Is it time to revise the definition of research misconduct?

U.S. federal policy defines research misconduct as fabrication of data, falsification of data, or plagiarism (FFP). In recent years, some have argued or suggested that the definition of research misconduct should also include sexual harassment, sabotage, deceptive use of statistics, and failure to disclose a significant conflict of interest (COI). While the arguments for revising the definition of misconduct used by federal agencies to include misbehaviors other than FFP are not convincing at this point in time, the arguments for revising definitions used by other organizations, such as professional societies, universities, or journals, may be. Since these other organizations play an important role in promoting integrity in science and deterring unethical behavior, they may consider adopting definitions of misconduct that extend beyond FFP. Debates about the definition of research misconduct are a normal and healthy part of broader discussions about integrity in science and how best to promote it. These debates should continue even if the federal definition of misconduct remains unchanged.     

Malaysian researchers talk about the influence of culture on research misconduct in higher learning institutions

Based on a previous survey by the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) in the USA, a considerable number of foreign research scientists have been found guilty of research misconduct. However, it remains unclear as to whether or not cultural factors really contribute to research misconduct. This study is based on a series of interviews with Malaysian researchers from the local universities regarding their own professional experiences involving working with researchers or research students from different countries or of different nationalities. Most of the researchers interviewed agreed that cultures do shape individual character, which influences the way that such individuals conduct research, their decision-making, and their style of academic writing. Our findings also showed that working culture within the institution also influences research practices, as well as faculty mentorship of the younger generation of researchers. Given the fact such misconduct might be due to a lack of understanding of research or working cultures or practices within the institution, the impact on the scientific community and on society could be destructive. Therefore, it is suggested that the institution has an important role to play in orienting foreign researchers through training, mentoring, and discussion with regard to the “does” and “don’ts” related to research, and to provide them with an awareness of the importance of ethics when it comes to conducting research.     

Data Audit as a Way to Prevent/Contain Misconduct

Research misconduct is frequently in the media headlines. There is consensus among leading experts on research integrity that the prevalence of misconduct in research is at least 1%, and shoddy work may even go over 5%. Unfortunately, misconduct in research impacts all walks of life from drugs to human subject protections, innovations, economy, policy, and even our national security. The main method of detecting research misconduct depends primarily on whistleblowers. The current regulations are insufficient since dependence on whistleblowers manifests itself as an accidental hit or miss. No other endeavor in our society depends on such a poor system of discovery of misconduct to remedy it. Nearly a quarter of a century ago, I proposed data audit as a means to prevent/contain research misconduct. The audit has to protect the creative process and be non-obtrusive. Data audit evaluates the degree of correspondence of published data with the source data. The proposed data audit does not require any changes in the way researchers carry out their work.     

Researchers experience of misconduct in research in Malaysian higher education institutions

This article offers a qualitative analysis of research misconduct witnessed by researchers during their careers, either by research students or fellow researchers, when conducting or supervising research in their respective departments. Interviews were conducted with 21 participants from various research backgrounds and with a range of research experience, from selected universities in Malaysia. Our study found that misbehavior such as manipulating research data, misrepresentation of research outcomes, plagiarism, authorship disputes, breaching of research protocols, and unethical research management was witnessed by participants among junior and senior researchers, albeit for different reasons. This indicates that despite the steps taken by the institutions to monitor research misconduct, it still occurs in the research community in Malaysian institution of higher education. Therefore, it is important to admit that misconduct still occurs and to create awareness and knowledge of it, particularly among the younger generation of researchers. The study concludes that it is better for researchers to be aware of the behaviors that are considered misconduct as well as the factors that contribute to misconduct to solve this problem.     

Preparing Whistleblowers for Reporting Research Misconduct

Making an allegation of research misconduct can be stressful for a whistleblower. The Research Integrity Officer (RIO) can play an important role in helping reduce the stress by thoroughly discussing what whistleblowers can expect if they make an allegation. Through interviews with 77 RIOs who had recently handled a research misconduct case, we found that RIOs who addressed more topics as well as specific aspects of the topics were more likely to have used some type of memory aide in their initial contact with whistleblowers, talked with ORI staff or other RIOs about “hypothetical” research misconduct cases, or attended a RIO boot camp training. We believe that RIOs who more fully inform whistleblowers are providing timely preparation and building whistleblowers' confidence so they can make a more informed decision about reporting and experience less stress.     

