Methods in Research on Research (MiRoR) is a project sponsored by Marie Curie Actions, a body funded by the European Union. MiRoR’s specific aims are to reduce waste and increase research value in clinical research. SENSE members who attended the METM19 conference last September in Split may have attended presentations by researchers working for MiRoR.
On 25 November last year, I had the pleasure of attending a one-day conference that marked the conclusion of this project. It was titled ‘Meta-research on transforming clinical research’ and was held in the very grand surroundings of the National Academy of Medicine in Paris. All 15 MiRoR fellows were on hand with poster presentations of their individual projects.
The keynote speaker was John Ioannidis, who is known as ‘the father of meta-science’. His 2005 article ‘Why most published research findings are false’ is one of the most often downloaded and cited scientific papers of all time. He and the other speakers in the first half of the program focused primarily on setting up and planning research in ways that can prevent waste. These presentations were illuminating, but didn’t relate directly to language quality in research articles.
The second half of the program, however, was very relevant for those working with academic and scientific English. It was devoted mostly to avoiding waste by writing articles in a more effective and transparent way. Topics investigated by some of the MiRoR fellows included encouraging the use of reporting guidelines, and reducing the number of exaggerated and/or poorly worded claims in research articles. We learned that a number of mechanical methods are now being created to achieve these aims. For example, Halil Kilicoglu of the University of Illinois gave a fascinating presentation on how text mining can be used to determine the use of reporting guidelines in a scientific article.
All in all, it was a great day that provided an opportunity to rub shoulders with some very distinguished academics and researchers. Extensive documentation on MiRoR is available via the website. For the full conference program, click here. Individual presentations can be found here.
