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Were later-retracted papers accepted faster?

Yes, for some kinds of retraction. We compared 20,471 retracted research papers in PubMed with 150,703 papers from the same journal and year that were not retracted. The median retracted paper went from received to accepted 12.5 days faster than its journal-year norm. The gap comes from papers retracted for peer-review manipulation (27 days faster) and paper mills (18.5 days). Papers retracted for honest error were accepted at the usual pace.

Published 7 October 2026 · Analysis plan fixed 2 October 2026, before any dates were fetched · All figures measured from PubMed · By Erik Jia. Spotted an error? erik@manusights.com

Data (CSV)Data and method (JSON)CC BY 4.0
Retracted papers
20,471
Comparison papers
150,703
Journals
1,790
Published
2012 to 2024
Plan fixed
2 October 2026

By retraction reason

Peer-review manipulation

Retracted: 3,626

Median gap, days (95% CI): -27 (-41 to -18)

Faster (95% CI): 79.2% (77.9 to 80.5)

Call: Faster

Paper mill

Retracted: 5,921

Median gap, days (95% CI): -18.5 (-31 to -11.5)

Faster (95% CI): 70.5% (69.4 to 71.7)

Call: Faster

Other or unspecified

Retracted: 3,934

Median gap, days (95% CI): -4 (-8 to -1.5)

Faster (95% CI): 53.7% (52.2 to 55.3)

Call: Faster

Plagiarism or duplication

Retracted: 798

Median gap, days (95% CI): -1.5 (-5.5 to +2)

Faster (95% CI): 51.4% (47.9 to 54.8)

Call: No clear difference

Data or image problems

Retracted: 5,732

Median gap, days (95% CI): +1.5 (-0.5 to +3)

Faster (95% CI): 48.7% (47.4 to 50)

Call: No clear difference

Honest error

Retracted: 460

Median gap, days (95% CI): -1 (-7 to +4)

Faster (95% CI): 50.7% (46.1 to 55.2)

Call: No clear difference

A negative gap means the retracted paper was accepted faster than the median comparison paper in its journal and year. "Faster" is the share of retracted papers that beat that median. "Call" applies the decision rule fixed in the analysis plan. Reasons come from the Retraction Watch Database, matched to 17,230 of the 20,471 papers; "Other or unspecified" includes papers with no match. Reason classes were fixed before any date was fetched. A paper with several reasons takes the first match, in the order paper mill, peer-review manipulation, data or image problems, plagiarism or duplication, honest error.

What it means

  • 61.5% of retracted papers were accepted faster than the median paper in their journal that year (95% CI 60.9 to 62.2%). With no difference, that share would be 50%.
  • Papers retracted for peer-review manipulation were the fastest: 79.2% beat their journal-year median, by a median 27 days. For paper-mill retractions it was 70.5% and 18.5 days.
  • Papers retracted for honest error (50.7%), data or image problems (48.7%) and plagiarism or duplication (51.4%) showed no clear difference.
  • The gap appears in papers published from 2021. For papers published 2012 to 2019 there was no clear difference (51.1% faster, median -1.5 days).

In other words, acceptance speed does not separate careless science from careful science. It tracks organised manipulation of the review process, the kind behind the mass retractions of 2022 and 2023.

Where the effect lives

The overall figure is pulled up by the journals and years hit hardest by mass retractions. Three checks we fixed in advance show how concentrated it is.

Each journal counted once

Across 1,790 journals, the median journal-level difference was -1.5 days (95% CI -3 to 0). 925 journals leaned faster and 848 slower.

Without Hindawi journals

13,651 retracted papers remain. 54.3% were faster, by a median 5.5 days (95% CI -9 to -2.5).

Without the three largest publishers

7,420 retracted papers remain. 54.1% were faster, by a median 5 days (95% CI -11 to -0.5).

So the typical journal shows a difference of a day or two. The effect is real outside the largest mass retractions, but it is smaller there. A fast acceptance in an ordinary journal tells you very little about any one paper.

By publication year

Every year from 2021 to 2024 shows retracted papers accepted faster, by a median of 17 to 22.5 days. No year from 2014 to 2020 does.