Perceptions of research integrity and the Chinese situation: In-depth interviews with Chinese biomedical researchers in Europe

ABSTRACT

Research misconduct has been a threat to Chinese biomedical research. Despite many publications dealing with research integrity in China, little empirical data is available concerning Chinese biomedical researchers’ perceptions of research integrity and misconduct. To learn more about this issue, we interviewed Chinese biomedical researchers in Europe to investigate their perceptions of this issue. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 participants until data saturation was reached. The findings indicate that certain aspects of research integrity need elaboration among Chinese biomedical researchers. Participants had a vague understanding of general concepts related to research integrity. Data fabrication, data falsification and plagiarism were perceived as the most severe deviance. Inappropriate authorship (especially gift authorship) and ghost writing were regarded as the most prevalent types of research misconduct in Chinese biomedical research. The harms of certain practices, such as inappropriate authorship, salami publication and multiple submission, were not well recognized. Attitudes toward research misconduct were divided. The current scientific evaluation system, pressures of promotion, motives for fame and other factors were perceived as the main reasons for research misconduct. Participants suggested various measures in addition to existing safeguards to improve research integrity in Chinese biomedical research.     

An International Study of Research Misconduct Policies

Research misconduct is an international concern. Misconduct policies can play a crucial role in preventing and policing research misconduct, and many institutions have developed their own policies. While institutional policies play a key role in preventing and policing misconduct, national policies are also important to ensure consistent promulgation and enforcement of ethical standards. The purpose of this study was to obtain more information about research misconduct policies across the globe. We found that twenty-two of the top forty research and development funding countries (55%) had a national misconduct policy. Four countries (18.2%) are in the process of developing a policy, and four (18.2%) have a national research ethics code but no misconduct policy. All twenty-two countries (100%) with national policies included fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism in the definition of misconduct, but beyond that there was considerable diversity. Unethical authorship was mentioned in 54.6% of the misconduct definitions, followed by unethical publication practices (36.4%), conflict of interest mismanagement (36.4%), unethical peer review (31.8%), misconduct related to misconduct investigations (27.3%), poor record keeping (27.3%), other deception (27.3%), serious deviations (22.7%), violating confidentiality (22.7%), and human or animal research violations (22.7%). Having a national policy was positively associated with research and development funding ranking and intensiveness. To promote integrity in international research collaborations, countries should seek to harmonize and clarify misconduct definitions and develop procedures for adjudicating conflicts when harmonization does not occur.     

Assessing the Seriousness of Research Misconduct: Considerations for Sanction Assignment

Federal and institutional policies recommend the criterion of “seriousness” as a guide for sanction assignment in cases where researchers have been found to have committed research misconduct. Discrepancies in assessments of seriousness for similar acts of misconduct suggest the need to clarify what might be meant by the seriousness of research misconduct and how the criterion can be used to assign sanctions. This essay demonstrates how determinations of seriousness can differ depending on the set of ethical appeals employed and argues that an expanded lexicon for talking about the seriousness of research misconduct would help to promote fairness and consistency in sanction assignment. It concludes with some policy recommendations for those charged with research misconduct sanction assignment and for those who oversee research integrity at institutional levels.     

Assessing the seriousness of research misconduct: considerations for sanction assignment

Federal and institutional policies recommend the criterion of "seriousness" as a guide for sanction assignment in cases where researchers have been found to have committed research misconduct. Discrepancies in assessments of seriousness for similar acts of misconduct suggest the need to clarify what might be meant by the seriousness of research misconduct and how the criterion can be used to assign sanctions. This essay demonstrates how determinations of seriousness can differ depending on the set of ethical appeals employed and argues that an expanded lexicon for talking about the seriousness of research misconduct would help to promote fairness and consistency in sanction assignment. It concludes with some policy recommendations for those charged with research misconduct sanction assignment and for those who oversee research integrity at institutional levels.     

Inaction over retractions of identified fraudulent publications: ongoing weakness in the system of scientific self-correction

Published articles may be retracted when their findings are no longer considered reliable due to honest error, publication misconduct, or research misconduct. This article focuses on the case of a single serial violator of research and publication ethics in anesthesiology and critical care, which is widely publicized. A chain of events led to detection of misconduct that had substantial impact on the evidence base for the safety of hydroxyethyl starch, an intravenous artificial colloid solution, which is reflected in current guidelines on fluid management and volume resuscitation. As citations to retracted works continue to be a cause for concern, this article reviews the retraction status of this author’s published articles to determine whether sufficient action has been taken to retract his body of work. Results show that retraction practices are not uniform and that guidelines for retraction are still not being fully implemented, resulting in retractions of insufficient quantity and quality. As retractions continue to emerge for the author’s publications, with ten more since 2011, and as they are generally increasing, these data on retractions not only provide findings of misconduct, but also allow us to make inferences about ongoing weaknesses in the system of scientific literature.     

