mean a stylistic unit where the writer thinks about a topic, mentions his thoughts, and perhaps pictures with them.
I have seen similar texts in professional and impact journals, but I found information that such reflections, sometimes including a summary of a topic, are usually written by renowned experts on the given topic, and the editor of the magazine asks them to do so. That is reversed approach than when the author of the article de facto requests its inclusion in the journal.
It follows from this that a Ph.D. student probably won't be able to publish such an opinion in an impacted journal, but they can still publish it elsewhere. Sometimes I find references to these types of texts in the "professional literature" (sometimes they are even debates, other times non-expert reflections). So the question is whether it is worth it for a Ph.D. student to waste time writing down his thoughts on a certain topic (even if they are new) when he should primarily focus on discovering something and eventually publish a standard article in an impacted journal?

I enjoy writing a blog where I make posts with my thoughts on various topics, not all related to my research and some more serious/in-depth than others. That could be a good place to start.

This kind of reflection can be very valuable to you. Thinking about how your work fits in a broader context and thinking about how you think may suggest new paths for the work itself. So write those thoughts down. The effort may pay off even if no one reads what you post on your web page.
As you grow professionally you will see how to revise them.
Your written English is just fine.

By this designation, I mean a stylistic unit where the writer thinks about a topic, mentions his thoughts, and perhaps pictures with them.

In my discipline I usually hear the term "essay" for this kind of writing. Such articles do indeed exist, but they are indeed qualitatively different from "research articles" or "literature surveys" (the other two major types of papers that appear in the scientific literature of my field).
Most of the essay-style papers I am aware of or was involved with were:

Either: written by invitation. Some journals have ongoing topical "columns" for which a specific person is asked to either provide a short article every issue, or find somebody else to write a short article on the topic for an issue. These articles are almost always "essay" articles, reflections on a certain aspect of the literature. As you say, invitations for such essays are usually given to well-known experts, but these experts do often team up with (some of) their doctoral students or collaborators since the reflections of a team tend to be more interesting than the reflections of a single person. I was involved in multiple such papers during my PhD, but it's not really something you can trigger or plan as a student.
Or: submitted to special tracks. Some conferences and journals have special tracks asking explicitly for essays and reflections (here is an example in the field of programming languages). If your field has something similar, submitting your essay there would be feasible.

So the question is whether it is worth it for a Ph.D. student to waste time writing down his thoughts on a certain topic (even if they are new)

That depends. I am a strong believer that you should not "tune" your PhD experience only towards what gives you to maximum number of output for your time - if you would enjoy writing such an article, believe you have valuable insights to share, and see an opportunity, then there is nothing wrong with going for it.
That said, I usually do not encourage my students to submit essay papers without an explicit invitation unless they really want to, since (a) the more custom a paper is to a specific venue, the higher your risk (if the one essay track in your community does not like the paper, then what do you do with that writing?), and (b) it is never quite clear how much your PhD committee or a future faculty search committee will value that kind of non-traditional writing (everything from "counts as a normal article" to "no value at all" is possible, depending on the person). That's fine if you spent a week writing up a short invited essay for a column, but maybe not so great if it takes you months to collect your thoughts, write and revise a detailed full-paper-length essay.
Of course, there are alternative ways to communicate your opinions - many researchers have blogs, and social media (particularly Twitter in my community) has established itself is the primary way to communicate opinions about the literature rather than primary research.

Many researchers use other media for that type of content. For example, their web pages. This would be a good option for someone just starting out. It is true that it will not have the impact that a publication can have, but those who are really interested in the subject will surely read it, as long as the format is serious and rigorous. Also, if they manage to become known, their websites will also have a lot of popularity.
So, my answer is yes, I think it could be very worth it for PhD students to write down and share their thoughts.

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Which humanities journals publish original research?
I was recommended to publish the results of my research, but the recommended articles include only review articles and if I asked them, whether I could send an original research paper, the answer was unclear:

"This structure makes very little sense for humanities articles, although social science original research often uses the structure that is more commonly found in science and medical fields."(for WikiJournal of Humanities)
"Every published text must be the original author's text. The use of appropriate professional methodology is therefore desirable."(for Brno in the past and today)

As time is the most expensive commodity for me, I cannot afford to blindly test whether the original research will pass and I need to eliminate possible missteps. I believe in the generally known principle that those who write an article similar to the articles in the given journal have a better chance of the article being accepted. So do you know of any journals where original research on the topic of central European art or humanities could be published?

This is research you need to do yourself. You know your article better than anyone on this forum, and since you have written an article on your topic you have an idea of the state of the literature on that exact topic. So you already know what journals publishes your type of articles, and you know it better than any of us could know.

I do not understand.  Go look at the web page of any professor at a serious research university in your field, and you will find at least several if not dozens of research articles published in journals.

@MaartenBuis I rethink my answer and actually, I would reply I don't have the idea. The fact I have seen some articles from journals doesn't mean I have seen all articles from these journals and thus, I cannot know whether they publish original research structured with Introduction, Methods, Results, etc. I was reading certain articles that aren't whole journals in my document research process.

@AlexanderWoo I am looking for research articles of a certain structure here. If I go to a web page of any... yes I will find dozens of research articles. But If I don't see them I am not able to determine, what structure they have. And that's the same for Journals. I would need to look at tens of thousands of pages to determine, whether they have a certain structure.

@Juandev: I'm not in art history (which is the field I'm imagining you're in), but as I understand it, reputable journals in that field tend to have very low acceptance rates.  That's just the nature of the field - papers take years and frequently several rounds of rejections at journals to be published.  There is no magic method around the process.  If you need a paper to be published next year, you needed to have it done several years ago.  There is no fix for not having planned ahead.  Finding a more appropriate journal increases your odds by a few percent, not drastically.

How does the journal's reputation relate to the structure of the articles @AlexanderWoo?

Journals typically organize by topic - I hope that is self-explanatory - and prestige - whether they publish the papers the community of researchers on that topic find most interesting, or somewhat less interesting papers, or anything regarded by the community as methodologically sound (whatever that means for that community) and not plagiarized.  Journals typically don't devote themselves to one methodology or another.

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How to recognize research paper from a literature review in the article missing headings?
In certain humanity fields articles are published without headings like Introduction, Methods, or Results. They usually do not describe literature research methodology (as it is probably always the same - reading and writing), but they do include their point of view on certain topics, which looks like a Conclusion section in a paper from the life sciences field. So my question is, if we have a way to distinguish between literature review and research paper or do we have to respect how certain journals label it?

The words 'knowledge' or 'research' or 'justification' do not have a single meaning.  Rather, these words have multiple related meanings that apply differently in different fields.  You should not assume that what creates 'knowledge' in your field looks anything like what creates 'knowledge' in a different field, and you should not attempt to do 'research' in a field without understanding what 'research' means in that field; it may be very different from what you think.  To do otherwise is not just disrepecting a journal but disrepecting an entire field of study.

What do you mean by "distinguish between literature review and research paper"? Are you assuming that in the humanities there are some "literature review" papers and there are some "research" papers and that these are different things? I'm asking sincerely; I am trying to understand what you are really looking for. Or are you asking about the "literature review" section of regular research papers?

@Tripartio Yes, I am kind of assuming that in the humanities there are some "literature review" papers (LRP) and there are some "research" papers (RP). Recently I read  10.1080/02665433.2020.1844042. Programmatically, I cannot determine whether it's an LRP or an RP. So can this article be called research because the author makes some of her own conclusions in it? Or how would I know it was research if I didn't know it came from a journal?

I am not a humanities researcher, so I do not know their various genres. Are you sure that they regularly distinguish between LRPs and RPs in general? In my field (information systems), that distinction indeed exists; one way that the distinction is clearly in our disciplinary culture is that many journals describe these as distinct genres in their "about this journal" or "information for authors" pages. Have you found any such clear distinctions in some humanities journals? My point is that if you are looking for a distinction that does not exist in their minds, then you won't get anywhere.

I need to note that we're talking about "humanities journals" as if this is a homogenous thing, which it most probably is not. I would expect that different humanities disciplines vary widely. Some might distinguish between LRPs and RPs while others might not. But I don't know.

I think that this is subtle and sometimes a judgement call. The issue is that in the humanities study of the literature may be research in itself. A simple example is when the "research" is to study discrepancies or inconsistencies in the work of an author or some set of authors. The "conclusions" are logical in nature and the evidence is the words and phrases of the original works.
So, a literature review is about "what the literature says" and research into the literature is more than that in some way.
If a journal characterizes a paper one way or the other then it is likely a judgement made by the reviewers based on their own knowledge and experience. One needn't make a hypothesis in such a paper, nor organize it in the same fashion as a statistical study. But it could still give insight into a body of thought.
Pure math is another field, where the organization is different from what you see elsewhere. In particular, "methods" is generally understood to mean logical proof and so doesn't need to be stated for most papers.

