Why is this important? (Important Because)
From The Embassy of Good Science
A description to provide more focus to the theme/resource (max. 200 words)
- ⧼SA Foundation Data Type⧽: Text
R
This policy brief is vital because achieving sustainability and climate resilience requires research and innovation to align ethically with ecological and intergenerational justice goals. Existing ethics frameworks often focus on human subjects or data integrity while overlooking environmental impacts. The brief addresses this gap by offering practical guidance to embed climate and environmental ethics into research governance. This approach helps institutions prevent unintended harms, build societal trust, and align with the European Green Deal. Its recommendations strengthen accountability and train future researchers to consider ecological impacts, ensuring that scientific progress supports both people and the planet responsibly.future generations of researchers are more attuned to ecological considerations. In a time when scientific research frequently shapes transformative technologies and policy, ensuring that ethical reflection includes environmental dimensions is essential. +
There are no comprehensive statistics on the extent of research misconduct in China — and few ministries, agencies or universities make cases public. Surveys and anecdotal evidence, however, reveal a deep-rooted problem, and suggest that students are learning unethical behaviour alongside their science. +
In order to support and foster excellent research, the FWF expects researchers to adhere to the highest ethical standards. This requires a good understanding of the fundamentals of research ethics and research integrity, for which the guidelines of the Austrian Higher Education Conference (created in 2020) are used as a standard. Further, grant applicants need to be able to foresee and weigh the potential benefits, risks and ethical implications of their own research, as advised by the good practice recommendations of the OeAWI. The ethical implications of research involving animals receives added attention. The number and type of research misconduct cases in Austria from 2008 to 2020 are also listed. +
This research strives to understand more clearly what constitutes appropriate scholarly behavior. That is important, since research integrity decisions depend on human effort. Part of the research is to find out on what decision makers base their findings (e.g., guidelines or standards) and whether they consider grey zone issues. If so, which grey zones, and are they appropriate? Automating misconduct detection requires clear definitions. +
Research integrity is at the core of the research endeavour. It is the basis for researchers’ trust in each other and in the research record and, equally importantly, society’s trust in research. There are many reasons to take research integrity seriously including research excellence and an unsullied research record;continuing societal support for public investment in research;avoiding harmful impacts and research waste etc.
Science Europe Working Group on Research Integrity (2015), Seven Reasons to Care about Research Integrity: '"`UNIQ--nowiki-00000000-QINU`"'
<br /> +
Retrospective studies are common in clinical research but carry risks of bias and data limitations. Ensuring research integrity improves the quality and reliability of findings. +
Research Integrity (RI) is an integral part of researchers' everyday work. Besides papers and books this podcast series provide a new and motivating way to talk and learn about the topic. +
The type of research misconduct presented here, although not frequently encountered, is not unique.
The case is significant for several reasons. First, it suggests that a research ethics body may not always have descriptions and labels to cover every single possible type of potential research misconduct.
Second, it is worth keeping in mind that more junior researchers may hesitate to put a complaint about their seniors’ behaviour, or generally, question and challenge ‘authority’.
Third, the case shows that consequences for such type of behaviour can be very costly for everyone directly or indirectly involved: perpetrators, their colleagues, the scientific research society and the wider society in general. The costs can be personal in terms or reputation and career consequences as well as wider in terms of public trust and monetary costs. +
Conflicts of interest may lead to the introduction of biases in research studies. This is especially the case when the product or drugs under investigation are produced by a company, as this may lead to corruption. Recent research shows that more favourable results are obtained for company-sponsored than non-company-sponsored studies.'"`UNIQ--ref-00000002-QINU`"' Therefore, it is important for researchers to declare all potential conflicts of interest. Undeclared conflicts of interests, such as in the present case, may cast considerable doubt on the objectivity of the researchers.
'"`UNIQ--references-00000003-QINU`"' +
The scenarios are designed to help researchers, research ethics committees ('RECs'), research integrity offices ('RIOs') and research administrators to become better acquainted with [https://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/data/ref/h2020/other/hi/h2020-ethics_code-of-conduct_en.pdf The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity] ('ECCRI' or 'ECoC') as a regulatory document that articulates the standards of good research practice.
