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An Intersectional Census of 16 High-Impact Medical Journals by Skin Tone, Race, Ethnicity and Gender, 2000-2022

Sat, August 9, 2:00 to 3:30pm, East Tower, Hyatt Regency Chicago, Floor: Ballroom Level/Gold, Grand Ballroom A

Abstract

Importance: Editors at high-impact medical journals and their editorial boards curate medical knowledge. Few studies investigate their skin tone-gender or racial-ethnic-gender representation.

Objective: Determine skin tone, racial, ethnic and gender representation among editors and editorial boards at 16 high-impact medical journals from 2000-2022.

Design: Repeated cross-sectional skin tone, racial, ethnic, and gender ascertainment.

Setting: 16 high-impact medical journals

Participants: Editorial boards from 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, 2020, and 2022.

Main Outcomes: Skin tone ascertained via the Fitzpatrick scale; race ascertained via visual ascription; and gender and ethnicity inferred using pronouns and given names. Counts reported for skin tone, race and ethnicity, gender, and intersections therein by editor role. Representation quotients (RQs) compared editors to US Medical School faculty by group (e.g. Latinx women) for intergroup comparison (e.g. Latinx women vs. women overall).

Results: Photos and names of 4570 individuals, including 93 editors-in-chief, 2499 other editors, and 1978 editorial board members were assessed. Overall, 91 (97.8%) editors-in-chief, 2433 (97.4%) editors, and 1889 (95.5%) editorial board members had lighter skin tone. From 2005-2022, increases in representation for women with lighter skin tone were 19 times larger than for women with darker skin tone among all editors and editorial board members. Editor representation surpassed faculty representation for women for the first time in 2022 (RQWO: 1.04). Comparing each group’s RQ to that for women overall found lower representation for Latinx (31%), Black (42%), and Asian (68%) women than for White women (130%) in 2022.

Conclusions: Increases in representation were much larger for women with lighter skin tone than for women with darker skin tone. Editor representation surpassed faculty representation in 2022 for women, yet editor representation benchmarked on faculty representation was lower for Latinx, Black and Asian women than for White women. Gender equity at high-impact medical journals requires race-conscious, intersectional approaches.

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