Nicolas Clairis
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nclairis.bsky.social
Nicolas Clairis
@nclairis.bsky.social
220 followers 440 following 77 posts
Postdoc passionate about effort-based decision-making and the roots of effort aversiveness.

If you are on Mastodon, my profile is: @nicolasclairis@fediscience.org
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Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
nrascovan.bsky.social
Institut Pasteur (@pasteur.fr) is recruiting new young PIs to open new groups in the Institute. Deadline is February 9th! Don't miss the opportunity!
January 27, 2026 at 6:56 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
stepalminteri.bsky.social
🧵 New paper in @NatureComms
Feedback-induced attitudinal changes in risk preferences
Nasioulas, Potier, Cerrotti, Lebreton & me (2026)
Does feedback really improve risky decision-making? Short answer: no! it changes attitudes, not learning. 👇
rdcu.be/e0VcO
Feedback-induced attitudinal changes in risk preferences
Nature Communications - Normative theory predicts that feedback should not affect decisions under risk, but past findings disagree. Here, the authors show that feedback shifts risk-taking by...
rdcu.be
January 27, 2026 at 12:12 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
pierrelemerre.bsky.social
Main postdoc study out! We can redefine prefrontal cortex regions with single-unit activity! Grateful to @carlenlab.bsky.social and @weltgeischt.bsky.social who made this crazy project real. Thanks to all co-authors, collaborators, and reviewers.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A prefrontal cortex map based on single-neuron activity - Nature Neuroscience
The authors mapped spontaneous and choice activity across mouse prefrontal cortex. The activity maps aligned with intrinsic connectivity rather than anatomical subregions, suggesting that connectivity...
www.nature.com
January 20, 2026 at 10:53 AM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
eicathomefinn.bsky.social
Kent, Essex and apparently Sussex all decline to be gouged by Elsevier Read & Publish deals. Others may well follow. 1/2
Three major research universities opt out of new Elsevier deal
Complaints over ‘price increases’ and open access models spur UK institutions to walk away from offer from publishing giant, despite nationally negotiated agreement
www.timeshighereducation.com
January 22, 2026 at 8:09 AM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
jeremie-n.bsky.social
Oui, When Prophecy Fails, l'étude fondatrice de la théorie de la dissonance cognitive repose sur des faits fabriqués :
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/....

Une "dissonance cognitive" auquelle beaucoup restent accrochés, dont G. Bronner, malgré les critiques connues du concept (et c'est meta 💀)
January 17, 2026 at 4:47 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
I hope this one gets an #IgNobel would be well deserved
sungkim.bsky.social Sung Kim @sungkim.bsky.social · Dec 26
If you were wondering - though I’m not sure why - yes, mosquitoes can fly in the rain.

Paper: arxiv.org/abs/1110.3051
December 26, 2025 at 6:54 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
carlbergstrom.com
Just decline the peer review invitation.

What are you people even doing?
More than half of researchers now use AI for peer review — often against guidance
A survey of 1,600 academics found that more than 50% have used artificial-intelligence tools while peer reviewing manuscripts.
www.nature.com
December 16, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
samuelmoore.org
Another AI-fabricated book from Top Quality academic publisher Spring Nature.
Publisher under fire after ‘fake’ citations found in AI ethics guide
A book published by Springer Nature includes dozens of questionable citations, including references to journals that do not exist
www.thetimes.com
December 15, 2025 at 8:23 AM
nclairis.bsky.social
fediscience.org/@ungarage@ma...
December 11, 2025 at 1:18 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
phdcomics.com
Publication charges
December 5, 2025 at 2:17 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
cnrs.fr
#Communiqué 🗞️ L'@academiesciences.bsky.social et le CNRS signent un accord de coédition pour développer un modèle de publication scientifique en libre accès et gratuit. ✍️

👉 www.cnrs.fr/fr/presse/la...
December 4, 2025 at 3:04 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
Proton 💙
proton.me Proton @proton.me · Dec 4
You requested it, now it’s here - introducing Proton Sheets! The privacy-first alternative to Excel and Google Sheets.