So if the study of the literature is research itself, and we can assume that everybody does this research the same way (reading sources), we don't need a special section to describe "Materials (books) and methods (reading, compiling)", "Results (notes in the notepad)," and "Analysis (our brain processes)"? Afterward, humanity researchers mix the "Introduction (literature review)" and "Conclusion (their thoughts)" into their article, which is less technically structured?


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How do you cite an image taken from Amazon.com?
I need to cite an image from amazon.com, but there isn't really an author/date.

Provide as much information as you can. If possible, figure out whether the image comes directly from Amazon or from one of their suppliers.

Citing in what way?  Do you intend to use/reproduce the image, which is probably not allowed?  Or do you intend to source information to the image, in which case the image is probably not the original source anyway?  To me this seems an XY problem and you probably shouldn't be citing the image at all.

You should probably not be reproducing an image from amazon.
If you are indicating that you used a particular product for research, you should contact the manufacturer. In my experience (with scientific equipment and reagents), most manufacturers are happy that you are using their product but occasionally have requirements. You would likely need to include product numbers or other specific identifiers.
If you are reproducing the image for other reasons, there are legal implications that are outside the scope of this forum.
Caveat if you are a student and this is for an informal school assignment, you may consider a reverse image search to find the original source of the image and cite appropriately.


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Studying a Subject in Addition to Pure Math
I am a sophomore at a competitive university, and I have been interested in mathematics for most of my life. As a result, I decided to take up math in university. I am ahead of most other students when it comes to math, having already taken a graduate-level course in differential topology. I have been told I have what it takes to be a mathematics professor. However, I am reluctant to pursue a pure math PhD. I am getting to math courses that are very interesting, yet are not needed for most careers (like advanced number theory). Though mathematics is my greatest strength and an interesting subject, I am interested in a variety of other subjects.
I have poured a lot of time into studying math. Halfway through my studies in the university, I wonder whether I should spend a significant amount of time studying some other subject in depth with the hope to get a career related to that subject. So, my question is: should I keep studying math at my current intensity, even though I have mastered basic math courses (algebra/analysis/topology), or should I dial back my intensity in math and spend significant time to get a deep understanding in a different area?
Of course, I have taken introductory courses in other areas, but there is no one area besides math I have studied in depth. So, this is a significant decision. I know this question is subjective, thus I only ask for the pros and cons of both paths. Two additional subjects I am interested in are computer science and chemistry/biochemistry. I feel fortunate to have a good understanding of basic math this early, and I repeatedly get asked what I will do with this math, and I am divided on the answer. I am specifically interested if anybody has any thoughts on the combination of chemistry and math.
I also encourage anyone to share if they have suggestions for areas outside of STEM that they think a mathematician would benefit from understanding deeply. I was actually raised in Washington DC which provoked activism for certain political issues. My point: I am not against studying humanities as a mathematician. My good friend (a few years older) has done the reverse of this: he went to college mostly for humanities and currently attends graduate school for math, even though he knew he had an interest in math from high school. Any advice on these questions is welcome, and thanks in advance to anyone who takes time to provide advice.

"courses that are very interesting, yet are not needed for most careers". I don't think that this is  how studying mathematics feeds through into the many careers where mathematicians excel: imho it's not the content that matters, it's a whole way of thinking that is being developed.

I think you might be interested in the advise given by Sir Roger Penrose (whom I'm a great fan of) in this talk at Churn institute (watch starting 1:57:00): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25HjUmn0KCE. My personal experience seems to be in accordance with what he says.

Word of warning: if you do go to grad school in math, you're likely going to have to repeat course work if you take too much advanced course work in math in your undergrad. You typically can't double dip and transfer those credits in, so to speak. Focus on research instead if you decide you want to pursue math.

You study whatever you like to learn. Why bother to ask?

Based on what you say here, it seems you have never done any mathematics research. The job of a working mathematician is very different to studying undergrad or even graduate level math. I don't believe that people can have judged that you have what it takes to become a professor without you having significant research experience.
That said if you feel reluctant to do a pure math PhD then you should (in my opinion) emphatically not do one. A PhD is a long and hard process and if you don't enjoy it for its own sake it is generally a terrible idea.
One thing that is important for you to understand is that most people don't end up working in a career which is directly part of, or even related to, their undergrad degree. A lot of math graduates go on to become programmers, or accountants, or data scientists, or physicists, or inventory managers, or a hundred other jobs that neither you nor I have heard of. Studying pure maths at university does not mean that you will study pure maths for the rest of your life.
Combining chemistry and math, or computer science and math are both fine ideas. I know multiple (UK) universities which offer chemistry and maths, or computer science and maths joint honours degrees (essentially doing half a degree in each subject). If you are interested in studying these subject then you should, but don't feel obliged to for some hypothetical future career.

there I thought physicists who couldn’t find a physics job became mathematicians…. I don’t think people with math degrees “become” accountants either.   They might do accounting or physics degrees, but then they function as “properly” trained professionals in their fields.

Most of the advice here is about what to do for grad school. I say start simpler by giving yourself a bit of breadth if you think you don’t want to stick with math (you don’t have to stick with something just because you are good at it).
From your comments it seems like you might be interested in things with a bit more of a human application. Check out economics, bioinformatics, data science, network science. Browse some textbooks and have conversations with faculty. Enroll in some mid level courses but don’t feel you have to commit until you try a few things. Good luck.

Most of the following is not necessarily an answer nor "advice," but rather a collection of anecdotes.
I knew fairly early on during my undergrad studies that I was going to go to graduate school and do a PhD. I didn't know at the time exactly what I would do with the PhD but I had a good feeling that the kind of careers I was interested in would require that advanced knowledge. In my undergrad, I majored in Pure Mathematics and Combinatorics & Optimization. I wanted to get a minor in Statistics as well because I was thinking: ok, statistics, quantitative finance, those seem like solid career options. In the end, I didn't end up doing the minor because of scheduling conflicts.
Now in grad school, I entered thinking I might end up doing a postdoc and hopefully, eventually becoming a professor. I still took some probability theory courses because it's always good to have options. Otherwise, I started my research, working in combinatorial algebraic geometry and things were ok, I was never a star PhD researcher but my research was "adequate."
Then the COVID-19 pandemic hits and my mental health and my research hit a slump. This began midway through my 3rd year of my PhD (which is a 5-6 year program) and about the time I needed to start thinking about my career after graduating. I realized that research wasn't exciting for me. I still liked it, sure, but it didn't rouse me the same way my undergraduate courses did. But I would have never known this before having started my PhD.
At the same time, I found out that my coauthor was leaving academia to work in industry. This coauthor's research was more pure than mine and he had done 2 postdocs with intentions of going into academia; didn't have much statistics/data science training until near the end of his last postdoc. He's now working as a data scientist. My takeaway is that it is never to late to make a transition from pure math to industry. Of course, all things being equal, it is preferable to have the industry training earlier than later but also don't give into the sunk-cost fallacy and think it's too late to make that transition.
After the pandemic "ended," I took a couple graduate statistics courses because I still wasn't 100% sure which path I would take after grad school. When I started applying for jobs last Fall, I was thinking about what excited me and that was outreach and teaching but outreach doesn't have as many options for a career so I focused on teaching. Also I've heard that tenure-track faculty positions can have 100 or more people competing for 1 position (yikes!). I felt that I wanted to stay in academia for the culture but not so much in research. So I was looking at teaching-focused positions or some government positions in statistics (similar culture, I felt) and a few postdocs because it didn't cost much to apply.
I was recently accepted into a teaching-based position with an equivalent of a tenure-track and I'm quite happy about where I landed in the end.
In my time here, I ended up hanging out with several people who worked in teaching-focused positions (at my school) or graduated and went on to such positions. Maybe it's a case of like-personalities attract. Some other anecdotes of people I've known/met:

math undergrad, now doing CS for PhD
PhD in (pure) algebraic geometry, now working in AI
PhD in algebraic number theory, going to work in a government lab (I believe in quantum computing)
Exited PhD with a masters degree, going to work in a government institution
PhD in combinatorics, looking for work in quantitative finance or maybe data science

My school maintains a list of where PhD alumni end up (ACO = Algorithms, Combinatorics, Optimization; CSE = Computational Sciences and Engineering). Although I acknowledge, it doesn't fully specify what they studied in grad school.
There are also postgraduate programs which are not "math PhD/masters" that you can consider. Law schools take people with any bachelors degree although I don't get the sense that that's an easy route to take. There are also math education PhD programs. Even looking at "math PhD" programs, many school offer different flavours like math-bio, quant. finance, combinatorics/optimization, computational math. Or you could apply to a CS program. I haven't read it myself, but see if your library has the book "101 Careers in Mathematics."