Misconduct versus Honest Error and Scientific Disagreement

Researchers sometimes mistakenly accuse their peers of misconduct. It is important to distinguish between misconduct and honest error or a difference of scientific opinion to prevent unnecessary and time-consuming misconduct proceedings, protect scientists from harm, and avoid deterring researchers from using novel methods or proposing controversial hypotheses. While it is obvious to many researchers that misconduct is different from a scientific disagreement or simply an inadvertent mistake in methods, analysis or misinterpretation of data, applying this distinction to real cases is sometimes not easy. Because the line between misconduct and honest error or a scientific dispute is often unclear, research organizations and institutions should distinguish between misconduct and honest error and scientific disagreement in their policies and practices. These distinctions should also be explained during educational sessions on the responsible conduct of research and in the mentoring process. When researchers wrongfully accuse their peers of misconduct, it is important to help them understand the distinction between misconduct and honest error and differences of scientific judgment or opinion, pinpoint the source of disagreement, and identify the relevant scientific norms. They can be encouraged to settle the dispute through collegial discussion and dialogue, rather than a misconduct allegation.     

Misconduct versus honest error and scientific disagreement

Researchers sometimes mistakenly accuse their peers of misconduct. It is important to distinguish between misconduct and honest error or a difference of scientific opinion to prevent unnecessary and time-consuming misconduct proceedings, protect scientists from harm, and avoid deterring researchers from using novel methods or proposing controversial hypotheses. While it is obvious to many researchers that misconduct is different from a scientific disagreement or simply an inadvertent mistake in methods, analysis or misinterpretation of data, applying this distinction to real cases is sometimes not easy. Because the line between misconduct and honest error or a scientific dispute is often unclear, research organizations and institutions should distinguish between misconduct and honest error and scientific disagreement in their policies and practices. These distinctions should also be explained during educational sessions on the responsible conduct of research and in the mentoring process. When researchers wrongfully accuse their peers of misconduct, it is important to help them understand the distinction between misconduct and honest error and differences of scientific judgment or opinion, pinpoint the source of disagreement, and identify the relevant scientific norms. They can be encouraged to settle the dispute through collegial discussion and dialogue, rather than a misconduct allegation.     

Retrospective Reflections of a Whistleblower: Opinions on Misconduct Responses

Almost 10 years ago, when I was in my fourth year of graduate school, my fellow graduate students discovered that our thesis advisor had engaged in misconduct by falsifying and fabricating data in two grant applications. We informed the university and my advisor resigned. This event was a turning point in my life. Years later, I have gathered my thoughts and reflections on the experience. I believe we must first prevent what misconduct we can. But unfortunately some misconduct will still occur and in those circumstances we must respond to protect those affected by the misconduct and to progress beyond the event. In so doing, we get the most value out of scientific research.     

From Baltimore to Bell Labs: reflections on two decades of debate about scientific misconduct

This essay proposes a new definition of scientific "misconduct," which is broader than the definition recently adopted by the U.S. government. According to the proposed definition, misconduct is a serious and intentional violation of accepted scientific practices, commonsense ethical norms, or research regulations in proposing, designing, conducting, reviewing, or reporting research. Punishable misconduct includes fabrication of data or experiments, falsification of data, plagiarism, or interference with a misconduct investigation. Misconduct does not include honest errors, differences of opinion, or ethically questionable research practices.     

From Baltimore to Bell Labs: Reflections on Two Decades of Debate about Scientific Misconduct

This essay proposes a new definition of scientific "misconduct," which is broader than the definition recently adopted by the U.S. government. According to the proposed definition, misconduct is a serious and intentional violation of accepted scientific practices, commonsense ethical norms, or research regulations in proposing, designing, conducting, reviewing, or reporting research. Punishable misconduct includes fabrication of data or experiments, falsification of data, plagiarism, or interference with a misconduct investigation. Misconduct does not include honest errors, differences of opinion, or ethically questionable research practices.     

