Several major scientific-journal publishers have launched poli­cies that allow scientists to easily change their name on previous pub­lications – a move that transgender researchers have been campaign­ing to introduce for years. In March Elsevier introduced a name-change policy that covers its more than 2500 journals, while similar initiatives were recently announced by IOP Publishing, which publishes Phys­ics World, as well as the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Chemi­cal Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry, PLOS and Wiley. The American Physical Society (APS), meanwhile, is expected to release its own policy soon.

For transgender scientists who change their name, their old name can be personally painful and can also reveal them as being transgen­der. Previously, scientists had there­fore faced a decision between two bad choices – leaving older research off their publication record or risk­ing discrimination. According to the APS LGBT+ Climate in Physics sur­vey, published in 2016, transgender and non-binary physicists reported the highest levels of exclusionary behaviour, adverse climate and unsupportive policies. In the UK, meanwhile, almost a third of LGBT+ physical scientists have considered leaving their jobs because of discrim­ination and toxic workplace climates.

These policies com­ing into existence are finally going to start allowing trans scientists to bring more of their full selves and their full academic history to every place as they advance in their career

Elena Long

The recent journal policy changes have been driven by a group of transgender scholars belonging to the Name Change Policy Work­ing Group, who have worked with publishers and individual journals to develop the new policies. Irving Rettig, an inorganic chemist at Portland State University, began campaigning for the change after he transitioned and found himself caught within the bureaucracy of the university, scientific societies and publishers. “Your name is really important in science because it is the identifier that is linked to your merit as a scholar,” notes Rettig. “If your academic work is fractured across multiple identities…that would be incredibly detrimental, not just to your reputation but to your access to grants, your access to collaborations, your recognition and visibility.” Ret­tig adds that, for other transgender scientists, the issue could be com­pounded later in their careers, when they could have a larger publishing record to correct.

The next step

With IOP Publishing’s new name-change policy, authors can update their name and other identifying information such as pronouns, head­shots and e-mail addresses in all previous journal articles. The policy – which was specifically designed to address the issues transgender researchers face – can be used by authors who change their name for any reason, such as gender identity, marriage or religion. IOP Publish­ing’s policy is fully confidential and offers the option to change a name with or without a public notice. It also does not require proof of a name change, which can be a daunting and costly hurdle for scientists undergo­ing a legal name change.

“We wanted to ensure that authors could change their name on already published research without a cum­bersome process,” notes Kim Eggle­ton, integrity and inclusion manager at IOP Publishing. “A more inclusive and equitable publishing environ­ment is important to us, so we’re pleased to have made another step in the right direction.”

The working group hopes to now introduce a set of guidelines through the Committee on Publication Eth­ics – a non-profit organization that aims to define standards in the eth­ics of publishing – to set best prac­tice and support smaller journals that may not have the resources to develop their own policies. Publish­ers and researchers are also consid­ering changes to the wider publishing infrastructure. The next step could be to allow name changes on citation lists – a tricky feat given that articles can have hundreds of citations in other works.

More to do

Elena Long, a nuclear physicist from the University of New Hamp­shire who co-led the APS’s LGBT+ Climate in Physics survey, says the journal policy shift is important and much needed. “These policies com­ing into existence are finally going to start allowing trans scientists to bring more of their full selves and their full academic history to every place as they advance in their career, without having to out themselves and risking that extra level of discrimina­tion,” says Long.

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Where people and particles collide

Both Rettig and Long now hope that with the shifts in digital pub­lishing, systems can be redesigned in more fluid ways. For example, researchers have recommended tying publications to an author’s ORCID ID, which is a unique digital identifier, rather than a name. Most importantly, Long notes, there needs to be a move to recognize that diver­sity and inclusion is a fundamental part of science. “Physics has made a lot of progress, but a lot of that pro­gress continues to be made by the people who are having to struggle through it,” says Long. “There’s still a long way to go.”