I think it's a good idea to study something else in addition to pure math. It's a good idea to keep your options open. I think it would be a good idea to explore different career paths before deciding to do a PhD in math. (Actually, you have to get in first, and I know people who applied to PhD programs and didn't get in.) Don't apply to PhD programs because you don't know what else you would be doing. Also, it would be a good idea to learn about what life as a professor is actually like. I used to think that mathematicians just spend all day thinking about math, and that is very, very false.

You may consider applying for a Masters/PhD programme in an area different from Pure Math. Needless to say, you will be welcome at an Applied Math or CS department. Above that, your application will be gladly considered by professors working in, e.g. quantum field theory (QFT), superstrings, quantum gravity (and gravitational physics in general), celestial mechanics, orbital mechanics. Many schools in the US will then enable you to take remedial undergraduate courses during your Masters/PhD studies.

If you choose to shift to theoretical physics, it will be advisable to read up some quantum mechanics at an undergraduate level. Normally, I would recommend Griffiths. However, given your mathematical education, you better use this little masterpiece. It will also be good to make some acquaintance with Relativity. To start right away with General Relativity concepts, the online course by Sean Carroll may be used. The best textbook on Special Relativity ever written is the little-known text by Stepanov. Spend 60 bucks on it, and you will be in for a treat.
If you decide to consider celestial and orbital mechanics, try to read this masterfully written introduction. It will help you understand if this choice is good for you.

Regarding humanities. Beware that in those areas you will encounter a subculture different from that of STEM. While in STEM people still are judged mainly by merit, in humanities (especially in the so-called ``critical studies'') one's political agenda becomes a key factor in their career. If you are comfortable with tuning your research to the ever-changing party line, and if self-censorship doesn't scare you, you may give it a try.

I downvoted.  If you have a background in math and want to switch to physics, the last thing you need are texts presenting mathematical approaches to QM or GR: such texts are useful if you want to continue in math but specialize in QM or GR.  Physicists do not think like mathematicians and any candidate physicist will need to well to learn the lingo of physics if they are to be understood by that community.   I'm not a great fan of Griffiths personally but it is a classic in its exposition and typical of the physicist approach to QM.

@ZeroTheHero Physicists' texts open with the Schr eqn -- but fail to explain whence it emerges. They do not derive it but introduce it out of nowhere. They fail to show that the duality between the observable and density operators is analogous to that between the classical observable and distribution. They fail to explain that the Schr & Heis pictures in QM are analogues to the Liouville & Ham pics in stat physics. They never stress that an expansion of a density op over projectors is analogous to the expansion of a distribution over classical states with both the momentum and position fixed.


text:
What is the standard way to refer to shared code in conference papers?
Say I have a github repository with the shared code and data used for that conference paper? What is the standard way to refer to it in the paper itself?

Write something like. The code is available in [5], and then give the linkas a reference?
Give the link in the paper text itself?
Give the link as footnotes?
Not mention the link in the paper itself, but send it separately as part of the submission?

I have seen all of 1-3 in papers. I would favor a link in the text or footnotes over a link in the references, to underline that the code is part of the contribution of the paper. (If it isn't, e.g. because it was already presented in one of your previous papers, or because someone not on the authors list wrote a significant portion of the code, put it in the references instead.)
Definitely mention the link in the paper itself, so that readers of the paper can look it up. Also, for convenience, it's nice if the URL is a clickable link in the PDF.

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Changing my field after having started my project for my thesis
I am about a month off of starting my Honors year at university (essentially an extra undergrad year aimed at getting students ready for research) and since I was very eager to get into research, I went around my department 6 months ago asking for a supervisor and found a project joint by 2 professors whom I respect and are very strong in their respective fields. After spending the past few months bogged down in my classes I finally got around to researching the project only to find that while I thought I enjoyed the field I find it bland and uninteresting which has made me a bit depressed at the prospect of having to commit to this for a whole year after next month. As a result over the past few days I have been thinking of swapping to another field which I believe is more 'meaty' and that I would enjoy more (I am already on good terms with a supervisor for that field) but at the same time I don't know if it is a sort of academic suicide for me to drop this project and build bad blood between my previous supervisors as I respect them and have nothing personal against them (will it reflect badly on me for not having researched their fields well enough beforehand?). Essentially, is it possible for me to swap fields to something I actually enjoy while staying on good terms with everyone?

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Will becoming ineligible for a J1 visa hinder my chances of getting a postdoc position?
If I'm currently doing my first postdoc in the US on an F1 OPT (in Astronomy) and I decide to apply for either an EB1A or an EB2, I understand that it would show my intent to immigrate making me ineligible for a J1 visa. Because of this, any future postdoc position would need to sponsor me for an H1B visa (assuming that my EB1A was denied or my EB2 has a really long wait time). Given this, will this reduce my chances of getting a second or third postdoc with a university because they'll have to sponsor me for an H1B as opposed to a J1?
Thanks!
P.S. Here are some examples of universities that state that they will sponsor an H1B for a postdoc if they have a pending green card application with USCIS: https://research.upenn.edu/postdocs-and-students/postdocs-foreign-nationals/ and https://postdocs.stanford.edu/postdoc-admins/how-quick-links/request-visas-postdoctoral-scholars

Generally, people decide on who to hire based on qualification and match to the project (if applicable), and only then worry about getting that person a visa (if applicable). I imagine that in nearly all cases where we hired foreigners, we did not actually know which visa they will require, and it played no role in the discussion either.

Meaning that as long as I'm in good standing, I shouldn't worry about becoming ineligible for a J1?

Also, are you aware of a case where the offer of a postdoc was retracted after learning that the postdoc absolutely needs an H1B visa (as Anyon seemed to allude)? (Although in the case he outlined, it really seems as if the postdoc wanted and not needed an H1B...my case would be the latter)

No, I can't imagine an offer being retracted. Getting an H1B is a bigger hassle than a J1, but in the end that is small change compared to hiring a postdoc to begin with. You should remember that paying a postdoc, including fringe and overhead, costs a university ~$130k/year. The cost for one visa or another is relatively minor.

I think that makes the most sense compared to everything I've heard so far. In that case, I think I'll go ahead and apply for EB1A and EB2 without hesitation, thank you!

My institution will occasionally sponsor H1B for postdocs under specific circumstances. My experience as a PI is that the H1B visa process is complex, slow, and expensive, and I would only consider it if there are no other options. There are a number of fees required that must be paid by the PI and are not allowable on some research grants. Also admin staff does not like H1B as they don't always have the bandwidth to process them. Finally H1B hires in some fields require a higher salary than the postdoc standard, which is problematic in terms of equity.

Sure, but I guess I knew most of this already. My main question I suppose is if you were to have two applicants who are both equally good, would you not hire one because they require H1B, while the other requires a J1?

This will determine if I apply for an EB1 or EB2 during my first post doc or not

All things being equal, between two equally qualified candidates, I would go with the one with J1 visa. Less paperwork, faster turnaround, and potentially less cost.

Right, but I think as Wolfgang pointed out, the cost to hire a postdoc for a university is ~130K/year (~400K for the duration of a typical 3-year postdoc). I cannot imagine it being  wise for a PI/university/department to not hire a good candidate just because the they were unwilling to allocate 1% of the funding for obtaining the visa compared to 0.25%. More relevant to your point, as Wolfgang said, the decision to hire is almost never based on visa considerations and he/she/they are not aware of a case in which an offer was retracted because of a postdoc's visa requirements

[General response]
Most committees will 'focus' on your fit and relevance, rather than your circumstances. In this context, relevance include your qualifications and relevant skillset. In essence, what are you bringing to the table.
However, if there are two candidates who meets the fit and relevance almost in the same way, one can't rule out opting for the  candidate that does not require 'visa'. Each situation is unique though.

