Research and publication ethics unit 3

1. Research & Publication Ethics
Prof.(Dr.) Anita Gehlot
Head- Research & Innovation
Uttaranchal University
Email- dean.rd@uumail.in

2. UNIT III
Publication ethics: definition, introduction and importance, Best
practices/ standards setting initiatives and guidelines: COPE,
WAME,etc., Conflicts of interest, Publication misconduct:
definition, concept, problems that lead to unethical behaviour
and vice versa, types, Violation of publication ethics, authorship
and contributorship, Identification of publication misconduct,
complaints and appeals, Predatory publishers and journals

3. Publication Ethics
• Adhering to high standards for scientific rigor and excellence
• Unbiased submission and review of manuscripts, regardless of source and content, including
negative or inconclusive results
• Submission and publication of manuscripts in a timely and appropriate manner
• Implementation of robust procedures that detect, discourage, and rebuke ghostwriting,
plagiarism, publication bias, and other unethical publication practices
• Adoption of standard practices that require full disclosure of author contributions, financial and
editorial support, and actual and potential conflicts of interest to their readership
• Establishment of clear policies and guidelines governing the conduct of publication
professionals including, but not limited to, requiring full disclosure of potential conflicts of
interest
• Ensuring that the commercial needs and interests do not influence the scientific rigor of the
publication review process

4. Importance of Publication Ethics
• Norms promote the aims of research, such as knowledge, truth, and avoidance of error. For
example, prohibitions against fabricating, falsifying, or misrepresenting research data promote the truth
and minimize error.
• Publishing provides a communication channel for researchers within a field, a repository of
important research efforts, and a recognition mechanism for researchers and institutions alike.
• While refraining from scientific misconduct or research frauds, authors should adhere to Good
Publication Practices (GPP). Publications which draw conclusions from manipulated or fabricated data
could prove detrimental to society and health care research.

5. Ethical Issues in Publication
• Ethical integrity is essential to writing and publication.
• Important ethical concerns to consider while writing a manuscript include etiquette,
fraudulent publication, pla- giarism, duplicate publication, authorship, and potential
for conflict of interest.

6. Authorship and Contributorship
• Authorship – we publish a list of authors' names at the beginning of the paper in the byline.
• Contributorship – we publish a contributorship statement at the end of the paper, giving
details of who did what in planning, conducting, and reporting the work.

7. Publication Misconduct
• Publication misconduct includes plagiarism, fabrication, falsification,
inappropriate authorship, duplicate submission/multiple submissions,
overlapping publication, and salami publication.

8. Ethical Considerations
• Informed consent
• Voluntary participation
• Do no harm
• Confidentiality
• Anonymity
• Only assess relevant components

9. Conflict of Interest in Scientific Research
A term used to describe the situation in which a public official who,
contrary to the obligation and absolute duty to act for the benefit of
the public or a designated individual, exploits the relationship for
personal benefit, typically pecuniary.
Situations in which financial material considerations may compromise,
or have the appearance of compromising, an investigator’s
professional judgment in conducting or reporting research

10. COPE
Committee of Publication Ethics
• COPE is a membership organisation.
• Aim of COPE is Promoting integrity in research and its publication
• COPE’s role is to assist editors of scholarly journals and publisher/owners in their endeavour to
preserve and promote the integrity of the scholarly record through policies and practices that
reflect the current best principles of transparency as well as integrity.
• COPE assists editors of scholarly journals and publishers - as well as other parties, such as
institutions - in their work to preserve and promote the integrity of the scholarly record through
policies and practices.
• COPE's Core Practices should be considered alongside specific national and international codes of
conduct for research.

11. Scope of COPE
• Allegations of misconduct
• Authorship and contributorship
• Complaints and appeals
• Conflicts of interest / Competing interests
• Data and reproducibility
• Ethical oversight
• Intellectual property
• Journal management
• Peer review processes
• Post-publication discussions and corrections

12. Allegation of misconduct
• "Allegation of misconduct" means a written or oral report
alleging that an educator has engaged in unprofessional,
criminal, or incompetent conduct; is unfit for duty; has lost
certification in another state due to revocation or
suspension, or through voluntary surrender or lapse of a
certificate in the face of a claim

13. Authorship and contributorship
• Authorship – we publish a list of authors' names at the
beginning of the paper in the byline.
• Contributorship – we publish a contributorship statement
at the end of the paper, giving details of who did what in
planning, conducting, and reporting the work.

14. Complaints and appeals
• The main difference between a complaint and a second
appeal is that in the case of an appeal, this Commission
may pass orders to provide the requested information to
the appellant in appropriate cases whereas such orders
cannot be passed while dealing with a complaint.

15. Conflicts of interest /
Competing interests
• A Conflict of Interest or Competing Interest is defined as a
set of conditions in which professional judgment
concerning a primary interest, such as the validity of
research, may be influenced by a secondary interest,
such as financial gain.

16. Data and reproducibility
• The reproducibility of data is a measure of whether
results in a paper can be attained by a different
research team, using the same methods. This shows
that the results obtained are not artifacts of the unique
setup in one research lab.

17. Ethical oversight
• Ethical oversight should include, but is not limited
to, policies on consent to publication, publication on
vulnerable populations, ethical conduct of research
using animals, ethical conduct of research using
human subjects, handling confidential data and
ethical business/marketing practices.

18. Intellectual property
• Intellectual property is a category of property that includes
intangible creations of the human intellect.
• All policies on intellectual property, including copyright and
publishing licenses, should be clearly described. In
addition, any costs associated with publishing should be
obvious to authors and readers

19. Journal management
• A well-described and implemented infrastructure is
essential, including the business model, policies,
processes and software for efficient running of an
editorially independent journal, as well as the efficient
management and training of editorial boards and editorial
and publishing staff.

