“Our paper published in Experimental Results has one of the highest altimetric scores in the journal. In fact, is has the highest altimetric score of any paper I’ve published. Just because it’s a short paper (700 words) and it’s something incremental, doesn’t mean it can’t be sexy!” explained Dr. Punit Shah, Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Psychology at the University of Bath.

Dr. Shah discusses his paper, which calls into question the use of the AQ10, a tool widely considered to be the gold standard screening tool for autism in adults. This highly controversial research was picked up by international news agencies, including BBC News. Additionally, the publication of the research directly informed the grant application to fund a P.h.D. for a researcher.

Benefits of publishing your standalone research in Experimental Results

• Get credit for null, novel or reproducibility research
• Make a positive contribution to your field
• Boost your publication record
• Improve career prospects
• Build an honest, credible scientific record

Short, controversial finding advances field of biological science

“This short and controversial finding helped to advance the field of biological science and autism research…the story was picked up by charities that focus on autism research and how to support people with autism” emphasised Punit. These charities reached out to Dr. Shah, wanting to work with him to understand why this screening test for autism may not be appropriate, and how it could be improved.

Novel results often go unpublished because they don’t fit the traditional journal framework

The controversial nature of the research made it difficult to publish in a traditional psychology journal so Experimental Results provided a platform to share this valuable research. These type of results often go unpublished simply because they do not fit the traditional scholarly journal framework. Experimental Results is perfect for novel research and allows it to make a meaningful contribution to the wider body of literature in the fields of science, medicine and technology. Additionally, the journal accepts short format papers, making it a relatively quick, painless paper to write.

About Experimental Results

Experimental Results is the home of standalone experiments including null, novel and replication research, within the Cambridge University Press collection of journals. It is an open access journal, providing a forum for experimental findings that disclose the small incremental steps, vitally important to experimental research; experiments and findings which have so far remained hidden.

Articles for consideration in Experimental Results include validation and reproducibility of existing findings, null results, supplementary findings, improvements or amendments to published results, as well as results that could be of importance, but for whatever reason, the researcher has not followed a particular line of questioning to produce the full narrative for a traditional paper.

Interview by Kin Maclachlan

Original publication:

Emily C. Taylor, Lucy A. Livingston, Rachel A. Clutterbuck and Punit Shah

Psychometric concerns with the 10-item Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ10) as a measure of trait autism in the general population

Experimental Results, [05 March 2020, DOI: 10.1017/exp.2019.e3]