Vincent Traag
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vtraag.bsky.social
Vincent Traag
@vtraag.bsky.social
530 followers 370 following 80 posts
Senior researcher at CWTS, Leiden University. Computational social science, science studies, modelling & networks.
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Reposted by Vincent Traag
danicajdillion.bsky.social
Americans are growing more socially isolated and politically divided.

Our new paper in Applied Network Science suggests these two forms of disconnection may be linked. People with denser, more connected social networks often feel less partisan animosity.

🧵
November 13, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
jlrohmann.bsky.social
BERLIN + CAUSAL GRAPHS = HAPPINESS.
Agree?
Follow: bsky.app/profile/appl...
Spoiler: Edition #3 in the making for Q2 2026! Stay tuned!
Applied Causal Graphs 2026 workshop teaser - stay tuned!
November 12, 2025 at 4:44 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
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 Vincent Traag
kauspurg.bsky.social
Billions of regressions ≠ robustness.

My new PNAS Letter shows how unjustified models can drown out justified ones — and why thoughtful model selection matters👇
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
November 11, 2025 at 4:56 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
iasliu.bsky.social
Join us on Thursday, 13 November, at 14:30 CET for the International Roundtable on Computational Social Science with Mirta Galesic 🔹Dynamics of belief networks🔹 More info: liu.se/en/article/s...
Seminars and lectures at IAS
Welcome to IAS public lectures and seminars.
liu.se
November 11, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
rmcelreath.bsky.social
How can we reform science? I have some ideas. But I am not sure you’ll like them, because they don’t promise much. elevanth.org/blog/2025/07...
Which Kind of Science Reform
What hope is there for science reform, if we can't agree on what to reform? Right now, principles are more important than practices.
elevanth.org
July 9, 2025 at 1:40 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
jonasfegert.bsky.social
We’re hiring a Postdoctoral Researcher to help lead my interdisciplinary team at FZI!
Work with us on the automated analysis and countering of #disinformation — at the intersection of AI, computational social science, and #democracy.

👉 Please apply and share! karriere.fzi.de/Vacancies/11...
November 10, 2025 at 11:32 AM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
cwts.nl
🎓 Last week, Dr. Eleonora Dagiene successfully defended her PhD thesis titled 'Quantitative research assessment and its unintended consequences' at Leiden University.

Congratulations on this amazing achievement!! 🥂

www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/news/2025...
Congratulations, Dr. Eleonora Dagienė!
On 30 October 2025, Eleonora Dagienė successfully defended her PhD thesis at Leiden University, titled ‘Quantitative Research Assessment and its Unintended Consequences’.
www.universiteitleiden.nl
November 7, 2025 at 10:16 AM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
hermwerf.bsky.social
Job! A vacancy at the @eui-eu.bsky.social for a postdoc joining the @learnineq.bsky.social project, for 13 months, starting mid January. We study inequalities in school careers, and we engage with policy makers. The vacancy is here, please forward. DEADLINE 24 NOVEMBER. www.eui.eu/Documents/Se...
November 5, 2025 at 6:11 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
luzuzek.bsky.social
Our study of 400 million tweets shows that the “war on science” is far more complex than a simple clash between truth and falsehood.

🔍 read more in our latest article

magazine.fbk.eu/en/news/what...

@ricgallotti.bsky.social
@chub-fbk.bsky.social
@vtraag.bsky.social
What a 400-Million-Tweet study revealed about the “War on Science”
The European project “Understanding Misinformation and Science in Societal Debates” (UnMiSSeD) aims at understanding the overlap between science and misinformation with a particular focus on the COVID...
magazine.fbk.eu
November 5, 2025 at 10:05 AM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
cwts.nl
📣 This Friday, we will have another seminar: @nathanaelsheehan.bsky.social from TU Munich will give a talk on 'Metascience of Past, Present, & Future'.

🎧 Make sure to join!

📅 Friday, 7.11.2025 | 3:00-4:15 PM (CET)
📌 Online & at CWTS

www.universiteitleiden.nl/en/events/20...
Metascience of Past, Present, & Future
This talk traces the trajectory of metascience from its origins in the Unity of Science movement to its contemporary form as an empirical reform project. I argue that while its methods and objects hav...
www.universiteitleiden.nl
November 4, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
ludowaltman.bsky.social
In het Financieele Dagblad beargumenteer ik dat universiteiten gelijk hebben om afstand te nemen van ranglijsten, in tegenstelling tot wat Sebastien Valkenberg in zijn recente column stelt:

fd.nl/opinie/15757...

FD stuk is paywalled, maar is ook beschikbaar via:

docs.google.com/document/d/1...
Waarom universiteiten gelijk hebben als ze afstand nemen van misleidende ranglijsten en focussen op echte kwaliteit
Internationale ranglijsten lijken objectief, maar meten vooral wat commercieel goed uitkomt. Ze zeggen weinig over de kwaliteit van onderwijs en onderzoek, schrijft Ludo Waltman, voorzitter van de nat...
fd.nl
November 1, 2025 at 3:02 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
yyahn.bsky.social
Work with us at UVA School of Data Science!