I understand that it would show my intent to immigrate making me ineligible for a J1 visa

Your understanding is spots on. J1 becomes extremely difficult (not completely ruled out). Agreed, J-1 shouldn't be attempted when EB route is in progress.
[Directed response (might extend outside Academia scope)]
In the last 6 months or so, there seems to be an (unprecedented) 'fast' turnaround time for approval of I-140 for certain EB1 and EB2. Nonetheless, each application is uniquely assessed and decided on; there's no blanket certainty.
If your current host is amenable to it, you should give EB-1B for Outstanding professors and researchers. The average turnaround is looking up: I-140 approval within 1 to 6 months.
EB-2A Advanced Degree || EB-2B Exceptional Ability are not far off as well: 2 to 8 months.
For how long the current 'fastness' will be, no one knows. There seems to be a directive though.
What you might go for though is the EB2-NIW. From your question, it's evident you already know much about the EB route.
PS: for noting: Premium Service
As of Jan. 30, 2023, all pending and initial Form I-140 petitions under an E21 NIW classification are eligible to request premium processing


text:
Describing remarkable extra jobs done in coursework in CV because of teacher's incompetence, in a professional manner?
Last year in the course Computer Networking, the teacher invented a relatively creative course lab to replace the legacy Wireshark labs from UMass, to let us write programs implementing some networking algorithms. Despite the lab idea itself being new and innovative1, everything after that was a complete joke.
The teacher told us, in the class that he announced this new lab, that he had instructed the TAs to provide lab docs and test cases "as soon as possible". In the next two weeks, fellow students had asked TAs in the group chat2 about ETA of the lab document, which should convey what to do and how to grade. The TAs did not even respond. The teacher, during this period, once told in a casual tone "Have they (TAs) provided the tests (test cases)? I'll ask them to expedite.", but didn't say anything more about that. It was only after two weeks of waiting, during which the teacher did not assign any other homework or lab, that the TAs published their first version of the document. Needless to say, it was plain horrible. A structure (struct in the C language) contained several fields of no clear purpose while lacking obviously required fields (e.g. length for a message). The TAs "went dead" for another week, forcing us to continue to ask for clarifications before they "were resurrected". A revised version of the document only introduced extra absurdity, and no one knew when the TAs were going to publish the test cases as promised.
During the next week after the revised document, I, according to my own understanding of the lab description, wrote a demo program, a starter framework wrapping up all parts the algorithm uses, and a set of test cases built on top of the framework, as well as documentations for these things. Only an hour after I turned my GitHub repository to public, one of the TAs contacted me expressing the interest in using my framework, test suite and documentation as official materials for the course, which I happily accepted. It wasn't hard to imagine that the TAs went dead again for a few more weeks, however, while I answered questions and provided support about the lab for fellow students.
Now I'm trying to populate my CV to include this experience as a demonstration of my productivity when the teacher and all TAs played dead. It's unmistakable that I should be professional on this (my CV), but I found it hard to word and describe this whole thing while avoiding being too disparaging or derogatory to the teacher and the TAs. I wonder if this is even possible as I want to show how I stood out in the disaster.

(Not directly related to my question)
This very professor was already known for misconduct as a PhD supervisor, and this teaching incident only added to his infamy, which I only learned after the course concluded, from the section for sharing experiences of our school BBS.
Footnotes:

The lab is "innovative" at least compared to the WS labs that our CS department has employed for several years.
It's a common practice in my area that group chats are used for communication and is considered a formal method.

There is far too much in this quesiton.

@AzorAhai-him- Can you elaborate a bit on "far too much"?

Too much domain-specific detail

You can talk about what you've done that is positive, but don't talk about the failings of anyone else.
Sounds like you have a public GitHub with something you're proud of. Feel free to link to that and explain how this work demonstrates your readiness for whatever you are applying for. Keep the rants about a course you took between you and sympathetic friends.

One predicament is the background story (the incompetence of the teaching authority) is highly supportive in this case, as both perceived from feedbacks from peers and felt from my own.

@iBug Maybe it feels that way to you, but it isn't likely to sound like a positive about you to someone else.

To echo Bryan, people who want to educate you don't really want to hear how poorly you thought of earlier educations, no matter how right you are.

I see what it means. Thank you for your quick response, Bryan and Azor.

During the course Computer Networking 123 you developed on your own an opensource framework [link], test suite [link] and documentation [link] for the course materials, that were more suited than the originally provided materials, to the point the course instructors adopted them -with your permission- as official materials for this course.


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If I have done my Masters in Philosophy, can i submit a research paper in International Relations subject?
I have done my Masters in Philosophy. I am seeking enrolment in PhD international relations.
Meanwhile can i write and submit a paper in International Relations subject without having done a master's in international relations?

I am not sure I understand your question. Did the journal specify that you must have done a master's in international relations in order to submit a paper in international relations?

No I am asking before submitting the paper.

You don't need any academic qualification to write and submit a paper to a journal. At a reputable journal it will be judged on its own merits.
But, you should take some precautions to avoid being seen as a crank by submitting sub-standard work. One way is to have someone more experienced than yourself in the field read your work and comment back on its quality and likelihood of publication. This isn't necessary, but can save you a bit of (private) embarrassment.
A really terrible paper will be rejected quickly in most cases. A marginal one might pass muster after a few revisions driven by reviewer comments.
Yes, you can submit a paper. Anyone can. Do your best to make it a good paper.


text:
Should a 1-year gap in employment/education 12 years ago be mentioned in the ATAS application? If yes, where should it be mentioned?
I am applying for an Academic Technology Approval Scheme (ATAS) certificate in order to start my job as an Assistant Professor at a Russell Group university in the UK. And I would like to know if a 1-year gap in employment/education history from 12 years ago should be mentioned in the ATAS application. The details of the gap are as follows:
After my undergraduate education, I started working in the industry. After a couple of years, I quit that job in order to study for the entrance examination for a master's degree education. This resulted in a one-year gap (from 2011 to 2012) before I started my master’s education. Should this gap be mentioned in the ATAS application? If yes, where should it be mentioned? Thank you.

I wouldn't bother mentioning that gap if HR or whoever conducts the job interview wants an explanation for that missing year, they will ask you during the interview.

ATAS is a UK government application. Citizens of certain countries working in "sensitive subjects" (including most if not all of STEM) need this permission to be allowed to work/study in these fields. It is not for the interview process (from the question it sounds like the position has already been offered).

ATLAS is an approval that the overseas nationals have to obtain if doing research in a field where some research potential national security implications. Most usually it is used to show that the particular piece of research has no national security implications (eg you do biology,  but your research wouldn't allow you to make biological weapons). In this case,  they generally care about the content of the research,  not the history of the person doing it.  I guess if you were doing something that might allow you to make bombs etc,  then they might care more.

Just list your jobs in chronological order. No one would really care about why you did not work 12 years ago for a year. I am sure you have evolved a lot in 12 years and that would make a big difference rather than a year gap more than a decade ago. Most likely, people only pay attention to your working history, not the gap. If they ask you about the gap during an interview or sometime later, then you can explain.


text:
Is it a good idea to include specific funding calls that I have identified for research topics in my research statement/cover letter?
I am applying for a position of an Assistant Professor in computer science at a university in the Netherlands. In my research statement, I have described a number of research directions and in particular, I have identified relevant funding calls for two of the research directions. Could academics who are familiar with the Netherlands system advise me on if it is a good idea to include specific funding calls in the research statement and the cover letter? Thank you.

Good to include as long as those research funding calls are suitable for your research directions. It shows your knowledge about research funding calls and it can be a plus point.

In most cases, it might be a very small plus point that, in isolation, won't matter a lot. But then, a large enough number of small plus points can eventually become a less small plus point.

@lighthousekeeper Totally agree!


text:
What is the fastest way of completing my post viva thesis correction edits?
I have written my thesis using Word and Endnote. I have three months of corrections. Any general tips based on previous experience on how to streamline the edits would be welcome.
The document is too big to run Grammarly on, and I am worried if I write directly in, I will introduce more typos that I won't catch. Should I just take each chapter apart and put it together again, write each edit in a separate document, paste it in carefully, and take care with the endnote bibliography?

Is the main problem here that you feel incapable of editing without the assistance of Grammarly? Built-in spelling/grammar check from Word isn't sufficient?

From the remarks in your question, my guess is that you have not been asked to make significant structural changes to your thesis that would involve cross-chapter links between changes. Instead, it sounds as if the changes are going to be pretty localized, either because you need to make some grammatical or typographical corrections, or because individual paragraphs need clarification or amendment.
My suggestions would be:

Create a backup, perhaps even several. Take additional safeguards by (a) changing the file permissions on the backups to 'read-only', and (b) including in the backup file-name something to indicate that it is a precious original
Edit your document using Track Changes in Word.
Confine your work to one chapter at a time. After every significant period of work, or having concluded work on a chapter, save another new copy, perhaps including the date and time in the file name. This can be helpful despite the fact that Windows will record the time of the last change in the file attributes. After saving a new copy of the file, close Word, click on the filename in Explorer, right-click and select Properties, then check the Read-Only box.
When you return to work, open the last-saved copy. Because it was marked Read-Only, you will be forced to save your new work in yet another new file, thereby preserving the hard-work of your previous sessions from being accidentally erased or overwritten.