They also allow users to reflect on and apply their own national and institutional research ethics and research integrity codes as well as other key regulatory documents and guidelines.
The goal is for the user to gain knowledge of the standards associated with good research practices and to make sense of these standards in different research contexts.
According to the ECCRI/ECoC, there are eight categories of research contexts that are covered by the standards of good research practice:
1) Research Environment
2) Training, Supervision and Mentoring
3) [https://zenodo.org/record/4063611#.X3cGAJNKjxQ '''Research Procedures''']
4) Safeguards
5) Data Practices and Management
6) Collaborative Working
7) Publication and Dissemination
8) Reviewing, Evaluating and Editing +
Research and scientific integrity policy' is important because it ensures credibility and trust in research by providing both preventive and corrective guidance. It prevents misconduct by educating researchers on standards, and offers frameworks for addressing violations fairly. In today’s interconnected research environment, having shared ethical codes strengthens international collaboration and consistency. For governments, institutions, and the public, this document demonstrates commitment to transparency, fairness, and societal responsibility. It is not just a guideline but a foundation for safeguarding the reliability of research outcomes. +
Research culture encompasses the behaviours, values, expectations, attitudes and norms of our research communities. It influences researchers’ career paths and determines the way that research is conducted and communicated. +
Research communities can be the science system as a whole, institutions or research labs. In these places a different reseach cultures might reign. Nontheless, research culture has an impact on the science system as a whole. The impact encompasses research integrity, diversity and inclusion, career paths, collaborations, the reward system, communication and more. Creating and maintaining a good research culture is invaluable for good science.
<br /> +
This kind of research fraud can cause a disease outbreak and cost the lives of children. +
The report argues that research integrity is vital because it creates trust, and trust is at the heart of the research process. Researchers must be able to trust each other's work, and "they must also be trusted by society since they provide scientific expertise that may impact people's lives". As the report's conclusions highlight, "research integrity has the potential to increase the quality of research in the European research ecosystem, thereby increasing its overall effectiveness and impact into the future". The inclusion by Science Europe members of research integrity amongst their core priorities shows their commitment to addressing the challenge. +
Research metrics are used to evaluate the popularity, impact and importance of individual scientists, articles and journals, as well as the performance of employees and projects. The logic behind such an approach is that cited items are perceived to have a bigger impact on science and are, therefore, of greater value. Consequently, research metrics can be employed as a basis of staff promotion and funding distribution. Bibliometrics are also used in research, when analyzing relationships between researchers, and when assessing the impact of research projects and grants. +
The proper conduct and reporting of research is fundamental to the scientific method and the integrity of the research record. Research misconduct however distorts the knowledge base. The practices of falsification, fabrication and plagiarism are widely agreed to constitute misconduct and are intentional deceptions. The Office of Research Integrity defines research misconduct as follows:
Research misconduct is ‘fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research, or in reporting research results.'
*<u>Fabrication</u> is making up data or results and recording or reporting them.
*<u>Falsification</u> is 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.
*<u>Plagiarism</u> is the appropriation of another person's ideas, processes, results, or words without giving appropriate credit.
*Research misconduct does not include honest error or differences of opinion.’
Falsification, fabrication and plagiarism, however, are relatively rare '"`UNIQ--ref-00000013-QINU`"' '"`UNIQ--ref-00000014-QINU`"'. In contrast, other behaviors, ranging from unintentional ‘sloppy' science to conscious minor breaches of research integrity are more frequent and possibly more damaging to science. '"`UNIQ--ref-00000015-QINU`"' '"`UNIQ--ref-00000016-QINU`"''"`UNIQ--references-00000017-QINU`"' +
In their NIH grant application, the researcher falsely claimed that a figure represented preliminary results of their independent experiments, which differed from the source of the figure and the prior research in the field. +
It shows that academic institutions have a responsibility towards the publications of those who are/were affiliated with them. In this case, King's college shows exemplary stewardship. +
Scientific fraud is not only about presenting false data, but also about not 'cherry picking' i.e. selecting certain data points to confirm or suport a specific hypothesis or make a result appear more spectacular. +