@uvadatascience.bsky.social will continue to hire multiple faculty members across many areas of data science! Let me know if you're curious about our school. :)

datascience.virginia.edu/pages/join-o...
Join Our Team — School of Data Science
We are hiring faculty and staff to build a forward-thinking community with a diversity of perspectives, backgrounds, and ideas centered around data science.
datascience.virginia.edu
October 31, 2025 at 9:12 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
patrickmello.bsky.social
We're hiring a Lecturer in Political Science @vuamsterdam.bsky.social (deadline Nov 24): 👉 werkenbij.vu.nl/vacatures/le...
Vacature — Lecturer in Political Science – Comparative Politics
Do you have a PhD in Political Science and some teaching experience? Are you interested in teaching a diverse and international student community? The Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU) offers a positi...
werkenbij.vu.nl
October 31, 2025 at 1:15 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
icpsr.bsky.social
Congratulations to the Data Rescue Project volunteers for their NDSA Excellence Award!
See the full list of contributors and learn more about this achievement at https://myumi.ch/qZMx2
Image that says, "Congratulations to all of the 2025 National Digital Stewardship Alliance Excellence Awardees"
October 31, 2025 at 5:25 PM
vtraag.bsky.social
The leidenalg package is now also updated and now supports igraph 1.0. github.com/vtraag/leide... You can download and install using pip. The conda package will be updated shortly.
October 31, 2025 at 5:42 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
scienceeurope.org
How do #OpenScience practices shape #ResearchCulture? 🧪

A new Scoping Review commissioned by Science Europe explores their benefits and unintended effects on values like equity, openness, integrity, and collaboration.

🔗 bit.ly/47UeY2L
October 30, 2025 at 11:09 AM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
cwts.nl
📄 New scoping review: "The Contributions of Open Science to Research Culture", a collaboration between the Know Center and CWTS that was commissioned by @scienceeurope.org.

📚 Find out more in the news item on our website 👉 tinyurl.com/bdd6jw96

@alexrushforth.bsky.social
October 30, 2025 at 1:01 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
claesdevreese.bsky.social
Today is the day 🎁

The #dsa regime for researchers to get access to platform data to study societal impact and risks starts TODAY.

This has been a loooooong time coming. And the proof of the pudding will be in the eating …

#dataaccess #commsky

digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/news/new-...
New measures unlock access to data from largest online platforms to support research
As of today, new rules under the Digital Services Act (DSA) will allow researchers to gain unprecedented access to very large online platforms' data to study the societal impact stemming from the plat...
digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu
October 29, 2025 at 3:00 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
cwts.nl
📊 The CWTS Leiden Ranking 2025 is online! 🎉 This time, we have released not one, but two editions: the Traditional Edition and the Open Edition. www.leidenranking.com
CWTS Leiden Ranking
The CWTS Leiden Ranking offers important insights into the scientific performance for major universities worldwide. Select your preferred indicators, generate results, and explore the performance of u...
www.leidenranking.com
October 29, 2025 at 12:37 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
cwts.nl
🏛️ New call for proposals and report by the King Baudouin Foundation, with contribution by CWTS to identify research on mental health, areas of strong research activity and potential gaps:

Call for proposals 👉 tinyurl.com/n6c3dbva
Full report 👉 tinyurl.com/37uxdsaz
Methods 👉 tinyurl.com/5hxpyznh
Towards a paradigm shift in mental health care
kbs-frb.be
October 28, 2025 at 1:49 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
python.org
TLDR; The PSF has made the decision to put our community and our shared diversity, equity, and inclusion values ahead of seeking $1.5M in new revenue. Please read and share. pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-...
🧵
The official home of the Python Programming Language
www.python.org
October 27, 2025 at 2:47 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
isa-rc28.bsky.social
Two Postdoctoral Researcher Positions in Sociology/Social Sciences at the University of Oldenburg (Germany)
Position 1 – Computational Text Analysis / LLMs — uol.de/job790en

Position 2 – Survey Research / Experiments — uol.de/job791en
Postdoctoral Researcher, SCEPTIC-Position 1 // University of Oldenburg
uol.de
October 24, 2025 at 10:07 AM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
rmcelreath.bsky.social
When there is a random way to do something, there is a less random way that is better but requires more thought. In this case, regression models that make no sense don't belong in a multiverse analysis. An inferential regression without a causal justification is like an opinion without reasons.
October 23, 2025 at 4:34 PM
Reposted by Vincent Traag
chrisbail.bsky.social
The ENSAE-CREST is hiring a computational sociologist -- Assistant or Associate Professor.

Date of appointment: September 2026.
Details here : www.css.cnrs.fr/assistant-or...
www.css.cnrs.fr
October 24, 2025 at 11:48 PM