Unveiling citation bias in economics: Taste-based discrimination against Chinese-authored papers

Abstract

We present evidence for taste-based discrimination against Chinese first authors in economic citations. We utilize a gravity model of citations and interpret the bias as a negative effect of “cultural distance”. After controlling for quality as well as author-, paper-, and journal-specific attributes, publications with a Chinese first author receive 14 % less citations. Coauthoring with non-Chinese does not mitigate the discrimination at all. While being affiliated with a US-based institute slightly reduces the bias by dampening the perceived “Chineseness”, it is not big enough to offset the discriminatory effect. Moreover, the COVID pandemic exacerbated the discriminatory effect. The forensic analysis narrowed down the source of discrimination to non-Chinese top economists from non-US affiliations.