2012

Retracted: 398

Median gap, days (95% CI): -4 (-9 to +0.8)

Faster (95% CI): 53.8% (48.9 to 58.6)

Call: No clear difference

2013

Retracted: 574

Median gap, days (95% CI): -6 (-11 to -1.5)

Faster (95% CI): 55.4% (51.3 to 59.4)

Call: Faster

2014

Retracted: 716

Median gap, days (95% CI): -4.5 (-11.8 to +1.5)

Faster (95% CI): 54.7% (51.1 to 58.4)

Call: No clear difference

2015

Retracted: 823

Median gap, days (95% CI): -2 (-10 to +1)

Faster (95% CI): 52% (48.6 to 55.4)

Call: No clear difference

2016

Retracted: 775

Median gap, days (95% CI): -4 (-9.5 to +0.5)

Faster (95% CI): 54.2% (50.7 to 57.7)

Call: No clear difference

2017

Retracted: 980

Median gap, days (95% CI): 0 (-4 to +5)

Faster (95% CI): 49.4% (46.3 to 52.5)

Call: No clear difference

2018

Retracted: 1,213

Median gap, days (95% CI): 0 (-5 to +5)

Faster (95% CI): 49.6% (46.8 to 52.4)

Call: No clear difference

2019

Retracted: 1,520

Median gap, days (95% CI): +3.3 (-1 to +6)

Faster (95% CI): 47.1% (44.6 to 49.6)

Call: No clear difference

2020

Retracted: 1,791

Median gap, days (95% CI): -5 (-11.5 to +0.8)

Faster (95% CI): 53.5% (51.2 to 55.8)

Call: No clear difference

2021

Retracted: 2,791

Median gap, days (95% CI): -17 (-32.5 to -7.5)

Faster (95% CI): 64.5% (62.7 to 66.3)

Call: Faster

2022

Retracted: 6,062

Median gap, days (95% CI): -18 (-37 to -10.5)

Faster (95% CI): 72.8% (71.7 to 73.9)

Call: Faster

2023

Retracted: 1,393

Median gap, days (95% CI): -19.5 (-30 to -8.5)

Faster (95% CI): 64.6% (62.1 to 67.1)

Call: Faster

2024

Retracted: 1,435

Median gap, days (95% CI): -22.5 (-34 to -6)

Faster (95% CI): 66.3% (63.8 to 68.7)

Call: Faster

Recent papers have had less time to be retracted, and some comparison papers will be retracted later. Both push the result toward no difference, so recent years are, if anything, understated.

Robustness checks

We declared seven checks in the plan before seeing any result. Six reach the same call. Restricting to 2012 to 2019 does not, which matches the year table.

Without Hindawi journals

Retracted: 13,651

Median gap, days (95% CI): -5.5 (-9 to -2.5)

Faster (95% CI): 54.3% (53.5 to 55.1)

Call: Faster

Without the three publishers with the most retractions

Retracted: 7,420

Median gap, days (95% CI): -5 (-11 to -0.5)

Faster (95% CI): 54.1% (52.9 to 55.2)

Call: Faster

Only journal-years with 5 or more comparison papers

Retracted: 20,451

Median gap, days (95% CI): -12.5 (-17.5 to -8.5)

Faster (95% CI): 61.6% (60.9 to 62.2)

Call: Faster

Without labelled supplements and special issues

Retracted: 20,457

Median gap, days (95% CI): -12.5 (-17.5 to -8.5)

Faster (95% CI): 61.5% (60.9 to 62.2)

Call: Faster

Without journals whose received date looks like a revision date

Retracted: 20,409

Median gap, days (95% CI): -13 (-17.5 to -8.5)

Faster (95% CI): 61.6% (60.9 to 62.3)

Call: Faster

Only journals that also deposit a revised date

Retracted: 12,386

Median gap, days (95% CI): -16 (-24 to -11)

Faster (95% CI): 66.8% (66 to 67.6)

Call: Faster

Only papers published 2012 to 2019

Retracted: 6,999

Median gap, days (95% CI): -1.5 (-3 to 0)

Faster (95% CI): 51.1% (49.9 to 52.2)

Call: No clear difference

The check using only journals that also deposit a revised date matters most for interpretation. In those journals the received date is clearly the original submission, and the gap is larger (-16 days), not smaller.

By publisher

Publisher is the Crossref member that registered each journal's DOIs. We report the 23 publishers with at least 30 retracted papers; 155 smaller groups are left out.