I worked my thesis in TeX rather than Word, but the same process of creating multiple new incrementally-changed copies, each of which was set as read-only, saved me from heartache on more than one occasion during the rewrite process.


text:
How to know if a paper is reviewed in zbMATH database?
So I wonder how one can differentiate if the work is reviewed or pending in the zbMATH database. In MathSciNet, it is clearly, mentioned if the work is prelim, pending, reviewed or indexed. But in zbMATH, there is no information like that. If the report is given then there is a name of the reviewer with the name of the city beside the item otherwise we are unaware if it is in review or indexed or only the summary has been selected as review.

Did you ask the people of zbMATH?

@WolfgangBangerth That's a good idea, I will ask them. Thank you.

I got the following response from zbMATH (Mr. David Biesenack) and it clears my doubt.
"If a paper/book will be reviewed will be
decided by our section editors in charge individually. You can see
according to the item id if a paper is still in the process or already
finalized (e.g. Zbl 07674133 is still unfinished / Zbl 1441.60053 is
finalized)."
P.S. I am not deleting the question as it might be helpful to others for future reference.

Indeed, please don't delete the question. I was wondering about the same thing and am happy that you asked and shared the reply here.


text:
Can you share some screenshots of editor's control panels?
Most journals use similar manuscript handling systems such as ScholarOne. I have seen both author and reviewer accounts (which are similar). I wonder how an editor account looks like. I mean how you search for reviewers, how they are assigned, notifications, etc.
Can you share some screenshots of your editor control panels (of course, sanitizing the sensitive information)? I am sure that many young researchers like me are curious to have a picture of the other side when we submit our manuscripts.

You mean like the help on this page  http://editorresources.taylorandfrancisgroup.com/scholarone-manuscripts-2/

I hope your real motivation in asking this question is to produce a competing system. Because ScholarOne is horrible and needs to die.

Here is a video made by one of the leading journals in neuroscience, showing you what editors are doing, and also giving you a glimpse on the tools they use: https://players.brightcove.net/2842341025001/default_default/index.html?videoId=5565351029001

@KonradRudolph I wonder if a question about what's wrong with existing systems might somehow be constructed to be on-topic?  I've been working on a startup, and finding problems like that that need fixing is something I'd very much be interested in.

@Nat That would probably be a good question for “meta”. At a guess I’d say that it’s probably not great in general, though it may be fine in specific cases. At the moment I’m actually tempted to chose this question as off-topic but it has generated a lot of interest.

The following screenshot is for Editorial Manager (used by Springer, Nature, APA, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, PLOS).

The action links on the left are where everything is done. Brief explanation of some of the tabs:

iThenticate is a program that checks for plagiarism. This particular submission has 16% similarity, which is low. If desired the editor can read the entire report, which includes both where the similarity occurs and where it came from.
"Duplicate submission" checks if the manuscript was submitted multiple times. Sometimes it's in error (author submits twice thinking the first time didn't go through); other times it flags a reject-and-resubmit manuscript.
"History" shows the history of the manuscript from submission till today, such as when it was submitted, when an editor was assigned, when each reviewer was invited, and so on. Every time the system sends an email, it's logged here.
"Edit submission" lets the editor modify the submission (e.g. if the authors later discovered they've not included a source file, this is where to add it).
"Invite reviewers" - self-explanatory. Clicking this goes to another menu that lets the editor both mine the current database and / or register new reviewers to invite. If this submission had a completed review there'd be a "view reviews and comments" button, and if it's ready for a decision, there'd be a "submit editor's decision and comments" button as well.
"Set final disposition" terminates the peer-review process. For this manuscript, since no decision has been made yet, the only option is 'withdraw'. If a decision has already been made (accept / reject), this is also where to set the final status.

The other boxes should hopefully be self-explanatory. In the review status on the right, the first manuscript currently has 3 reviewers who've agreed to do it, 1 who hasn't responded, and 3 who declined. Clicking the "more" button lets the editor see who those reviewers are, when the reviews are due, how long it's been since the reviewer invitation was sent out (for the reviewer who hasn't responded), and the reasons for declining, if any.
The bottom manuscript is showing status "required reviews completed" because the settings for this particular journal is set to flag any submission with 1 completed review as such. Some journals might require two or more reviews before the status updates.

People are declining to be reviewrs? What can be possible cause'

@SSimon in my experience, by far the two most common reasons are 1) lack of time and 2) the reviewer doesn't feel he or she has enough specialist knowledge to review the article.

@SSimon so many reasons.   The paper may not be in their area, they are on holidays, they do not want to contribute, they are senior and too busy unless they know you, and many others.

The above interface really needs to die!  As an editor, I hate using it.

This answer is for SuSy, the in-house editorial management system used by MDPI. Caveat: I have used SuSy for less than two weeks as of time of writing, and my understanding of it is relatively rudimentary.
Papers in SuSy have their own page, which is much bigger and more detailed than Editorial Manager. It is big enough that I can't fit it in one screenshot.

Manuscript ID: the identifier of the manuscript. It generally starts with the name of the journal, followed by several numbers.
Type: what kind of article is it? A review, a research article, etc?
Open Review: see this article on MDPI's website describing their editorial processes. To quote, "MDPI journals offer the possibility for authors to publish review reports together with their paper (Open Review) and for reviewers to sign their open review reports once “Open Review” (https://www.mdpi.com/editorial_process) is selected by the authors. However, this will only be done at publication with the reviewer’s permission. In all other cases, review reports are considered confidential and will only be disclosed with the explicit permission of the reviewer." If this shows as "yes", then the authors agreed to open review. It does not mean the reviewers will agree to open review.
Recruiting Reviewers: see section 5 of the same article above. The authors, when submitting, can choose whether or not to accept volunteer reviewers. If they indicate yes, then the title/abstract is viewable by volunteer reviewers, and vice versa if no.
Manuscript: the source files for the manuscript.
Section: Some MDPI journals have sections, topics, or similar classifications. If there is such a classification then there will be a corresponding box here. Similarly, if the submission is for a special issue, there will be a corresponding box here.
Author contributions: which author did what for the work? Who conceptualized it, who ran the analysis, who wrote the paper, etc.?
Submission received: when did the submission arrive?
iThenticate: this is an automated plagiarism checker. The report it produces is uploaded here.
Some boxes not shown: There is a section with who the pre-check editor is (i.e., the person that makes the decision whether or not to send the manuscript for peer review), and details of that pre-check. This is also usually the person that will make the final accept/revise/reject decision for the manuscript. There is another box with the APC confirmation. This tells the author what the APC will be should the article be accepted. MDPI offers a lot of discounts, so there is a high chance the published APC is not the one that is actually charged. If there is a discount voucher for the manuscript, this is where to input it.

To search for reviewers you need an email address. Inputting that email address brings up the reviewer profile (the editor can also register a new profile if that reviewer is not already in the system). The reviewer profile gives details like the reviewer's name, affiliation, when they were last invited and by whom/for which journal, whether the reviewer is a guest editor/editorial board member, etc.
SuSy will warn the editor if the invited reviewer shares an email domain with the authors (a little annoying when it flags @gmail.com), as well as things like whether the reviewer is a volunteer, whether that reviewer is being invited too frequently, and so on. The default is to warn the editor if the most recent invitation was within the last 30 days, although this might not apply if the reviewer is a volunteer with a frequency of 1 review per 15 days. If the most recent invitation was within the last 15 days, then SuSy will refuse to send more invitations unless an editor with advanced permissions overrides the block.
The authors can propose reviewers, in which case they are shown here. The pre-check editor (more precise term used by MDPI is "academic editor") can also propose reviewers, in which case they are shown here. Other reviewers are invited by the MDPI editor assigned to the manuscript.
Finally, the green check mark indicates that this reviewer has agreed to review the paper. As with other EMSes, SuSy will display when the reviewer was invited, when the report is due, when the last reminder was sent, etc.
Reviewer/Authors co-authorship: this feature wasn't in Editorial Manager the last time I used it. This lets the editor check if the invited reviewer has co-authored any papers with the authors, and if so what those papers are. It does flag a lot of false positives (multiple people with the same name/initials), which is especially common with Chinese names. If there is a flag then SuSy requires confirmation from the editor before sending the invitation - typically either false positive, or the previous collaboration was more than 3 years ago (3 years is the conflict-of-interest threshold given on the website).
Overall (and this is a personal opinion) I'd say SuSy does some things better than Editorial Manager, and some things worse - with the most important negative being, since each manuscript has its own huge webpage, SuSy is rather unwieldy when trying to monitor the status of every submission in the system.


