Gender gaps in publications and citations in gambling studies: Comparisons against addiction science.

Abstract

Women in academia publish fewer papers and receive fewer citations than men. These gender gaps likely reflect systemic biases operating over several levels, from journal editorial policies to academic career progression. This study sought to characterize gender gaps for publications and citations in the field of gambling studies. An automated gender inference procedure classified authors' binarized gender from their first names. Gender gaps were computed for publications and citations of papers in gambling studies, using the wider field of addiction science as a benchmark. Publication data were scraped from eight peer-reviewed gambling/addictions journals and separately from all gambling publications listed in PubMed. Men authored 16% more publications than women among gambling papers and 23% more publications among nongambling addictions papers. Although robust gender gaps were observed in specialist gambling journals, we find limited overall evidence for gender inequality being greater in gambling studies. Indeed, among nongambling addiction papers, men published more, despite a greater apparent representation of women in the field. The gender gap was most pronounced for the last authorships, denoting seniority. Among the first authorships, there was variability between journals, and some journals displayed approximate parity. There was limited evidence for any corresponding gender gap in citation counts. Gender gaps in gambling research, and addiction science more broadly, adhere to wider trends in academia, including the associations with academic seniority. Variability between individual journals supports the role of journal editorial policies to increase the representation and visibility of women researchers in addiction science. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).