Academic and research misconduct in the PhD: Issues for students and supervisors

What is this about?

This case presents four factual anonymised cases of misconduct practices occurring in PhD supervision. More specifically: a) engagement with regulatory processes (i.e., the case of deviation from the initially ethics-approved data collection procedures without informing the relevant regulatory body); b) problems of knowledge or understanding transfer (i.e., a misunderstanding between student and supervisor in relation to intellectual property); c) culturally specific issues in the PhD study (i.e., the writing of disjoined, sometimes plagiarised, paragraphs in the thesis of a student whose first language was not English); d) academic theft (i.e., a student discovered her ex-supervisor had published work containing a literature review very similar to her own).

Why is this important?

These are thought provoking examples of roles and responsibilities in the PhD student-supervisor relationship. They are real examples that can be used for reflection for supervisors and students alike, as well as for teaching purposes.

For whom is this important?

PhD StudentsSupervisors

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