Expenses policy
…- reasonable costs for meals and refreshments will be reimbursed. A reasonable level is classed as no more than £15 for lunch and £30 for dinner. When using a private car the allowable rates per mile are: 45p per mile up to 150 miles in one trip; 25p per mile over 150 miles in one trip. Parking fees and tolls are reimbursed where applicable. Fines incurred as a result of driving or parking…- Webform
COPE peer review workshop, November 2020
…Peer review workshop Thursday 19 November 2020, online workshop 9.00am - 10.30am (GMT) (COPE Members only) REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED AS WORKSHOP IS FULL Following on from the success of our Peer Review Workshop during this year’s Peer Review Week, COPE is re-running… - Case
A case of plagiarism
A paper with five authors was submitted from a university hospital in a Middle-Eastern country. One of the reviewers complained that it extensively plagiarised one of his own publications. Examination showed that about 30% of the text and tables had been copied. The results were original, and in some cases had simply been slotted into the plagiarised text. The paper was rejected by… - Case
Possible case of fraud
A paper was submitted to us describing an RCT carried out in a Far Eastern hospital. Soon after the manuscript had been sent out for review, one of the reviewers sent a letter alerting us to a “possible case of fraud”. The reviewer in question appears to have compared notes with another investigator in his institute, and together they realised that the same group had submitted two… COPE Forum
…peer review, editing of reviewer comments Predatory publishing Ethical considerations around book publishing- Forum discussion topics
Editorial conflicts of interest
March 2022 Watch the introduction to the topic "Editorial conflicts of interest" with COPE Council member, Itamar Ashkenazi. - News
Announcement of COPE Council elections
…administrator here, to whom applications and nominations can be emailed. The closing date for applications is 22 OCTOBER 2010. _________________________________________________________________________________________________ COPE council member: role description Purpose of role To be responsible, together… - Case
Possible omission of information essential for conclusions in a research paper
In 2013, our journal published a paper describing an observational study comparing two drugs (A and B) for the management of a chronic disease over a period of 10 years. The conclusion in the paper was that mortality was higher in group A (97 deaths) compared with the other group B (52 deaths) (hazard ratio 1.76, 1.22 to 2.53; P=0.003). This analysis was done after adjustment for a large… - Research
CrossCheck guidance: an analysis of typical cases of plagiarism in different disciplines 2010
…this site http://www.zju.edu.cn/jzus/editorpaper.php: 1. Zhang YH, Jia XY. A survey on the use of CrossCheck for detecting plagiarism in journal articles. Learned publishing 2012;25(4):292–307. 2. Zhang YH, McIntosh I. How to stop plagiarism: blacklist repeat offenders? Nature 2012;481:22. doi:10.1038/481021a 3. Zhang YH,… - Case
Image duplication
The editor received an allegation of image falsification from a whistleblower relating to two papers published more than ten years previously (under the previous editor and publisher). A senior editor reviewed the allegations according to COPE guidelines, and decided there was evidence of image duplication. The allegations were then put to the author who was unable to supply the original data a… - Forum discussion topics
Dealing with complaints about the integrity of published research
June 2022 Watch the introduction to the topic "Dealing with complaints about the integrity of published research" with COPE Council member, Jigisha Patel. Membership subscription fees
…£45,396 1751 to 2000 £41,414 1501 to 1750 £37,167 1251 to 1500 £33,451 1001 to 1250 £29,203 751 to 1000 £24,424 501 to 750 £19,911 251 to 500 £13,805 101 to 250 £8,495 …- News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: January 2019
…height: 125px; margin-left: 3px; margin-right: 3px; float: left;" /> Read January 2019 COPE Digest newsletter and use the COPE Audit Tool, read a case discussion on citation manipulation, get dates in the diary for COPE events in 2019, and keep… - Case
Author requests permission to publish review comments
…reviews and a commentary on the issues raised, prior to submission to a journal with open peer review. The author requested the journal’s consent for the review comments to be made public under CC licence. We declined permission to publish the reviews and explained that the journal operates a confidential single blind review process. Reviewers are informed that their names will not be revealed to… - News
In the news: February 2018 Digest
…Requirements" at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Pyn_Hr5_DgYMF7ncyFWjsNjcjtPdnW8GYSEqXvmF9co/edit … which was still active as of February 7, 2018. Based heavily on the “Concordat on Open Research Data”, RCUK, 28th July 2016, - News
COPE in 2023
…A time to review and look forward In 2022, COPE celebrated its 25th year. While we celebrated this anniversary with pride in all that we have achieved over the past 25 years, we also took the opportunity to reflect on COPE’s role and purpose in a rapidly evolving research and publication landscape.… - News
In the news: March Digest
…policies, features, and practices of 44 preprint platforms in the life and biomedical sciences were presented during a recent ASAPbio workshop on preprints. The workshop was attended by Iratxe Puebla, COPE’s Facilitation and Integrity Officer, and approximately 30 other stakeholders with the goal of developing an agreed set of best practices for metadata and processes to support the discoverability, use,… - Case
Retraction request after university investigation found no evidence of fraud
COPE Council judged in 2022 that ‘A journal has the right to retract an article, even when an institutional investigation does not find misconduct. The editor is responsible for the ethical standards of their journal, and if the editor has independent evidence that… Membership: universities and research institutes
COPE announced the launch of membership for selected universities and research institutes in May 2022. An initial group of universities and research institutes have joined as members and will help ensure that the dedicated resources provide the appropriate support and guidance that universities and research institutes need: Aston University |- Flowcharts
Systematic manipulation of the publication process
…process COPE guidance 2023 Paper mills research report COPE & STM, 2022 How to recognise potential manipulation of the peer review process COPE infographic