A system called QUALIS was implemented in Brazil in 2009, intended to rank graduate programs from different subject areas and promote selected national journals. Since this system uses a complicated suit of criteria (differing among subject areas) to group journals into discrete categories, it could potentially create incentives to publish in low-impact journals ranked highly by QUALIS. Here I assess the influence of the QUALIS journal ranking system on the global impact of Brazilian science. Brazil shows a steeper decrease in the number of citations per document since the implementation of this QUALIS system, compared to the top Latin American countries publishing more scientific articles. All subject areas showed some degree of bias, with social sciences being usually more biased than natural sciences. Lastly, the decrease in the number of citations over time proved steeper in a more biased subject area, suggesting a faster shift towards low-impact journals. Overall, the findings documented here suggest that the QUALIS system has undermined the global impact of Brazilian science, and reinforce a recent recommendation from an official committee evaluating graduate programs to eliminate QUALIS. A system based on impact metrics could avoid introducing distorted incentives, and thereby boost the global impact of Brazilian science.

中文翻译：

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QUALIS：期刊排名系统破坏了巴西科学的影响

巴西于2009年实施了称为QUALIS的系统，该系统旨在对不同学科领域的研究生课程进行排名，并推广某些国家级期刊。由于该系统使用一套复杂的标准（在主题领域之间有所不同）来将期刊分为不同的类别，因此它有可能产生激励措施，以在QUALIS排名较高的低影响期刊上进行出版。在这里，我评估了QUALIS期刊排名系统对巴西科学的全球影响的影响。自从实施QUALIS系统以来，巴西的每篇文献被引次数急剧下降，而拉丁美洲发表文章最多的国家排名最高。所有学科领域都表现出一定程度的偏见，社会科学通常比自然科学更偏颇。最后，事实证明，随着学科领域的偏向，引文数量随着时间的推移而下降，这表明向低影响力期刊的转移更快。总体而言，此处记录的调查结果表明，QUALIS系统削弱了巴西科学的全球影响力，并加强了评估研究生课程的官方委员会最近提出的消除QUALIS的建议。基于影响指标的系统可以避免引入扭曲的激励机制，从而增强巴西科学的全球影响力。并加强了评估研究生课程的官方委员会的最新建议，以消除QUALIS。基于影响指标的系统可以避免引入扭曲的激励机制，从而增强巴西科学的全球影响力。并加强了评估研究生课程的官方委员会的最新建议，以消除QUALIS。基于影响指标的系统可以避免引入扭曲的激励机制，从而增强巴西科学的全球影响力。