That doesn't match my experience (as a former academic scientist who moved into software development). The governing rule for us was always "publish or perish." Programming was a means (exploring a problem) to an end (advancing knowledge and publishing the results). I, at least, never came across the jargon for testing, maintenance, etc. until I moved out of academia and into this industry.
Oh I agree, scientists are far less inundated by software "best practices" than professionals. It's just that those which they have heard of, they often stick to religiously.
Personally I prefer the results of these scientists to much of what I see from real software engineers. It might be wreck, but it is only 1000 lines of wreck -- and not a sophisticated wreck created with powerful modern tools.