text:
Writing a recommendation letter for a senior colleague
A good colleague of mine from a previous life is applying for outside professorships at both pre-and-post tenure Associate levels. I was flattered when they reached out asking for a letter from me, and am happy to help.  The only thing is, they are a few more years more senior than me; I am a new, young, relatively no-name junior professor, and I worked under this person a few years ago when I was a postdoc. We had a good working relationship, the only thing is that I'm not totally familiar with the idea of writing letter for a senior colleague. My understanding of this kind of letter in general is that you get top names in your field to vouch for you. Assuming that my colleague is already recruiting top names alongside mine, what do I have to contribute that they don't; how should I approach the letter? Am I just writing a character reference, or do I wax about their potential to transform the field? Is it on me to be explicit about what I do and don't feel credible to claim about this person, or my vision for how the information in my recommendation should complement that from the other letters; or can I trust any readers to gather that info for themselves?
Because norms differ so much by discipline, please include your own field in your answer. I'm in information science.

Any reason you have not asked this person what they would like you to emphasize in this recommendation letter?

I'll get there, but first I'd like to know what is the standard, if there even is one.  I honestly have no idea how conventional or unconventional it is to get letters from junior colleagues in general, or what role they serve.   Their feedback will be most informative relative to what's normal.  Also, we're in slightly different disciplines: that person is in psych, so I figured I get from this forum a sense of the variance across disciplines.

Can you talk about your colleague's demeanor towards juniors and students?

@FrankFYC, yeah, I can definitely do that.  Is that all I'm good for? Is there anything of importance to committees, outside of personality and character, that I can assert with more credibility than the typical senior writer of this kind of letter?  And if not, should I restrict my letter to those subjects, or own my situation and try to speak with authority on the same things the seniors are going to be writing about?

I believe it is common (at least in computer science) for senior (i.e. tenured) people to get a recommendation from one of their students or some they mentored. The purpose is to show that they are a good advisor.

The fact you are more junior does not mean you can't write a helpful letter.
Write a letter that describes what you observed, e.g., in his lectures and in his interactions with students and colleagues, and in his research.  Try to be specific.  Instead of simply saying he was a great lecturer, describe the techniques you observed, e.g., that he mixed PowerPoint and whiteboard effectively, answered students' questions really well, how he's mentored and taught you, etc.
After you've outlined the facts that might support it, offer your opinion, that this is an individual who would be perfect for the position.
I'm a lecturer in CS at University of Michigan.  I've written lots of LORs for both students and colleagues.  They're very formulaic.  You can do this.


text:
Difference in Indexed and Reviewed items in Mathscinet
What is the difference between the two item types: Indexed and Reviewed in MathSciNet? I have seen some research articles in the same issue of an indexed mathematics journal being categorized differently. Some are indexed while others are reviewed.

Indexed items have only their basic metadata copied to MathSciNet. Hundreds of journals and book series are routinely indexed by MathSciNet, presumably by a partially-automated process that requires relatively little hands-on work for each item. Indexing is handled by full-time staff.
Reviewed items, on the other hand, have summaries written manually by experts in the field. In order for a paper to be reviewed, it must first be indexed, and an expert must read it and agree to write a review for MathSciNet. As a result, many indexed items may never be reviewed.

I have heard from some senior Professors that Reviewed items are more trustworthy than indexed ones. So, is that the case or it's just that MathSciNet failed to get the item reviewed as many experts in the field rejected it for reviewing?

@Hardeep Have you thought how much work it would be to review all papers?

@WolfgangBangerth Yes, I agree that it would be lots of work. I am really thankful to MathSciNet for making our lives easy. But, I wanted to ask how the process is done and if indexed items are not of the quality that's why those were not reviewed or the reason is something else.

@Hardeep I don't think you will be able to make a determination that could be applied to individual papers. It may be true statistically that papers nobody cares about aren't reviewed, but I bet that lots of papers people do care about are also not reviewed and that, as a consequence, when you see a non-reviewed paper, you won't be able to tell whether it's good or not just from that fact.

@WolfgangBangerth my first research paper is shown as pending and might be indexed or reviewed soon I found out that my colleague's recent paper got indexed and so I asked the guide and he said that probably the paper might not be of high quality. I was a little bit anxious hearing that. Thank you for clearing up the confusion though.


text:
What are the criteria for degree revocation?
I was awarded a degree from a reputable college or university. For what reasons could my degree be revoked after the fact? Should I be worried?
Note to readers: This is a special community wiki 'canonical' question that aggregates advice on a frequently-asked question. See this meta discussion. Please feel free to edit this question to improve it.
Each answer here relates to a different criterion which may (or may not) lead to degree revocation. If you have a new possible criterion, please add an answer. If you have more information about an existing criterion, please edit the existing answer.

A historical note: The Nazis revoked degrees from many Jews, which were reinstated some decades later: https://news.uga.edu/polish-university-reinstates-degrees-earned-by-german-jews-in-nazi-era/ and some Nazis later had their degrees revoked: https://www.jta.org/1961/06/06/archive/german-universities-consider-revocation-of-degrees-from-nazi-physician (for committing horrible crimes) ... obviously not relevant here as an answer.

I removed the comments discussing the wiki's structure of this canonical Q&A. The best place to discuss the structure is this meta question. Please bring further criticism and suggestions there.

How does one appropriately answer in the case that there are no criteria? I have in mind the University of Oxford's regulation on deprivation [as of 2022]  "4.1. Congregation shall have the power to deprive any individual of any degree of the University for any reason it thinks fit."

Interesting! I guess you could say "Criterion: Any reason the university sees fit [at certain universities]."

@DanielHatton For sure the "management" can't control the outcome. But in practice essentially no one turns up unless there's a matter of general importance, and it used to be the case that a whip would be sent round the salaried members of the central admin, and this payroll vote would ensure that no "accidents" occurred!

@cag51: What about mental health issues? Recently, someone I know completed all the requirements for a degree, but today she cannot even recall her name. Can the university reconsider awarding her the degree?

@Bumblebee: was the degree already conferred? Certainly I cannot imagine a university revoking a degree after the fact due to something like that. If the student is 99.9% done and the university is not being reasonable about that last 0.1%, that's a different matter. But sounds like an interesting situation -- if you're comfortable, consider posting this as a question so others can also answer.

@cag51: Not yet, and the university has not expressed any concerns. I was just wondering whether there is any possibility that her degree could be withheld due to her current medical situation. Under the present circumstances, she is not in a condition to demonstrate any of the skills she acquired during her undergraduate studies.

Please feel free to edit this answer to improve it.
Short answer: will my degree be revoked?
Almost certainly not. Degree revocation is extremely rare, and almost always involves some major, willful misconduct such as plagiarizing long sections or falsifying data. Almost everyone who has raised concerns on this site over the years had nothing to worry about. The different answers below discuss different criteria that could lead to degree revocation, but these are generally edge cases. The typical person who earned their degree in good faith has nothing to worry about.
But this site cannot give you a definitive answer. Different schools have different staff and different policies, so it is impossible to predict how a particular institution will respond to a particular situation. Nor can we decide whether you committed misconduct (and even if we did, our decision would not count for anything). We recommend checking your school's policy on degree revocation (often available online). If you are concerned about degree revocation, you could discuss the issue with a legal advisor or the school in question, though you may be better off "letting sleeping dogs lie."
Finally, note that degree revocation may be discussed or threatened rather more frequently than it actually occurs. Individuals and/or organisations may respond to some incident or action by 'calling on the university to revoke the degree', and this may gain traction on social (or indeed traditional) media. However, this does not mean it is actually likely to happen.

"you should check your particular institution's policies"  I'd guess many universities have no such policy and have never revoked a degree.

Please feel free to edit this answer to improve it.
Criterion: Research or Academic Misconduct (e.g., Plagiarism)
Degree revocation is very rare. When it does happen, academic misconduct is usually the cause, and it usually must be severe and intentional. As henning writes:

I've been working in Academia for the past ten years. The only cases of degree revocation that I am aware of were due to severe cases of academic misconduct such as plagiarism, fraud, or large-scale cheating. The rationale is that gross academic misconduct invalidates the achievement the degree should certify.

