- News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: January 2019
…a checklist, it is easy to identify areas of journal policies and procedures that might benefit from revision. Using this checklist on a regular basis as an established process helps ensure journals have robust, well described, and publicly documented publication ethics procedures. The Journal Audit Tool is not a survey and requires no response to COPE, but feedback to COPE to improve or enhance the Journal… - News
In the news: May & June 2022
…academic publishing issues which could be difficult to solve using AI. Majority of the survey participants think that identification of predatory publishers can be difficult even with the use of AI-based tools. Furthermore, identification of fake or manipulated data can also be an undeniable challenge in maintaining research integrity. How else should AI be used and integrated in academic research and publishing without… - Case
Authors’ contributions and involvement by medical communications company
The Forum suggested there were two separate issues here—dealing with the author and dealing with the medical writer. Is the medical writer a member of any professional organization, such as the American Medical Writers Association (AMWA), the European equivalent (EMWA) or the International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP). If so, these organizations usually have a code of… - Case
Seven plagiarized manuscripts in one month by the same corresponding author
…in chief checked the manuscript and found that the author had completely copied it from a previously published article although it was stated in the cover letter that the material had not been previously published or submitted elsewhere for publication. The author only changed the author names and added their own and the second author's names (A and B). There were no common authors, and the… - News
In the news: November 2018 Digest
…-massive-database-retracted-papers-reveals-about-science-publishing-s-death-penalty" target="_blank">An analysis of the database was published in the journal Science. This concludes that the increase in retractions in recent years might reflect better editorial practices. Not all retractions involve misconduct, 40% of the retractions in the database are due to errors, problems with reproducibility, and other issues. Around 50% of the retractions are due to “fabrication, falsification, or… - News
In the news: January 2021
…economics, medicine, physics and psychology were surveyed about various peer review issues. 49% reported checking all manuscripts for plagiarism, 61% allowed authors to recommend for or against specific reviewers, and fewer than 6% used a form of open peer review. 91% identified at least one circumstance in which it was acceptable for… - Case
An authorship dispute and a question about when a paper is considered published
The Forum agreed that the editor has done all he can in this messy authorship dispute. As the institution has been unhelpful, it was suggested that what was needed was an independent arbitrator or the funding agency that could liaise between the authors and come up with a solution. The Forum did not think there was a legal case for the journal to answer, and in any case the journal should be… - News
Data and reproducibility: The role of research institutions
…="http://www.sickkids.ca/Research/EnRICH/Publication-School/EQUATOR-Canada-Publication-School.html" target="_blank">Publication Schools, Data Carpentry workshops). Dedicated staff (i.e., Publications Officers), and investment into institutional libraries or research offices, will be required to develop these support structures. For the COPE… - Case
Potential duplicate publication
…B (ahead of the joint site/national agency paper) or to Journal C (when the joint site/national agency papers were under review with Journal B). The corresponding author of paper 3 published in Journal C was contacted. This author did not reply, but a response was received from two other authors on behalf of all the authors at site 1. This stated: 1. The authors felt that the emphasis and message in the… - Case
Repetitive duplicate submission to multiple journals and redundant publication
…without offering an explanation. The editor of J1 then brought this matter to the attention of all of the editors within this field in case they had also received the manuscript. The extent of the matter was then discovered, involving a number of different manuscripts and over half the journals in the field. It was felt that this was not an accident or misunderstanding of the rules… - Case
Dispute arising from peer review of a rejected comment and published correction
…potential risks? • While recognising the publisher’s original comment/reply policy contributed to this matter, does the Forum have any advice on how the publisher/journal could or should handle similar disputes in future? The policy has been amended to reduce the possibility of conflicts of interest. • How far should the publisher go in trying to resolve disputes between groups (especially… - News
In the news: December 2021
…highest PPMP or Gini index values, they found that the most prolific authors were members of the editorial board in 61% of the cases, and these papers were likely to be accepted for publication within 3 weeks of their submission. Peer review Is the peer review system in need of repair? The authors of this… - Case
Dispute over submitted comment and the right to be forgotten
…involved is unacceptable. The new editor-in-chief is not in a position to wash their hands of this. It is their job to handle the situation, in collaboration with their board and other experts (eg, legal counsel) as needed. It is irrelevant that the paper was submitted/published before their tenure as editor-in-chief. No matter how this is approached—retraction or comment—it is important for there… - Case
Disputed change in authorship
…contributorship statements upfront, many of these problems could have been avoided. If a contributorship statement was not requested, the journal may wish to include this requirement in their editorial policies and submission requirements (using the CRediT taxonomy for example, or something similar). Having this statement enables editors to better understand what is… - Event
COPE webinar: Enhancing partnerships of institutions and journals
…="mailto:[email protected]?subject=Question%20for%20webinar%3A%20Enhancing%20partnerships%20of%20institutions%20and%20journals">email your question in advance or ask questions during the webinar. Cooperation between research institutions and journals Susan Garfinkel will share the findings and recommendations of the working group Enhancing partnerships of institutions… - News
Standards in Authorship webinar summary
…authorship roles prior to engaging in the research or because of disagreements between members of the group. Transparent agreements upfront can help to identify any unique issues and resolve authorship disputes. However, it was interesting to see from the webinar polls, that only… Member Insight
…COPE Members to watch again. COPE and STM are embarking on a research project to understand more about paper mills. Would you like COPE Members to contribute to the research with your personal or professional experience of the problem? Let us know by filling in the website form. The latest in our series of…- Case
Undeclared competing interests
…correction, which the author also agreed to: “[The publisher] thanks the authors for clarifying their competing interests and wishes to make clear its view that even employees of non profit public charities may have competing interests (financial or otherwise) and that it is always best to err on the side of declaring these. However, at the time of publication of the original article, our competing… - Case
Mislabelling/duplicate images
…a different, although similar, tag was in fact used. He said he spoke with his co-authors, who agreed that the error did not affect the scientific conclusions of the paper and that he could either correct the tag name or provide a new correct image. For the poster, he said that there were a number of images mislabelled, and that this occurred, in essence, because he used ‘placeholder’ images while… - Case
Scientific misconduct claim from a whistleblower where the institution will not investigate
…the potential for misconduct. • Due to the importance for the career of individuals on this paper, can the editors aid the authors submitting elsewhere, given that the whistleblower lied, but there is no way to disprove fraud. Or should the editors provide the information about the whistleblower to the institution. …