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MDPI UK Social Sciences Academic Forum


Group of people smiling near a decorated Christmas tree and MDPI banner in a conference setting. Warm lighting and festive mood.

On 27th November, MDPI UK hosted its first Social Sciences Academic Forum at the Hyatt Regency in Manchester.  


The event brought together local researchers at every stage of their career, from PhD. students to professors.

 


Throughout the day, attendees heard from three social sciences experts who delivered presentations on a range of topics: 


  • Prof. Daniel McCarthy, Section Editor-in-Chief of Social Sciences; 


Prof. McCarthy talked about the challenges of publishing interdisciplinary research, focusing on the difficulties of finding the right journal for interdisciplinary papers, the importance of a quality peer review process, and the challenges of the existing Anglophonic bias in academic publishing.  


  • Dr. Sylvia Terbeck, Editorial Board member for Social Psychology; 


Dr. Terbeck’s presentation explored the quantity versus quality in relation to the novelty of research. Specifically, she challenged the assumption that impactful research must have a large sample size.  


  • Dr. Anya Osborn, Journal Relations Project Manager at MDPI.  


Finally, Dr. Osborn delivered a presentation on the use of AI in the publishing industry. She covered MDPI’s guidelines on AI use, authorship and AI, the risks of using AI for manuscript content, and AI usage during the peer review process.  


Following these presentations was a series of breakout discussions which allowed researchers to discuss the key topics from each presentation in more depth. Each breakout group was led by a social scientist working for MDPI, meaning our speakers were able to provide further insights into their presentations throughout the breakout discussions.  



The discussions brought out an array of pertinent points, including the various benefits of qualitative versus quantitative research, the bias of reviewers reading papers where AI use has been disclosed, and the difficulties of publishing in a journal that isn’t indexed in an internationally recognised database.  


We are happy to say that the forum was filled with lively social debates about a variety of topics relevant to academic publishing today.  


MDPI UK wishes to extend its sincere thanks to all of the speakers and attendees who made the event possible, and we look forward to seeing them again at future events.  

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