0 1
Does it matter?
First of all, we should distinguish the reasons why the referenced file was withdrawn.
There are many reasons why an article is rejected, which may be the article itself, the author or the journal.
If an article is withdrawn because the data source is not allowed or the author's signature is problematic, it is not a big problem to quote the data and tables in the withdrawn article, but the premise is that the editor must be contacted in time to inform this situation. Of course, the document has been withdrawn, and the reason for withdrawal will also be explained.
However, if the reason for the retraction is academic misconduct or the ethical review fails, it is obviously inappropriate to quote the content of this article at this time, and it is necessary to correct your own article in time to avoid being affected by the retraction.
Then, when the cited documents are withdrawn, under what circumstances should we revise our corresponding articles?
At this time, we need to know what kind of paper we are writing.
For original research articles, the references cited by them have little influence on the conclusions of the articles. However, the cited articles either support or contradict the author's own research work, which may slightly change the focus of the discussion. So the discussion part of the article needs to be slightly modified or even deleted. At the same time, the article revision statement will be issued after revision to remind readers that this part of the quoted content is no longer valid, which can ensure that the withdrawn article will not be cited again.
However, for review articles, especially for systematic reviews integrating research results through meta-analysis, deleting a study may have a considerable impact on the conclusion, and even the conclusion will be completely overturned. Therefore, it is suggested that the authors of such articles revise their conclusions in time, and it is best to repeat the Meta-analysis.
02
How to avoid it?
There are generally two situations in which a reference file is withdrawn. The author of the first kind of literature did not withdraw when quoting, and the second kind of literature was withdrawn, but neither the author nor the peer-reviewed editor knew it.
In view of the first situation, it is necessary for the author not to blindly "superstitious" high-scoring papers and authoritative documents in the stage of collecting documents, but to collect and read with his own critical thinking, and to have his own control and judgment on the doubtful points in the article.
In addition, sometimes articles have been retracted, but the explanation of retraction is not detailed, and many databases also lack complete retraction information, which leads to the author's ignorance of this issue. At the same time, many editors will not verify in detail whether the cited documents have been withdrawn when reviewing manuscripts, which will easily lead to the second situation. In order to avoid this situation, the author must carefully verify whether the sources of documents and data are reliable at the stage of collecting documents.
In short, we should know that for the problems in published articles, magazines usually take three steps: correcting, expressing doubts and finally withdrawing the manuscript. In other words, when the article is retracted, there must be no minor problems in one aspect, because the first choice for editing these problems must be the author to correct them. By the time the manuscript is retracted, there must be great fallacies or academic disputes in the whole article. Then, when quoting literature, the author must keep his eyes open and bring dialectical and critical thinking. If the literature he quoted is unexpectedly withdrawn, he should contact the journal editor at the first time to correct the article, so as not to eventually affect his paper.