Spreadsheets form the framework of modern businesses, and with Proton Sheets, you can ensure your data is private and secure.

1/4
December 4, 2025 at 12:49 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
"This decision by the CNRS will help the organisation save €1.4 million annually in subscription fees, funds that will be redirected towards initiatives promoting open science, particularly the development of open databases." YES!
#scientificPublishing
December 4, 2025 at 8:40 AM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
paolocrosetto.bsky.social
Since AI slop is again all over Scientific Reports, a thread on the economics of grey-zone publishing.

Why does slop keep getting published? What does it mean for science? How can we stop this?

Background readings:
Understand the strain: tinyurl.com/2b6wxx5r
Stop the drain: tinyurl.com/3jfscscy
An obviously AI-generated figure with AI slop and fake text all over it, recently published in Scientific Reports.
November 30, 2025 at 11:10 AM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
sarahgarf.bsky.social
** Recruiting a postdoc ** We are looking for a postdoc to work on emotion, mental health, and interoception, based in London at @ucl.ac.uk in my lab (Clinical and Affective Neuroscience). Part of a large Wellcome Grant (co-led with the brilliant @camillanord.bsky.social)
November 24, 2025 at 12:22 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
arossotto.bsky.social
New pontification piece with @awestbrook.bsky.social and Jean Daunizeau, just out in TICS:
Why is cognitive effort experienced as costly?
(or why does it hurt to think)

never written a review paper before in my life, that was a new and unusual experience
Why is cognitive effort experienced as costly?
A widespread observation is that people avoid mentally effortful courses of action, and much recent work examining cognitive effort has explained subjective effort evaluation – and, consequently, pref...
www.cell.com
November 19, 2025 at 2:48 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
"commercial publishing is becoming increasingly detached from the needs and interests of researchers and now serve profits, not science"
November 19, 2025 at 2:30 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
Anyone understands why such a big part of internet depends on one single US-based company? That sounds like a terrible security flaw on so many levels (sovereignity, vulnerability, etc.)
November 18, 2025 at 2:31 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
dannykay68.bsky.social
EXCELLENT graphic on the drain of scientific publishing! zenodo.org/records/1759...
November 15, 2025 at 4:04 AM
nclairis.bsky.social
R.I.P. US-based research 😅
mjcrockett.bsky.social M.J. Crockett @mjcrockett.bsky.social · Nov 14
Just unbelievably cruel and stupid.
environmicrobio.bsky.social Roland Hatzenpichler @environmicrobio.bsky.social · Nov 14
“The prohibited activities would include joint research, co-authorship on papers, and advising a foreign graduate student or postdoctoral fellow. The language is retroactive, meaning any interactions during the previous 5 years could make a scientist ineligible for future federal funding.”
November 14, 2025 at 1:13 PM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
hansonmark.bsky.social
We wrote the Strain on scientific publishing to highlight the problems of time & trust. With a fantastic group of co-authors, we present The Drain of Scientific Publishing:

