Press
…transparency and best practice released 15 September 2022 The fourth edition of the Principles represents a collective effort between the four organisations to align the principles with today’s scholarly publishing landscape. Guidance is provided on the information that should be made available on websites, peer review, access, author fees and publication ethics. The…- News
Letter from the COPE Chair: March 2020
…resources, including discussion documents, flowcharts, guidelines, and case studies under 10 distinct types of publications ethics issues. It allows you to find all the relevant material on an issue (eg, authorship and contributorship). Our case discussion this month is case 19-11: Withdrawal of… - Case
Contacting Research Ethics Committees with concerns over studies
A paper was submitted, detailing a small overseas trial of a drug treatment of a politically controversial disease. The treatment was moderately toxic. The paper was seen by two referees (A and B), who had considerable criticisms of the methodology used. Comments were also received from C, who was invited to review but refused, because s/he did not want his/her name known to the authors under t… - Case
Possible plagiarism and fabrication
…drug B vs placebo, and drug A vs drug B comparisons, the p values for efficacy are identical in the two papers. 10. Both papers report an astonishing p<0. 000006 in favour of drug A compared with placebo for the difference in the incidence of vomiting. Both papers use Fisher’s exact test for analysing differences in the incidence. 11. Both papers report a p<0. 009 in favour of drug A compared… - Case
Duplicate publication and alleged image manipulation
The editorial office of journal A was contacted anonymously by an individual who made allegations against two papers, both published by the same author. Paper 1 was alleged to be a duplicate publication, with the paper previously having been published in journal B. The editorial office of journal A, in accordance with the COPE flowcharts, contacted the author informing them of the allegations a… - Case
Duplicate publication in possibly four papers
This case involves four manuscripts. Three of the manuscripts were originally published in another language and then published in our English language journal. There is overlap in the authors who were involved in all four manuscripts. The first and second manuscripts were duplicated publications from another journal. The evidence is very clear. The papers were published in another countr… - Case
Deceased author and author delaying publication
The journal accepted a manuscript for publication with two authors. One of the authors died before signing the copyright. This manuscript is now ready for galley proof approval from the surviving author. Proofs were sent to the surviving author and the author who died as normal because the production editor assigned to this manuscript did not know that one of the authors had died. After… Membership subscription fees
…Number of journals Fees per year 5 to 10 £666 11 to 25 £1515 26 to 50 £2728 51 to 100 £4848 101 to 250 £9693 251 to 500 £15753 501 to 750 £22720 …- Case
Ukrainian authors request retraction of article in Russian conference proceedings
A journal has been contacted by a group of authors from Ukraine who wish to retract their article because of acute ethical issues in relation to the war with Russia. The authors are employees of a research institute in Ukraine. When preparing their article they were not fully informed about the country of the organisers of the conference. They are concerned that participation in a Russian confe… - News
New: Chinese resources
…="https://publicationethics.org/files/Ethical_Guidlines_for_PeerReviewers_Chinese_Web.pdf">Ethical guidelines for peer reviewers Discussion document: What constitutes authorship? Flowcharts: Complete set of flowcharts - News
In the news: August 2021
…journals, and other organisations represents a commitment to creating a more inclusive culture in STEM fields and STEM publishing in particular. The participating national laboratories will facilitate requests for name changes for any reason, including religious, marital, or… - News
Case discussion: repeated complaints about a review
…Case summary Case 11-07 A reader, whose identity was unclear, alerted a journal about an author who had recently been found guilty of publication misconduct and had had a dozen papers retracted. Subsequently, the reader repeatedly… Resources and further reading
…_10_04/caredit.a1300211#.Uk9ffEYHu3c.twitter PEER REVIEW Hames, I. The Future of Peer Review, EASE / ISMTE joint meeting Blankenberge. September 2013http://www.ease.org.uk/sites/default/files/irene_hames_the_future_of_peer_review_september_2013.pdf UK House of…- Forum discussion topics
Best practices for guest edited collections
…different from the conference proceeding paper. See the STM Permissions Guidelines (2022) for alternative proposals.' Q: Keeping in mind that it is common practice to publish preprints on repositories such as arXiv (where there is not a proper review but in any… Diversity policy
…the Executive Officer or to a COPE Officer. Please refer to the grievance policy (being reviewed) for details. Related content Other COPE policies Page history First published 10 September 2022 Back to top…Submitting a guest editorial or opinion piece to COPE
…any loss or damage caused or occasioned as a result of the publication of a guest editorial or opinion article. Publication history This policy will be reviewed and updated at the discretion of the editors. Published: 25 January 2022 Updated: 20 June 2023…- News
Guest article: Detecting integrity issues
…href="https://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts/systematic-manipulation-publication-process">Systematic manipulation of the publication process, COPE guidance 2022 The evolving relationship between universities and scholarly publishers, COPE Seminar Keynote address 2021… - Case
Possible peer review manipulation
A journal received a complaint by one of the co-authors of an article submitted by a research team, stating that one of the reviewers suggested by the corresponding author sent an email to corresponding author asking them to tell them what comments they should insert in their review. In response, the corresponding author asked the co-authors to propose comments to be sent to the reviewer. One o… - Case
Is there a time limit for submitting a critique of a published article?
A letter to the editor was submitted to a journal with a comment referring to a study published a year previously. The reader raised concerns about the study and interpretation of the results. The editors of the journal examined the peer review comments of the manuscript and found that the aspects in question were missed out. The journal sought expert advice from an independent reviewer who com… FORUM DISCUSSION TOPIC: Issues related to papers submitted to “discussion” journals
…discussion section of the journal Within 2-8 weeks, the paper is up online with a DOI, ready for the open peer review process Two referees are invited to post their reviews online Anyone else can comment on the paper whilst it is going through review A decision is made on the paper based on the review comments, with the normal “major,” “minor,” “accept” and “reject”…