Archive

21 May Hannah, K., Fuller, R.A. Smith, R.K., Sutherland, W.J. and Amano, T. (2025) Language barriers in conservation science citation networks. Conservation Biology.

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In this paper we showed that non-English papers receive citations largely from the same language, indicating that conservaiton evidence rarely crosses language barriers....

05 Feb Berdejo-Espinola, V. and Amano, T. (2025) Assessing diverse values of nature requires multilingual evidence. Nature Reviews Biodiversity 1: 5–6.

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This paper argues that global assessments of people’s values of nature should be based on multilingual evidence to capture the plurality of nature’s values across cultures and languages, avoid overlooking valuable knowledge, and inform policy and decision-making on the basis of unbiased evidence....

04 Feb Amano, T. and Berdejo-Espinola, V. (2025) Language barriers in conservation: consequences and solutions. Trends in Ecology & Evolution.

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This review first describes, with evidence based on a growing body of literature, three types of language barriers in evidence-based conservation. It also provides a checklist of solutions that can be adopted by individuals, institutions, journals, conferences, and funders for overcoming three types of language...

25 Mar Arenas-Castro, H., Berdejo-Espinola, V., Chowdhury, S., Rodríguez-Contreras, A., James, A.R.M., Raja, N.B., et al.. (2024) Academic publishing requires linguistically inclusive policies. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 291: 20232840.

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This study examined the linguistic policies of 736 journals in biological sciences and revealed that scientific journals are doing minimal efforts to foster a multilingual community of authors and readers....

20 Mar Wei, H., Berdejo-Espinola, V., Ma, Y. & Amano, T. (2024) Content analysis of nature documentaries in China: challenges and opportunities to raise public conservation awareness. Biological Conservation 292: 110522.

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This paper investigated the challenges and opportunities for nature documentaries in China to raise public conservation awareness, by investigating their thematic, geographical, and taxonomic coverages....

08 Feb Hannah, K., Haddaway, N.R., Fuller, R.A. & Amano, T. (2024) Language inclusion in ecological systematic reviews and maps: Barriers and perspectives. Research Synthesis Methods.

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By assessing 72 systematic reviews and maps published in Environmental Evidence, this paper revealed the barriers that limit authors' ability or intent to find and include non-English-language literature....

25 Jul Amano, T., Ramírez-Castañeda, C., Berdejo-Espinola, V., Borokini, I., Chowdhury, S., Golivets, M., González-Trujillo, J.D., Montaño-Centellas, F., Paudel, K., White, R.L. & Veríssimo, D. (2023) The manifold costs of being a non-native English speaker in science. PLOS Biology 21: e3002184.

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This paper quantified disadvantages of being a non-native English speaker in conducting a range of scientific activities, from reading and writing papers to participating in international conferences....

22 Mar Amano, T., Berdejo-Espinola, V., Akasaka, M., de Andrade Junior, M.A.U., Blaise, N., Checco, J., et al. (2023) The role of non-English-language science in informing national biodiversity assessments. Nature Sustainability 6: 845-854.

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By investigating the use of scientific literature in biodiversity assessment reports across 37 countries/territories, we have uncovered the established role of non-English-language literature as a major source of information locally....

22 Mar Berdejo-Espinola, V. & Amano, T. (2023) AI tools can improve equity in science. Science, 379: 991.

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In response to Science's updated policy to ban the use of text generated by AI tools in papers, in this letter we argue that AI tools could help alleviate current linguistic disparities in academia and thus improve equity in science....

23 Feb Nolde-Lopez, B., Bundus, J., Arenas-Castro, H., Román, D., Chowdhury, S., Amano, T., Berdejo-Espinola, V. & Wadgymar, S.M. (2023) Language barriers in organismal biology: what can journals do better? Integrative Organismal Biology, obad003.

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This study surveyed the author guidelines of 230 journals in organismal biology for linguistically inclusive and equitable practices and policies....