Research Misconduct Definitions Adopted by U.S. Research Institutions

In 2000, the U.S. federal government adopted a uniform definition of research misconduct as fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism (FFP), which became effective in 2001. Institutions must apply this definition of misconduct to federally-funded research to receive funding. While institutions are free to adopt definitions of misconduct that go beyond the federal standard, it is not known how many do. We analyzed misconduct policies from 183 U.S. research institutions and coded them according to thirteen different types of behavior mentioned in the misconduct definition. We also obtained data on the institution’s total research funding and public vs. private status, and the year it adopted the definition. We found that more than half (59%) of the institutions in our sample had misconduct policies that went beyond the federal standard. Other than FFP, the most common behaviors included in definitions were “other serious deviations” (45.4%), “significant or material violations of regulations” (23.0%), “misuse of confidential information” (15.8%), “misconduct related to misconduct” (14.8%), “unethical authorship other than plagiarism” (14.2%), “other deception involving data manipulation” (13.1%), and “misappropriation of property/theft” (10.4%). Significantly more definitions adopted in 2001 or later went beyond the federal standard than those adopted before 2001 (73.2% vs. 26.8%), and significantly more definitions adopted by institutions in the lower quartile of total research funding went beyond the federal standard than those adopted by institutions in the upper quartiles. Public vs. private status was not significantly associated with going beyond the federal standard.     

Evaluating research misconduct policies at major research universities: a pilot study

This pilot study evaluates the accessibility and usefulness of the research misconduct (RM) policies at the top-25 universities as ranked by NIH and NSF grant awards. Measuring accessibility demonstrates how readily-available policies are to the people they affect. Evaluating the range of policy content indicates whether policies and procedures on research misconduct are "useful" as opposed to merely "minimal" (Rhoades, 2003). On average, it took five clicks to get from a university's home page to its RM policies. Only nine policies were accessed within three or fewer clicks. Policy information was coded into categories comprising a total of 20 topic areas, which were then grouped into five content domains. The policies reveal a broad range of usefulness. Some provide relevant details on almost every topic area, while others leave most questions unanswered. Three of the 20 topic areas are almost universally covered in the policies analyzed. In contrast, five other topic areas average less than half of the information which could have been included. These policies, from elite U.S. research universities, may serve as role models; as such they should perhaps be held to the highest standards. If the message sent by a policy lacks clarity and precision, it should be revised to include an appropriate level of detail.     

Evaluating U.S. Medical Schools' Efforts to Educate Faculty Researchers on Research Integrity and Research Misconduct Policies and Procedures

This paper examines how well U.S. medical school institutions are doing to promote research integrity. It is an important question to ask in order to determine whether there are sufficient and adequate protections in place to protect the U.S. Public Health Service's (PHS) resources devoted to medical research. This paper focuses on 5,100 medical school researchers' knowledge of what constitutes research misconduct as well as their willingness to report it to the research integrity officer (RIO) and educate their Ph.D. trainees. We learned that 5.6% of researchers could correctly distinguish seven or more of the nine scenarios that depicted likely research misconduct, as defined by the PHS regulations, from scenarios describing other ethical issues. Instead, researchers had expansive definitions and often inappropriately identified infractions such as conflicts of interest, Institutional Review Board (IRB) violations, and other breaches in ethical standards to be research misconduct. In addition, researchers who correctly identified four instances of likely research misconduct in the test items were highly unlikely to report their observations to a RIO. Researchers also provided insight on the factors they believe influence their decision making process of whether to report research misconduct. In addition, this paper also reports on the guidance that faculty said they provided their trainees on research misconduct issues. We conclude with a discussion and recommendations on what institutional leaders might consider doing in order to enhance their research integrity efforts and protect their institution's reputation.     

Scientific misconduct: Undue process

Numerous professional societies, universities, research funding sources, federal agencies, and Congressional committees have expressed concern about an apparent increasing incidence of scientific misconduct. Many of these organizations also have published standards for defining such misconduct and their procedures for investigating allegations of scientific misconduct. The futility of these procedures is illustrated by an example of blatant data falsification and fabrication in two different research projects conducted by a single researcher. The problem derives from administrative and judicial systems which have evolved to a stage where they are more concerned with process than outcome. An alternative to the resulting interminable “due process”; of the present system is tentatively suggested.     

Ensuring scientific integrity in research: Aspects of fairness and justice

The procedures established by the Public Health Service and the National Science Foundation reflect an inclination to keep lawyers and legalistic procedures out of scientific misconduct cases. Although misconduct cases resolved at the agencies’ Washington headquarters probably reflect a greater degree of concern with due process, their published procedures require institutions to resolve misconduct cases with virtually no guidance as to the demands of procedural due process.

A number of deficiencies in the handling of misconduct cases under PHS rules at the institutional level are discussed anecdotally on the basis of the author's experience in representing both whistle blowers and accused scientists in misconduct cases.

It is inevitable that some misconduct cases will be heard by the federal courts, and that some of the legalistic trappings of due process will be imposed by the courts. Lawyers and scientists should work together to develop techniques for resolving cases in a way that meets due process requirements without smothering science in a legalistic straight‐jacket.