We received a complaint from an author claiming that her PhD thesis had been plagiarized in a journal article. After many discussions, the editorial office decided that the authors should resolve this issue among themselves, as it was an author dispute.
After further correspondence, the editorial office is now also saying that because the thesis is not published anywhere, there is no need to cite it in the reference list. The instructions for authors state that: "The list of references should only include works that are cited in the text and that have been published or accepted for publication. Personal communications and unpublished works should only be mentioned in the text."
There are many opinions/views/cases available on different websites. But the prevailing view seems to be that any document, whether an unofficial discussion piece (or an unpublished thesis?), must be cited. What is the opinion of the COPE Forum?
The Forum were unanimous in their assertion that the PhD thesis should be cited. Even if the PhD thesis is unpublished, it should still be cited. It counts as a type of publication. The intellectual property belongs to the authors, so their rights may have been violated.
However, the editor raised another issue. The Forum were told by the editor that one of the authors of the paper is a supervisor of the PhD thesis. Hence there may be incorrect author attribution here. Should the author of the PhD thesis in fact be an author on the paper? At this point it is impossible for the editor to sort this out, so the editor should contact the institution with this information, presented in a neutral way, without making any accusations. The institution need to investigate who owns the data. Following the investigation, the editor may have to publish a correction. In the meantime, one suggestion was to publish an expression of concern in the journal.
The editor sent the advice of the COPE Forum to the complaining author who said he would discuss the possibility of publishing an erratum with the authors of the article. The editor is awaiting a response.
Follow up (September 2013):
In the end, the author concerned decided that he did not want to escalate the case to the university authorities. This editor considers the case now closed.
Comments
This is not right. Editors and publishers must directly demand integrity from supervisors and institutions, as well as their board members/authors, particularly when supervisors plagiarize a thesis, AND the degree was not offered/partly offered if a double degree cotutelle. There are international privacy laws that a corresponding author cannot side-step in case there are no longer valid signed agreements (since say, the cotutelle ended, but the two supervisors like the thesis "future work" ideas and go ahead and implement them without the author of the idea/without citing the thesis). However, unlike the corresponding author in this international scenario, the Journal does have the authority to DIRECTLY make inquiries with the institutions and demand proof of contributions from authors (the same as authors are demanded proof by reviewers). It is a privilege that this complainant brought the issue to the Editor, and clearly the complainant was not protected, most likely intimidated by either the editor, publisher, or both. Supervisors that plagiarize or use other forms abuse do it because they can! So, people just quit science if they do not want to become corrupt.
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I agree with you. The issue should be brought by the editor/Journal to the institution directly, not by the complainant . I guess the complainant decided not to escalate the issue to the institution because she is not being protected. All she asked was her right to the data and attribution. if she bring this matter to the institution, it may affect someone's career/future. And that definitely not her intention. Pity on her because the case closed without any solution. The authors of the paper may not realize that their paper has been brought to COPE. Please do something!
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PhD students should also know that data collected by a student belong to both the supervisor/s and the University. In most cases, the student has to be included in the paper but whose name/s appear/s first would depend on who has written the paper (not the thesis). If a student work was written up by the superior/s then, their names should appear first and so on. In many cases, normally an agreement is researched between the student and the superior, if the student is not willing to write then the superior can, in which the latter name appears first on the paper.
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