45
views
0
recommends
+1 Recommend
0 collections
    0
    shares
      • Record: found
      • Abstract: found
      • Article: found
      Is Open Access

      Languages Are Still a Major Barrier to Global Science

      other
      1 , 2 , * , 1 , 1
      PLoS Biology
      Public Library of Science

      Read this article at

      Bookmark
          There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

          Abstract

          While it is recognized that language can pose a barrier to the transfer of scientific knowledge, the convergence on English as the global language of science may suggest that this problem has been resolved. However, our survey searching Google Scholar in 16 languages revealed that 35.6% of 75,513 scientific documents on biodiversity conservation published in 2014 were not in English. Ignoring such non-English knowledge can cause biases in our understanding of study systems. Furthermore, as publication in English has become prevalent, scientific knowledge is often unavailable in local languages. This hinders its use by field practitioners and policy makers for local environmental issues; 54% of protected area directors in Spain identified languages as a barrier. We urge scientific communities to make a more concerted effort to tackle this problem and propose potential approaches both for compiling non-English scientific knowledge effectively and for enhancing the multilingualization of new and existing knowledge available only in English for the users of such knowledge.

          Related collections

          Most cited references13

          • Record: found
          • Abstract: found
          • Article: not found

          Knowing but not doing: selecting priority conservation areas and the research-implementation gap.

          Conservation assessment is a rapidly evolving discipline whose stated goal is the design of networks of protected areas that represent and ensure the persistence of nature (i.e., species, habitats, and environmental processes) by separating priority areas from the activities that degrade or destroy them. Nevertheless, despite a burgeoning scientific literature that ever refines these techniques for allocating conservation resources, it is widely believed that conservation assessments are rarely translated into actions that actually conserve nature. We reviewed the conservation assessment literature in peer-reviewed journals and conducted survey questionnaires of the authors of these studies. Two-thirds of conservation assessments published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature do not deliver conservation action, primarily because most researchers never plan for implementation. This research-implementation gap between conservation science and real-world action is a genuine phenomenon and is a specific example of the "knowing-doing gap" that is widely recognized in management science. Given the woefully inadequate resources allocated for conservation, our findings raise questions over the utility of conservation assessment science, as currently practiced, to provide useful, pragmatic solutions to conservation planning problems. A reevaluation of the conceptual and operational basis of conservation planning research is urgently required. We recommend the following actions for beginning a process for bridging the research-implementation gap in conservation planning: (1) acknowledge the research-implementation gap is real, (2) source research questions from practitioners, (3) situate research within a broader conservation planning model, (4) expand the social dimension of conservation assessments, (5) support conservation plans with transdisciplinary social learning institutions, (6) reward academics for societal engagement and implementation, and (7) train students in skills for "doing" conservation.
            Bookmark
            • Record: found
            • Abstract: found
            • Article: not found

            Language bias in randomised controlled trials published in English and German.

            Some randomised controlled trials (RCTs) done in German-speaking Europe are published in international English-language journals and others in national German-language journals. We assessed whether authors are more likely to report trials with statistically significant results in English than in German. We studied pairs of RCT reports, matched for first author and time of publication, with one report published in German and the other in English. Pairs were identified from reports round in a manual search of five leading German-language journals and from reports published by the same authors in English found on Medline. Quality of methods and reporting were assessed with two different scales by two investigators who were unaware of authors' identities, affiliations, and other characteristics of trial reports. Main study endpoints were selected by two investigators who were unaware of trial results. Our main outcome was the number of pairs of studies in which the levels of significance (shown by p values) were discordant. 62 eligible pairs of reports were identified but 19 (31%) were excluded because they were duplicate publications. A further three pairs (5%) were excluded because no p values were given. The remaining 40 pairs were analysed. Design characteristics and quality features were similar for reports in both languages. Only 35% of German-language articles, compared with 62% of English-language articles, reported significant (p < 0.05) differences in the main endpoint between study and control groups (p = 0.002 by McNemar's test). Logistic regression showed that the only characteristic that predicted publication in an English-language journal was a significant result. The odds ratio for publication of trials with significant results in English was 3.75 (95% CI 1.25-11.3). Authors were more likely to publish RCTs in an English-language journal if the results were statistically significant. English language bias may, therefore, be introduced in reviews and meta-analyses if they include only trials reported in English. The effort of the Cochrane Collaboration to identify as many controlled trials as possible, through the manual search of many medical journals published in different languages will help to reduce such bias.
              Bookmark
              • Record: found
              • Abstract: found
              • Article: not found

              Four barriers to the global understanding of biodiversity conservation: wealth, language, geographical location and security.

              Global biodiversity conservation is seriously challenged by gaps and heterogeneity in the geographical coverage of existing information. Nevertheless, the key barriers to the collection and compilation of biodiversity information at a global scale have yet to be identified. We show that wealth, language, geographical location and security each play an important role in explaining spatial variations in data availability in four different types of biodiversity databases. The number of records per square kilometre is high in countries with high per capita gross domestic product (GDP), high proportion of English speakers and high security levels, and those located close to the country hosting the database; but these are not necessarily countries with high biodiversity. These factors are considered to affect data availability by impeding either the activities of scientific research or active international communications. Our results demonstrate that efforts to solve environmental problems at a global scale will gain significantly by focusing scientific education, communication, research and collaboration in low-GDP countries with fewer English speakers and located far from Western countries that host the global databases; countries that have experienced conflict may also benefit. Findings of this study may be broadly applicable to other fields that require the compilation of scientific knowledge at a global level.
                Bookmark

                Author and article information

                Journal
                PLoS Biol
                PLoS Biol
                plos
                plosbiol
                PLoS Biology
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, CA USA )
                1544-9173
                1545-7885
                29 December 2016
                December 2016
                29 December 2016
                : 14
                : 12
                : e2000933
                Affiliations
                [1 ]Conservation Science Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
                [2 ]Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
                Author notes

                The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

                Article
                pbio.2000933
                10.1371/journal.pbio.2000933
                5199034
                28033326
                bbd0957a-8a68-4223-a4f6-75fe1355e42f
                © 2016 Amano et al

                This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

                History
                Page count
                Figures: 3, Tables: 0, Pages: 8
                Funding
                European Commission’s Marie Curie International Incoming Fellowship Programme (grant number PIIF-GA-2011-303221). Received by TA. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. European Commission's Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions (grant number H2020-MSCA-IF-2014- 656572). Received by JPGV. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Isaac Newton Trust (grant number 15.23(s)). Received by TA and WJS. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Arcadia Fund. Received by WJS. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment. Received by TA. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
                Categories
                Perspective
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Conservation Science
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Behavior
                Verbal Behavior
                Verbal Communication
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Ecology
                Biodiversity
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Ecology
                Biodiversity
                Science Policy
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Anatomy
                Digestive System
                Mouth
                Tongue
                Medicine and Health Sciences
                Anatomy
                Digestive System
                Mouth
                Tongue
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Conservation Biology
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Conservation Science
                Conservation Biology
                Ecology and Environmental Sciences
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Agriculture
                Crop Science
                Crops
                Fiber Crops
                Cotton
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Agriculture
                Agronomy
                Plant Products
                Cotton
                Biology and Life Sciences
                Agriculture
                Crop Science
                Plant Products
                Cotton

                Life sciences
                Life sciences

                Comments

                Comment on this article