a 🧵 1/n

Drain: arxiv.org/abs/2511.04820
Strain: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/...
Oligopoly: direct.mit.edu/qss/article/...
A table showing profit margins of major publishers. A snippet of text related to this table is below. 1. The four-fold drain 1.1 Money Currently, academic publishing is dominated by profit-oriented, multinational companies for whom scientific knowledge is a commodity to be sold back to the academic community who created it. The dominant four are Elsevier, Springer Nature, Wiley and Taylor & Francis, which collectively generated over US$7.1 billion in revenue from journal publishing in 2024 alone, and over US$12 billion in profits between 2019 and 2024 (Table 1A). Their profit margins have always been over 30% in the last five years, and for the largest publisher (Elsevier) always over 37%. Against many comparators, across many sectors, scientific publishing is one of the most consistently profitable industries (Table S1). These financial arrangements make a substantial difference to science budgets. In 2024, 46% of Elsevier revenues and 53% of Taylor & Francis revenues were generated in North America, meaning that North American researchers were charged over US$2.27 billion by just two for-profit publishers. The Canadian research councils and the US National Science Foundation were allocated US$9.3 billion in that year. A figure detailing the drain on researcher time. 1. The four-fold drain 1.2 Time The number of papers published each year is growing faster than the scientific workforce, with the number of papers per researcher almost doubling between 1996 and 2022 (Figure 1A). This reflects the fact that publishers’ commercial desire to publish (sell) more material has aligned well with the competitive prestige culture in which publications help secure jobs, grants, promotions, and awards. To the extent that this growth is driven by a pressure for profit, rather than scholarly imperatives, it distorts the way researchers spend their time. The publishing system depends on unpaid reviewer labour, estimated to be over 130 million unpaid hours annually in 2020 alone (9). Researchers have complained about the demands of peer-review for decades, but the scale of the problem is now worse, with editors reporting widespread difficulties recruiting reviewers. The growth in publications involves not only the authors’ time, but that of academic editors and reviewers who are dealing with so many review demands. Even more seriously, the imperative to produce ever more articles reshapes the nature of scientific inquiry. Evidence across multiple fields shows that more papers result in ‘ossification’, not new ideas (10). It may seem paradoxical that more papers can slow progress until one considers how it affects researchers’ time. While rewards remain tied to volume, prestige, and impact of publications, researchers will be nudged away from riskier, local, interdisciplinary, and long-term work. The result is a treadmill of constant activity with limited progress whereas core scholarly practices – such as reading, reflecting and engaging with others’ contributions – is de-prioritized. What looks like productivity often masks intellectual exhaustion built on a demoralizing, narrowing scientific vision. A table of profit margins across industries. The section of text related to this table is below: 1. The four-fold drain 1.1 Money Currently, academic publishing is dominated by profit-oriented, multinational companies for whom scientific knowledge is a commodity to be sold back to the academic community who created it. The dominant four are Elsevier, Springer Nature, Wiley and Taylor & Francis, which collectively generated over US$7.1 billion in revenue from journal publishing in 2024 alone, and over US$12 billion in profits between 2019 and 2024 (Table 1A). Their profit margins have always been over 30% in the last five years, and for the largest publisher (Elsevier) always over 37%. Against many comparators, across many sectors, scientific publishing is one of the most consistently profitable industries (Table S1). These financial arrangements make a substantial difference to science budgets. In 2024, 46% of Elsevier revenues and 53% of Taylor & Francis revenues were generated in North America, meaning that North American researchers were charged over US$2.27 billion by just two for-profit publishers. The Canadian research councils and the US National Science Foundation were allocated US$9.3 billion in that year. The costs of inaction are plain: wasted public funds, lost researcher time, compromised scientific integrity and eroded public trust. Today, the system rewards commercial publishers first, and science second. Without bold action from the funders we risk continuing to pour resources into a system that prioritizes profit over the advancement of scientific knowledge.
November 11, 2025 at 11:52 AM
Reposted by Nicolas Clairis
hansonmark.bsky.social
For-profit journals are supposed to improve research quality, yet they're perversely incentivized to churn out whatever they can monetize. This was happening before AI (see Strain: bit.ly/43gJPUM), and AI will make it worse.

It's insane that we volunteer our time to help them do so.

4/n
November 11, 2025 at 11:52 AM
nclairis.bsky.social
"Academia should resume control of publishing using non-profit publishing models (e.g. diamond open-access)"
November 10, 2025 at 1:44 PM
nclairis.bsky.social
Not super reassuring for young european researchers 😅 thank you Donald
carandinilab.net Matteo Carandini @carandinilab.net · Nov 3
Europe's MSCA postdoctoral fellowships are now attracting many researchers who would have gone to the US. So the payline has dropped below 10% (~1,600 fellowships to 17k applicants). Super tough situation. One more reason to double the next Horizon budget, as proposed by the EU Commission.
drtomemery.bsky.social Tom Emery @drtomemery.bsky.social · Oct 22
Applications for MCSA are up 64%! 50% now come from outside the EU. Trump effect?

The European Research market just got a hell of a lot more crowded.

EU should turn on the tap

marie-sklodowska-curie-actions.ec.europa.eu/news/msca-po...
November 3, 2025 at 8:39 AM