Hindawi Limited

Retracted: 6,822

Median gap, days (95% CI): -20 (-38 to -13)

Faster (95% CI): 76% (75 to 77)

Call: Faster

Elsevier BV

Retracted: 3,173

Median gap, days (95% CI): -3 (-7 to 0)

Faster (95% CI): 52.6% (50.9 to 54.3)

Call: No clear difference

Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Retracted: 3,056

Median gap, days (95% CI): -9 (-15 to -4.5)

Faster (95% CI): 56.6% (54.8 to 58.3)

Call: Faster

Wiley

Retracted: 1,775

Median gap, days (95% CI): -16 (-30.8 to +1)

Faster (95% CI): 60.5% (58.2 to 62.7)

Call: No clear difference

Public Library of Science (PLoS)

Retracted: 1,242

Median gap, days (95% CI): -30 (-51.5 to -10)

Faster (95% CI): 65.5% (62.8 to 68.1)

Call: Faster

Spandidos Publications

Retracted: 1,050

Median gap, days (95% CI): +3 (0 to +6)

Faster (95% CI): 46.6% (43.6 to 49.6)

Call: No clear difference

Frontiers Media SA

Retracted: 561

Median gap, days (95% CI): -3 (-12.5 to +7.5)

Faster (95% CI): 51.9% (47.7 to 56)

Call: No clear difference

Informa UK Limited

Retracted: 437

Median gap, days (95% CI): +5 (-5 to +9.5)

Faster (95% CI): 44.9% (40.3 to 49.5)

Call: No clear difference

MDPI AG

Retracted: 426

Median gap, days (95% CI): +0.5 (-1 to +2.5)

Faster (95% CI): 46.5% (41.8 to 51.2)

Call: No clear difference

Portland Press Ltd.

Retracted: 251

Median gap, days (95% CI): -2 (-10 to +10.5)

Faster (95% CI): 51.8% (45.6 to 57.9)

Call: No clear difference

Impact Journals, LLC

Retracted: 197

Median gap, days (95% CI): -6 (-16 to 0)

Faster (95% CI): 54.8% (47.8 to 61.6)

Call: No clear difference

Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)

Retracted: 195

Median gap, days (95% CI): +3 (-3 to +7.5)

Faster (95% CI): 43.1% (36.3 to 50.1)

Call: No clear difference

S. Karger AG

Retracted: 179

Median gap, days (95% CI): +24 (-18 to +35)

Faster (95% CI): 37.4% (30.7 to 44.7)

Call: No clear difference

Publisher not identified

Retracted: 106

Median gap, days (95% CI): +3 (-3 to +9)

Faster (95% CI): 45.3% (36.1 to 54.8)

Call: No clear difference

Oxford University Press (OUP)

Retracted: 90

Median gap, days (95% CI): -5.8 (-14.5 to +15.8)

Faster (95% CI): 51.1% (41 to 61.2)

Call: No clear difference

American Chemical Society (ACS)

Retracted: 85

Median gap, days (95% CI): +1 (-6 to +10)

Faster (95% CI): 49.4% (39 to 59.8)

Call: No clear difference

SAGE Publications

Retracted: 65

Median gap, days (95% CI): +1 (-42.5 to +25)

Faster (95% CI): 49.2% (37.5 to 61.1)

Call: No clear difference

Bentham Science Publishers Ltd.

Retracted: 39

Median gap, days (95% CI): 0 (-16.5 to +8)

Faster (95% CI): 41% (27.1 to 56.6)

Call: No clear difference

FapUNIFESP (SciELO)

Retracted: 37

Median gap, days (95% CI): -1.5 (-27.8 to +7.5)

Faster (95% CI): 51.4% (35.9 to 66.6)

Call: No clear difference

Walter de Gruyter GmbH

Retracted: 36

Median gap, days (95% CI): -24.8 (-39.5 to +2.3)

Faster (95% CI): 63.9% (47.6 to 77.5)

Call: No clear difference

e-Century Publishing Corporation

Retracted: 36

Median gap, days (95% CI): +2 (-1 to +5)

Faster (95% CI): 44.4% (29.5 to 60.4)

Call: No clear difference

AME Publishing Company

Retracted: 34

Median gap, days (95% CI): -11 (-28.5 to +0.5)

Faster (95% CI): 70.6% (53.8 to 83.2)

Call: No clear difference

American Association for Cancer Research (AACR)

Retracted: 31

Median gap, days (95% CI): +1 (-28.8 to +36.5)

Faster (95% CI): 48.4% (32 to 65.2)

Call: No clear difference

A publisher's count reflects where retracted papers with deposited dates are concentrated, not how common misconduct is there. Hindawi's count reflects the mass retractions of its special-issue papers announced in 2022 and 2023. This table describes papers published 2012 to 2024. It is not an assessment of any publisher's current review process.