Similarly, canadian humanist reports:

I sit on our university's Senate which is the body that would have to deliberate a degree revocation. Even a straight-forward case of plagiarism in a degree requires a long, drawn-out and surprisingly contentious decision, and it might happen once or twice a decade. This is the last step of a very, very long and drawn-out process.
So no, I wouldn't worry, outside of demonstrable research misconduct that puts the entire integrity of the degree in jeopardy.

A now-departed user provides some examples of degrees which have been revoked for major academic misconuduct, notably plagiarism:

There have been spectacular examples of falling from grace.

Pal Schmitt resigned as President of Hungary after his doctorate was stripped by Semmelweis University on findings of plagiarism.
Former German Defence Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg graduated...from the University of Bayreuth in 2006...A finding of plagiarism led to his degree being revoked.

The same answer also reiterates that the criteria for revocation due to academic misconduct are likely formally defined by your university:

In my university...the policy allows for a revocation in the event that the degree was awarded in error or through fraud. The policy proceeds to list the criteria and processes to be followed. Fraud is defined broadly and includes conventional definitions of academic misconduct, but other acts as well. Finally, there is a specific clause [stating that] one cannot [defend oneself] on the basis that there was no intention to commit fraud.

Practices on degree revocation also vary regionally. Sergio J Castro reports that degree revocation in the Spanish-speaking world almost never happens, even when clearly merited.
Could academic misconduct after completing the degree lead to revocation? User Stephan Kolassa addresses this:

Yes. Although you will need to do something blatantly unethical.
For instance, my alma mater (the University of Konstanz, in Germany) revoked an alumnus' Ph.D. after this alumnus blatantly falsified data, although the Ph.D. thesis as such was not tainted.

But this varies regionally. Araucaria describes a 2005 paper from a US institution, which did not find a single degree that was revoked for bad acts subsequent to graduation.

In the (2005) paper The Right of Educational Institutions to Withhold or Revoke Academic Degrees from the Stetson University College of Law Twenty-sixth Annual National Conference on Law and Higher Education, the authors give an in-depth survey of reasons universities have successfully revoked degrees. Not one of these involves the behaviour of a candidate after they have completely left the institution—whether this behaviour be academic, political or indeed criminal. [Note, Stetson is in the US].

Further, revocation due to academic misconduct is rare due to practical reasons. As reported here, it is often difficult to prove that academic misconduct took place happened years after the fact. And outside of certain high-profile individuals, few theses are scrutinized after being approved.
Prior to this wiki's creation, Academia.SE received dozens of questions from users concerned that they could be accused of academic misconduct, leading to their degree being revoked. To my knowledge, the answer was never once "yes, you committed academic misconduct and your degree is likely to be revoked." For example, concerns like data changing underneath you, the thesis not containing sufficient novelty, self-reporting  possible problems with the thesis, or having a missing degree requirement were all dismissed.

Please feel free to edit this answer to improve it.
Not a Criterion: Political Activities
As discussed here, revoking a degree based on political activities (e.g., criticizing the university that granted the degree) would gather wide attention, but we are not aware of any such cases having happened. Although anything could happen in the future, given the lack of observed cases it does not seem political activity is considered grounds for revoking (non-honorary) degrees.
Indeed, taking any sort of action based on political expression is anathema to Western ideas of tertiary education.

I think it would be useful to have stronger wording here than "would not normally", given that this is never known to have happened.

My thinking was that most questions have asked about mainstream political debate (e.g., the linked question is about "anti-wokeness"), but some very extreme political opinions (e.g., a high-profile neo-nazi) could have different considerations. Though I admit that I'm not aware of any neo-nazis having their degree revoked, so perhaps your point still stands.

That's a good point. My thinking is just that, when someone says something is "remotely possible" or "would never happen under normal circumstances" or such, some people still latch on to that perceived tiny chance that it might actually happen. (The good old "So you're saying there's a chance?") That's why I tend to gravitate toward using stronger wording, e.g. "completely unheard of" or "practically impossible", and that would be how I'd go here unless/until we actually do have an example of a degree being revoked for political activity.

I gave a stab at an edit along @DavidZ 's suggestions. I also wonder if there might be some exceptions in countries with authoritarian or theological leanings, though I suspect those countries would tend to use imprisonment or other means rather than revoking degrees.

As the only answer on the page where the answer is "no" (at least currently), it should be distinguished so the reader doesn't scroll through and think the answer is "yes." However, i'm not quite sure how to do that, so I leave it for someone feeling more inspired.

Maybe just make it say "Not political activities". Though I'm speculatively thinking it might be beneficial to edit the question to be along the lines of "Can my degree be revoked for this reason?" so posting an answer of "Political activities: NO" makes more sense in context.

Good point. I took a stab at a fix -- edits welcome.

"revoking a degree based on political activities ... we not aware of such cases having happened". Consider the claims in this 1982 letter to Science: https://science.sciencemag.org/content/216/4544/360.1  That letter details such a case by the USSR, and references apparently well-known cases in 1930's Germany.

I have provided an answer to the original question that addresses politically motivated revocations in authoritarian or non-Western countries. They certainly have happened in the not-too-distant past, and probably still occur in some places. We shouldn't presume here that we are always writing to a Western audience.

vk5tu, psychonaut -- I didn't have time to read the links, but from your comments, I think your points could be valuable and encourage you to edit this answer accordingly.

@Psychonaut It's not only a practice of authoritarian countries. In 1964 Goethe University of Frankfurt and Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich removed the degrees of Josef Mengele (ref: https://www.uni-frankfurt.de/68268693/Josef_Mengele). Although perhaps this is better covered under "Personal Misconduct" than "Political Activities".

Please feel free to edit this answer to improve it.
Criterion: Personal Misconduct
Degree revocation is very rare, and is usually a result of academic misconduct that renders the degree itself invalid. However, degrees are occasionally revoked for serious personal misconduct, particularly in Europe.
We should first distinguish between honorary degrees and academic degrees. As Ian Sudbery explains:

Honorary degrees are given to some for expressly moral judgement even though the recipient hasn't completed any classes or met the required academic standards. They are awarded because they represent to sort of character that they would like the world to associate with the university. If they prove themselves not that have that character, or stop having that character, then it makes sense to remove the honorary degree.

For academic degrees, the situation is quite different regionally. In Europe, degrees can be (and are) revoked for personal
misconduct, though it is rare. For example Earthlin reports that in Germany:

a PhD may be revoked in case of:

a wilful act resulting in a prison sentence of one year or more, or
a deliberate/wilful offence abusing their scientific qualification.

These are quite "mild" conditions, presumably in place to discourage degree holders to engage in behaviour on the wrong side of the law.

Similarly, doog reports that Cambridge is/was in the process of revoking a pedophile's degree, though in this case, the bad acts happened while attending the university and were discovered later.
On the other hand, revocation for personal misconduct in the US is even less likely, as user6726 reports:

In the US, you have a property right to the degree that you earn and pay for (regardless of the ultimate source of funding -- the student has the responsibility to pay), and as long as you don't violate the conditions for obtaining the degree (various forms of dishonesty in admissions and satisfaction of the degree), improper actions after the fact don't license depriving a person of what they have earned.

In the US, an example of honorary degrees being revoked would be the comedian and supporter of higher education, Bill Cosby.
As of May 2024, his honorary degree Wikipedia page lists that 62 of his 72 honorary degrees have "been revoked due to his now-overturned conviction on sexual assault charges."
(**) Existing answers are limited to Europe and the US; please feel free to edit this page with your expert knowledge about other parts of the world.

a PhD may be revoked in case of a wilful act resulting in a prison sentence of one year or more What relevance does a prison sentence have on knowledge bought to the world?!

Agree. I don't have much more to contribute on this topic, but you or others should feel free to improve this answer.

@Araucaria-Nothereanymore. As written For academic degrees...a PhD may be revoked, I presume honorary degrees aren't considered and that the PhD has been awarded

@user2768 none, but degrees in Europe, especially in Germany are historically and a bit still today also seen as a status symbol and sign of honour that is bestowed by the university on the individual. So it's linked to holding the person in high regard. A clearly dishonourable act would be in conflict with that. From another viewpoint by bestowing the degree the university enables the person to hold certain positions and the underlying assumption is that a criminal should not be allowed to hold these.

