Taxonomic Bias Persists in Ecology and Evolution Research Despite Decades of Concern
- 1Evolution & Ecology Research Centre, School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences University of New South Wales Kensington New South Wales Australia
Abstract
Scientific hyperfocus on certain organisms slows innovation and hinders the generality of ecological and evolutionary inference. Yet, the extent of taxonomic bias in this research field and its potential changes over time remain poorly quantified. By assessing 1,383,803 papers and 612 journals, we show that ecology and evolution research is strongly taxonomically biased. We found that the prevalence of studies on vertebrates in the literature as a whole (but not within some pockets of ecology and evolution) has remained similar since the early 2000s, when the first studies of taxonomic bias were published. We also observed that studies on vertebrates, relative to those on invertebrates, were more prevalent in higher impact journals and, within journals, received more citations and mentions in the media. However, classifying animals into more specific groups led to context‐dependent temporal and attention patterns. We propose a series of urgent targeted actions to ameliorate taxonomic imbalances in ecology and evolution.
Related
- Chronic stress remodels gut bacterial ecology and polysaccharide metabolism with neuroendocrine consequences despite unchanged behavior
- Ocean depth modifies host-microbiome ecology and evolution
- The use of sequence databases for taxonomic research in phytovirology and the application of factor analysis of correspondences to the clustering of geminiviruses
- Time-calibrated phylogenomics reveals relationships and parallel evolution of neoteny within Elateriformia (Coleoptera) despite pervasive homoplasy
- Why we need ecology and evolution for a better understanding of misdirected behaviour
BibTeX
@article{pollo2026taxonomic,
title = {{Taxonomic Bias Persists in Ecology and Evolution Research Despite Decades of Concern}},
author = {Pietro Pollo and Michael M. Kasumovic},
journal = {Ecology and Evolution},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1002/ece3.74450},
url = {https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ece3.74450},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Taxonomic Bias Persists in Ecology and Evolution Research Despite Decades of Concern
AU - Pietro Pollo
AU - Michael M. Kasumovic
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/04
JO - Ecology and Evolution
DO - 10.1002/ece3.74450
UR - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ece3.74450
AB - Scientific hyperfocus on certain organisms slows innovation and hinders the generality of ecological and evolutionary inference. Yet, the extent of taxonomic bias in this research field and its potential changes over time remain poorly quantified. By assessing 1,383,803 papers and 612 journals, we show that ecology and evolution research is strongly taxonomically biased. We found that the prevalence of studies on vertebrates in the literature as a whole (but not within some pockets of ecology and evolution) has remained similar since the early 2000s, when the first studies of taxonomic bias were published. We also observed that studies on vertebrates, relative to those on invertebrates, were more prevalent in higher impact journals and, within journals, received more citations and mentions in the media. However, classifying animals into more specific groups led to context‐dependent temporal and attention patterns. We propose a series of urgent targeted actions to ameliorate taxonomic imbalances in ecology and evolution.
SN - 2045-7758
SN - 2045-7758
ER -