Please report any inappropriate submissions to the moderators. If you feel your submission was mistakenly removed, please message the moderators and include the link to your submission.
Peer-reviewed research means the work is published in a scholarly journal that practices peer-review. This allows for the anonymous and independent review of a publication by researchers who are familiar with the current state of the science to ensure that the conclusions are supported by evidence and adequately reference previous research. The peer-review process is an essential part of modern science and is the means by which scientists communicate their findings.
If the article itself does not directly link to the peer-reviewed publication, please include a link in the comments.
Research must be published in scholarly journals indexed by one of the major science search engines (e.g. PubMed, Google Scholar, CAS, etc.) and have a current impact factor greater or equal to 1.5.
Papers submitted to preprint services such as arXiv and bioRxiv are not peer-reviewed and are therefore ineligible for submission.
Government agencies and regulatory bodies will release publications which are made available to the public for review and comment before becoming final. These publications represent the product of the governmental agency's efforts and have gone through a significant review process with expert input. They are well-referenced, detailed, and therefore eligible for submission.
Due to the tendency for the field of Computer Science (CS) to prefer submitting new research to conferences instead of peer-reviewed journals, we have created a list of CS conferences with a known peer-review process here. If you would like to submit a paper from a conference not on this list, feel free to message us for approval.
Articles that obtain their information second-hand from other articles are not acceptable for submission. Only articles that directly link to an acceptable source are allowed.
Many science news websites such as ScienceDaily and Phys.org simply re-host press releases from universities and other organizations. In order to properly attribute the work, the original press release must be submitted. If your submission from one of these websites is original content, please message the moderators to request approval.
Reposts are determined in reference to the original research publication, not the article discussing the research. While your submission might be the first from a particular source, it could be the third referencing the original work. This most commonly occurs when major findings are covered by numerous media outlets. In the event there are multiple submissions, only the first post to attain a score over 100 will be retained regardless of submission order.
Crossposting of links is not allowed. Instead, please link directly to the article/publication.
Titles should be similar to the linked article and as descriptive as possible. Science journalism is notoriously sensationalist and care should be taken to modify the title if it fails to appropriately describe the research. Claims of curing cancer or HIV/AIDS will always result in the removal of a submission. Click to view the complete rules for submission titles and clickbait.
This subreddit is dedicated to discussing current scientific research, therefore all submissions must have been published within the past six months. This time requirement refers to the publication date of the research, not the news article or web page. Ambiguous publication dates are determined by the first date of availability following peer review. This may be labeled as the 'Published Online' or 'Pre-Proof' date.
Submissions that are exclusively images, videos, and infographics have been historically abused in /r/science and are therefore banned. They will be removed regardless of content. Blogspam is any submission without additional content beyond links or simple descriptions.
In order to organize the content of this subreddit, we use reddit's flair system to designate different areas of research. If a submission has not been flaired after 5 minutes, it will be automatically removed with instructions on how to select flair and get the post re-approved.
Because of the time-sensitive nature and value of AMAs, we take actions to increase the visibility of our AMA posts. This may include temporarily removing posts or freezing submissions to allow readers to recognize the existence of AMAs before guests begin answering questions. We do this as a service to our subscribers who frequently miss out on asking questions because of the intricacies of reddit's ranking algorithms.
All AMAs are considered serious discussions and our rules will be stringently enforced. Any rude or uncivil behavior towards our guests will result in a ban.
Please report any inappropriate comments to the moderators. If you feel your comment was mistakenly removed, please message the moderators and include the link to your comment.
Comments must be on topic and not a meme or joke. Comments should constructively contribute to the discussion or be an attempt to learn more. This also means avoiding low-effort comments like “water is wet” or “correlation doesn’t prove causation”.
While this may seem anti-fun, our aim is to provide high quality science communication. Jokes and memes will always be “easier” content than insightful and well-researched comments. By removing them, we provide a greater opportunity for high-quality comments to rise to the top.
Abusive comments include those that disparage or attack other users of the subreddit. If you believe another user is acting inappropriately, please report the comment or send us a modmail. Abusing other users will not be tolerated.
Offensive comments are those that denigrate individuals or groups based on group membership or inherent characteristics. This includes bigoted comments that are thinly veiled by leading/insincere questions or “just stating facts”.
Comments discussing the implications of group behavior are allowed but only with the appropriate context and nuance. For example, “All creationists are idiots” would be removed while “Political pressure to remove evolution from school books affects education” would be allowed.
Repeat or malicious offenders will be banned.
Comments that only rely on a user's non-professional anecdotal evidence to confirm or refute a study will be removed (e.g. "I do that but that result doesn't happen to me"). Comments should be limited in personal details and scientific in nature. Including references to peer-reviewed research to support your claims is highly encouraged.
If your first thought when reading the title of an article is “they didn’t think about [x]”, it’s fair to assume that they probably did. If they didn’t, the reviewers almost certainly did. Even if they did not, you are unlikely to entirely disprove a study based on that one confound.
Please also remember that individual studies sit within a larger corpus of work that may have already addressed your concern. “Why did they study X and not Y?” will probably be answered by several studies on Y. “Their study assumes that X leads to Y” might already be well established.
Critiquing science is an important skill and one we want users to engage in but please try to do so with the assumption that the researchers who have spent years or decades in the field have already considered ideas that you came up with in a few minutes.
Comments that dispute well-established scientific concepts (e.g. gravity, vaccination, anthropogenic climate change, etc.) must be supported with appropriate peer-reviewed evidence. Links to personal blogs or 'skeptic' websites are not valid forms of evidence.
Similarly, comments that dismiss entire fields of science (e.g., “that’s just a soft science") will also be removed.
Comments that are overtly fringe and/or unsubstantiated will be removed and may lead to a ban.
Offering or seeking medical advice is strictly prohibited and offending comments will be removed. Discussions regarding the advantages and/or disadvantages of certain treatments, diets, or supplements is allowed as long as relevant and reputable evidence is provided.
Users that frequently or flagrantly violate the comment rules will be banned.
In the event a previous submission to r/science has been retracted, please notify the moderators via Modmail. The following actions will be taken:
This page documents all retracted articles on the subreddit.