Mapping gender and geographic diversity in artificial intelligence research: Editor representation in leading computer science journals

Abstract

Background The growing role of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare, particularly radiology, requires its unbiased and fair development and implementation, starting with the constitution of the scientific community. Purpose To examine the gender and country distribution among academic editors in leading computer science and AI journals. Material and Methods This cross-sectional study analyzed the gender and country distribution among editors-in-chief, senior, and associate editors in all 75 Q1 computer science and AI journals in the Clarivate Journal Citations Report and SCImago Journal Ranking 2022. Gender was determined using an open-source algorithm (Gender Guesser™), selecting the gender with the highest calibrated probability. Result Among 4,948 editorial board members, women were underrepresented in all positions (editors-in-chief/senior editors/associate editors: 14%/18%/17%). The proportion of women correlated positively with the SCImago Journal Rank indicator (ρ = 0.329; p = .004). The U.S., the U.K., and China comprised 50% of editors, while Australia, Finland, Estonia, Denmark, the Netherlands, the U.K., Switzerland, and Slovenia had the highest women editor representation per million women population. Conclusion Our results highlight gender and geographic disparities on leading computer science and AI journal editorial boards, with women being underrepresented in all positions and a disproportional relationship between the Global North and South.