20. Peer review processes
• All peer review processes must be transparently
described and well managed. Journals should provide
training for editors and reviewers and have policies on
diverse aspects of peer review, especially with respect to
adoption of appropriate models of review and processes
for handling conflicts of interest, appeals and disputes that
may arise in peer review

21. Post-publication discussions
and corrections
• “Journals must allow debate post publication either on
their site, through letters to the editor, or on an external
moderated site. They must have mechanisms for
correcting, revising or retracting articles after publication.”

22. World Association of Medical
Editors (WAME)
• Established in 1995, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit voluntary association
of editors of peer-reviewed medical journals from countries
throughout the world who seek to foster international cooperation
among and education of medical journal editors.
• Membership in WAME is free and all decision-making editors of
peer-reviewed medical journals are eligible to join. Membership is
also available to selected scholars in journal editorial policy and
peer review.
• WAME has more than 1830 members representing more than 1000
journals from 92 countries

23. Goals of WAME
• to facilitate worldwide cooperation and communication
among editors of peer-reviewed medical journals;
• to improve editorial standards, to promote professionalism
in medical editing through education, self-criticism and
self-regulation;
• to encourage research on the principles and practice of
medical editing.

24. WAME's founding members common goals:
• to publish original, important, well-documented peer-reviewed articles on clinical and laboratory research;
• to provide continuing education in basic and clinical sciences to support informed clinical decision making;
• to enable physicians to remain informed in one or more areas of medicine;
• to improve public health internationally by improving the quality of medical care, disease prevention and medical research;
• to foster responsible and balanced debate on controversial issues and policies affecting medicine and health care;
• to promote peer review as a vehicle for scientific discourse and quality assurance in medicine and to support efforts to
improve peer review;
• to achieve the highest level of ethical medical journalism;
• to promote self-audit and scientifically supported improvement in the editing process;
• to produce publications that are timely, credible and enjoyable to read;
• to forecast important issues, problems and trends in medicine and health care;
• to inform readers about non-clinical aspects of medicine and public health, including political, philosophic, ethical,
environmental, economic, historical and cultural issues;
• to recognize that, in addition to these specific objectives, a medical journal has a social responsibility to improve the human
condition and safeguard the integrity of sciences.

25. Unethical publishing
• Unethical or suspicious publishing (sometimes known as
predatory journal or vampire press) is an opportunistic
publishing technique that exploits the academic need
to publish but offers little reward to those who use
their services.
• Fabrication, falsification, plagiarism or other practices
that seriously deviate from those that are commonly
accepted within the scientific community for proposing,
conducting, or reporting research.

26. Problems that lead to unethical
Behaviour
• (a) falsification - manipulating research materials,
equipment or processes, or changing or omitting data or
results such that the research is not accurately
represented in the research record;
• (b) plagiarism - the appropriation of another person's
ideas, processes, results, or words without giving
appropriate credit.

27. Violation of publication ethics
• Violation of publication ethics is a global problem which
includes duplicate submission, multiple submissions,
plagiarism, gift authorship, fake affiliation, ghost
authorship, pressured authorship, salami publication and
fraud (fabrication and falsification)

28. Types of publication misconduct
• Plagiarism and copyright infringement.
• Duplicate publication.
• Data fabrication and falsification.
• Authorship disputes.
• Peer review misconduct.
• Citation manipulation.

29. Predatory journals and publishers
• “Predatory journals and publishers are entities that prioritize self-
interest at the expense of scholarship and are characterized by false
or misleading information, deviation from best editorial and
publication practices, a lack of transparency.
• Predatory journals—also called fraudulent, deceptive, or pseudo-
journals—are publications that claim to be legitimate scholarly
journals, but misrepresent their publishing practices. Some common
forms of predatory publishing practices include falsely claiming to
provide peer review, hiding information about Article Processing
Charges (APCs), misrepresenting members of the journal’s editorial
board, and other violations of copyright or scholarly ethics.

30. How to Identify Predatory Journal
• Many authors first encounter predatory publishers when
they receive emails requesting that the author submit an
article to one of their journals. These emails can be
extremely flattering, make promises to publish anything the
author submits, or promise review and publication on an
unusually fast timeline.

31. Negative consequences
• Fake peer review undermines the scientific
conversation. One of the most common forms of fraudulent
publishing practices is for predatory journals to claim to
provide true peer review when they do not. This practice
leads to many problems in the broader context of scientific
progress. Articles with low-quality or deliberately false
information, which true peer review would likely catch, are
also sometimes published in these journals.

32. Negative consequences
• Publishing in a low-quality journal can make your
research harder to find and less likely to be used by
others. Because fraudulent journals are perceived to be low
quality and untrustworthy, researchers in your field are less
likely to browse those journals or read them on their own.

33. Negative consequences
• You could be scammed and lose your work. The goal of
predatory publishers is to convince authors to pay an APC
while performing the least amount of work possible on the
publisher’s side. Sometimes, this includes not actually
publishing accepted articles, taking articles or journal
websites offline without notice, or publishing submitted
articles before authors have signed a publishing agreement.

34. Strategies to avoid predatory publishers
• These can be as simple as looking through the journal’s archives for
articles that seem off-topic
• checking that the APCs and review process are clearly stated on the
journal website.
• Are there spelling or grammatical mistakes or other questionable
characteristics on their website or in the solicitation email
• Is the journal indexed in databases
• Is the peer review process clearly stated on the website
• Are the time-stamps of incoming emails consistent with the working
hours of the reported country of origin
• Does the phone number have the correct country code