What this does not show

  • It does not show that any individual paper was reviewed improperly. The comparison is descriptive, and most quickly accepted papers are never retracted.
  • Received and accepted dates are deposited by publishers. Some journals reset the received date when a revision arrives. The checks above that exclude or isolate those journals give the same answer.
  • Only papers with both dates in PubMed are included. 4,451 retracted records had no usable received and accepted dates.
  • Retracted papers are the ones that were caught. A process that is good at hiding manipulation would not show up here.
  • We searched for earlier paper-level studies of this question and found none, but that search was not exhaustive (see prior work).

Method

We enumerated every PubMed record tagged "retracted publication" and published 2011 to 2025 (30,172 records), kept research articles published 2012 to 2024 with one received date and one accepted date, and dropped front matter and intervals outside 1 to 1,825 days. That left 20,483 retracted papers.

For each journal and publication year containing a retracted paper, we drew a uniform random sample of non-retracted research articles from the same journal and year, up to 10 per retracted paper, checked against the same rules. We examined 182,006 candidate records and kept 150,703. 20,471 retracted papers had at least one comparison paper.

Each retracted paper's interval was compared with the median interval of its comparison papers. Confidence intervals for medians come from 10,000 bootstrap resamples of journal-years, so papers from the same journal and year move together. Shares use Wilson intervals. The plan fixed the decision rule in advance: "faster" only if the interval for the median difference lies entirely below zero and the lower bound of the share faster is above 50%.

A second script recomputed the headline and the Hindawi-excluded figures independently from the frozen inputs and matched them. One change was made during the run: the downloader was set to retry an intermittent PubMed error, which changed no analytic choice. No language model was used in the analysis.

Prior work

Earlier studies looked at parts of this question. None compared retracted and non-retracted papers within the same journal and year across PubMed.

  • Mascato Fontaíña and colleagues described 142 journals that retracted paper-mill papers, including their editorial times (Research Integrity and Peer Review, 2025). Their comparison is at the journal level.
  • Sevryugina and Jimenez measured peer-review time in 1,292 retracted chemistry papers (ACS Omega, 2023), and Abo-Elnour and colleagues did the same for 590 retracted pediatrics papers (European Journal of Pediatrics, 2025). Neither had non-retracted comparison papers.
  • Christos Petrou compared special-issue and regular papers at Hindawi, and publishing-speed trends at Frontiers and PLOS (The Scholarly Kitchen, 2025).

Data sources

PubMed (NCBI E-utilities)

Retracted-publication records, received and accepted dates, journal and year

Retraction Watch Database, via Crossref

Retraction reasons

Crossref REST API

Publisher (Crossref member) for each DOI prefix

The downloads carry every number on this page, with both kinds of confidence interval, under CC BY 4.0. They contain aggregates only. No paper, author, editor or journal is listed.

Questions

Were retracted papers accepted faster than other papers?

On average, yes. Across 20,471 retracted research papers in PubMed published 2012 to 2024, the median retracted paper was accepted 12.5 days faster than the median paper in the same journal and year, and 61.5% were faster than that median. The gap comes from papers retracted for peer-review manipulation and paper-mill activity.

Does a fast acceptance mean a paper is unreliable?

No. Papers retracted for honest error, data or image problems, or plagiarism were accepted at the usual pace, and across 1,790 journals the typical journal showed a difference of only 1.5 days. Most fast papers are never retracted. Speed is a pattern in organised manipulation, not a test for an individual paper.

Which retractions show the biggest speed gap?

Papers retracted for peer-review manipulation were accepted a median 27 days faster than their journal-year median, and 79.2% were faster. Papers retracted for paper-mill activity were 18.5 days faster, and 70.5% were faster.

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APA
Manusights. (2026). Were later-retracted papers accepted faster? A within-journal comparison of 20,471 retracted papers in PubMed (Version 2026.10.02-retraction-speed-v1). https://manusights.com/research/retraction-acceptance-speed
MLA
Manusights. "Were Later-Retracted Papers Accepted Faster?" Version 2026.10.02-retraction-speed-v1, Manusights, 7 Oct. 2026, https://manusights.com/research/retraction-acceptance-speed.
Vancouver
Manusights. Were later-retracted papers accepted faster? [Internet]. Version 2026.10.02-retraction-speed-v1. 2026 Oct 7. Available from: https://manusights.com/research/retraction-acceptance-speed

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