Als 4. Ausgabe im Jahr 2023 der Editors' Selection der „German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research“ wurde der Beitrag „Does COVID-19 facilitate gender inequality in article submission behavior? To what extent is article submission behavior influenced by career status? An exploration using the German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research as an example“ von Lena Henning, Charlotte Raue-Behlau, Barbara Halberschmidt, Jana Peikenkamp & Maike Tietjens ausgewählt. Der Beitrag ist im Open Access frei verfügbar.
Abstract
During the COVID-19 pandemic, many governments closed schools and imposed social distancing requirements, limiting childcare options and requiring researchers to stay at home. Recent studies indicated that women are particularly negatively affected by the pandemic containment measures. Depending on discipline and type of publication, it is stated that the number of submissions by women has fallen dramatically, but submissions by men have remained constant or even increased. The aim of this study is to examine whether a decrease in article submissions during the COVID-19 pandemic by women also applies to the field of sport and exercise sciences using the German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research as an example. Furthermore, this study aimed to investigate to what extent career status has an influence on submission behavior during COVID-19. The current analysis focuses on 198 submissions to the German Journal of Exercise and Sport Research, which were systematically examined with regard to the first authorship of articles submitted from April 1st, 2019 to March 31st, 2021. Results of a log-linear analysis show that men submitted significantly more articles. The gap between women and men is greatest in the position of professors, which reflects the distribution of women and men in scientific employees. However, no significant differences in submission behavior are found before vs. during the pandemic. This study functions as a starting point for the discipline of sport and exercise science from which submission behavior should be further monitored taking into account individual and social factors which might influence submission behavior.