What Earthling says about revocation of degrees due to "a wilful act resulting in a prison sentence of one year of more" seems to apply obly to some universities in Nordrhein-Westfalen, and not to Germany as a whole. In most of Germany, the "wilful act" has to be related to science, according to Wikipedia

Criterion: Admissions Fraud
If a student was admitted to a university through fraudulent means and graduated, the university may revoke the degree once it knows that the student should not have attended the institution in the first place.
For example, UPenn initiated a policy that states the university may revoke degrees for providing false information on their applications.

UPenn's policy was in response to the 2019 college admissions scandal.  After the 2019 college admissions scandal, several colleges indicated (via public statement or via policy updates) that admissions fraud may result in degree revocation.  This was probably already a possibility, but now it's far more publicized.


text:
Conference presentation of a weak paper to an expert audience.
As a part of my research project, I am almost finished a first paper. I was proud of myself because of the contributions: I was able to take some ideas that has been used in the field for some years now, and I provided a unified point of view. However, as it turned out, some of those results had been already obtained before. Nevertheless, this results seems to be unknown yet in the community of the field.
A very important conference is coming up, in which the main leaders on the topic will be present. My supervisor wants me to give a talk about my results in this event. Given the fact that a few of these results had been already obtained (and of course, I am not taking credit for this), the paper with only my contributions (discarding what was done before) is not a strong paper. Although my supervisor thinks it is OK, I am afraid that giving this talk in front of these experts will result in them not taking me seriously as a researcher in the future. What are your thoughts on that?

"Not so strong" papers are published and presented all the time, everywhere. Don't worry. Don't be overly self-critical. It'll be fine.

Enjoy it, get your feet wet and remember, there are many papers presented at the beginning of projects : Everyone there has all had to present their first paper...

Maybe drop a hint at the beginning of the presentation to let the audience know it is your first paper. They will know what to expect and not be too harsh with their critique but instead maybe trying to give tips and improvements instead.

Do your best,  show enthusiasm and show awareness of what was done already.  Innest your contribution to that.  Every bo

dy will be happy.

Find some hidden nuggets in this topic that will interest your audience, even if they're a bit tangential to your official topic.

Answer inspired by @Roland's comment.
First of all, have a little faith in yourself, your supervisor seems to believe your work is good enough and so should you.
Otherwise, if you really do have some doubts about the relevance of the paper you can stress the fact that these results seem to be unknown in the community.
Raise awareness on the fact that your project is interesting and that some work and results have already been made, yet seem to have passed under the radar of many.

I like the answer by @everyone but I want to introduce another factor to consider, and that is the scoop factor.
Are you planning to continue working in this area?  Do you think that identifying this area as insufficiently mined creates a special opportunity for you to build on what's been done previously, to come up with something novel, original and worthwhile?  If so, you might want to play your cards closer to your chest, and wait before going so public.
If, on the other hand, you just want to see other people build on what's been done so far, and you yourself are planning to turn your attention to other areas and problems, then there's no reason to be circumspect.  In this case, go ahead and present, and get people fired up about this potentially fruitful direction!


text:
How to find all the books in which a given essay is published?
It is fairly common for a journal article in humanities to be published afterwards in a book by the same author or in some collection edited by someone else.
Is there an easy way to track where a given paper was published afterwards? That is, is it possible to find all the books where a given paper was republished?
This is relevant because sometimes the article can have minor (or sometimes pretty major) edits when republished in a book, or have some other related texts there (e.g., replies, other papers on the same subject, or a newer essay by the same author side by side)


text:
What information to list in opening slide for conference?
Silly question, but I figured I'd ask. What information should be present in the opening slide of my presentation to a conference and how do I format it? Should it be like this:
Interesting picture
Title
Name of presenter
MA Student, Department, University
Logo of Department/University

My opening slide usually has the title of the talk, my name, my affiliation, the name of the conference, and the date.

@AndreasBlass Thank you! And do you include your department in your affiliation or just the university?

I've usually included only the university on my opening slide, but that's mostly because it's pretty well known that I'm a mathematician. I think it's perfectly reasonable to also include the department, especially if the conference is interdisciplinary.

Heh heh. The first slide is your chance to tell a "dad" joke.

If there is a presentation template of your university, I would follow it.  It is often desirable to present a uniform "corporate design" to the public. If there is not, you can check whether the conference provides a template and use that as a reference.
Otherwise, I would use the information on publications as a guideline:

Title
Author(s): Presenter can be highlighted if there are multiple authors.
Afiiliation: position/job description, department and university.
Name and place of conference
Date of the presentation

About the graphical design:

An interesting picture that fits the content of the presentation is always nice, of course.
Logo of the university and department (if available)
Logos of other involved project partners / of the research project

Note: For funded research projects, it is often also intended that the logo and funding code of the funder are present. However, if there are no clear guidelines for this, this information can also go on the last slide of the presentation. I would also include contact information there.

Skip the name and place of the conference. Skip the date. Your audience is guaranteed to know those details by virtue of being there. (Yes, it's common to include this information. But bear in mind it is also common to give incredibly bad presentations at academic conferences...)

@user2705196 That info is nice to include if your slides end up floating around the internet afterward.  It can also be useful later when you want to search through your old files of slides.

The content of a talk depends very strongly on the audience and the effect you want to produce.
Once I gave a talk on fundamental methods (as in, introductory methods, almost at a remedial level) for producing high quality source code in computer programming. Things like variable names and using white space to improve readability and such. Real basic stuff, leading up to the basics of code arrangement, routine style, etc. All very basic stuff that I noticed people did very poorly when I did code review.
My first slide was a picture of a beach in the tropics. My opening few lines of  my talk was about the surfing guru who accepted a student. The first thing the student was required to do was swim the reef. He had to go snorkeling and find out where the water was deep and shallow, how the level changed, and where the jagged coral was that would rip you apart if you fell on it. That is, the underlying fundamentals. And today we would "swim the reef" of computer programming.
Maybe you don't want exactly that. But you do want to select an opening slide that matches the goals of your talk, judged according to audience, the venue, and the general nature of the conference.


text:
What does "post-secondary academic work" mean?
While searching for PhD programs, I read a requirement that states I should send in my application an official transcript of all "post-secondary academic work completed to date". Surely this cannot mean all work, including published articles or lectures?
My question is: What does "post-secondary academic work" mean?  Should I send academic work from both my completed Bachelor and from the Bachelor I did not complete? (BTW, is this expression correct, "completed Bachelor"? What would be a better English expression?)
Thank you!

They are only asking for the transcripts, not the actual class work you completed.

@JonCuster Ah, I see! You mean as a sort of "abstract"? I thought "transcript" would be a copy of the work translated to English. I read now Merriam-Webster says https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/transcript : especially : an official copy of a student's educational record. Should it mean that they want only the record (the grades, etc. - no articles, lectures, papers, etc.)? Sorry for the confusion, English is not my native language.

You can Google for "academic transcript" - it's something you typically request from your university's student service center or equivalent. You certainly cannot prepare one yourself; you need one that's certified by your university. Example of what a transcript looks like: http://www.registrar.pitt.edu/assets/img/trans_acrec/xmlacrec.png

@Allure thank you! I feel pretty dumb now, obviously they only wanted this kind of transcript, not transcript of other works. At least I didn't ask them this directly... thanks a lot for the help! I actually tried deleting this question, but it is not allowed by now

In your question, you say they ask for the transcript of all work.  They don't want all work, as no one has that kind of time to read it all, they just want to know your performance in each course/module/etc.
The reason they stress the transcripts of all work, is that sometimes someone may have, as in your case, completed one program but not another and they would like to see the performance from that incomplete program (or perhaps you did two programs —in full— but one was in an unrelated field, they still want to see how you did in both).
Transcripts, thankfully, generally aren't very expensive to have translated.

Yes, you are right, I understood "transcript" incorrectly, I thought it meant a translated copy, when it meant a sort of "report card" (an "academic transcript", as Allure mentioned in a comment). I wish I could delete this question since it bears on a mistaken conception of the word "transcript" (and, therefore, is not truly related to the meaning of "post-secondary academic work"). But I thank you for your help! As an aside, do you happen to know if "completed Bachelor" is a correct way to refer to a Bachelor one has completed? It doesn't sound natural to my ears

It means all academic work you did after high school. This includes undergraduate, masters, etc. So yes, you should send academic work from both your completed Bachelor's and uncompleted Bachelor's degrees, including published articles or lectures.

Thank you! But don't you think this sounds a little weird? The costs of the translations would be pretty high and the volume of work per admission would be too big to be analysed. I guess I should ask the program directly, but I was afraid of sounding foolish by asking;) I'll ask them. Thank you again for the explanation!