Seminars
…22kB] Poster: Fraud and deceit in medical research Download [PDF 22kB] Poster: Authors’ awareness of publication ethics: An international survey- News
Predatory behaviour in publication ethics
…href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0099133320301270?via%3Dihub">list of predatory journals is inevitably subjective and varies from one list to another. Publishers and editors… - 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 - Forum discussion topics
Peer review models
…introduction to the COPE Forum discussion on the topic "Peer review models" with COPE Council Member, Patrick Franzen. COPE Forum discussion Peer review sits at the core of scholarly publishing.… - News
In the news: July 2021
…tenure decisions. This index can be gamed by excessive self-citation and there are instances of authors adding references at the revision stage of the peer review process after there is likely to be scrutiny of the reference list, producing in an “h-index factory“. The author proposes for these, and other reasons cited in the post, that the community of researchers and publishers need to “ - Forum discussion topics
Systematic manipulation of the publishing process via “paper mills”
…is not necessarily a sign of a paper mill submission but if there are other red flags, it can be useful. Some additional features have been added. The original features for the tool were to protect against reviewer fraud and a report would only be issued after peer review. A new setting (low, medium, high) can raise an alert if there is a high rate of submission from the same device. Would it be… - News
In the news: December 2020
…the phenomenon of "vanished journals "- open access journals that disappear - Mikaek Laakso and co-authors consulted several major bibliographic indices and found 176 open access journals that vanished from the web between 2000-2019 from all major research disciplines and world regions. This highlights concerns about the integrity of the scholarly… - News
In the news: May 2021
…of misconduct The editors of a journal published a case history describing why they decided not to retract a paper, despite evidence of misconduct by one of the authors. Their conclusion was that to retract a paper where the outcome is still valid would be unethical and that, in such… - News
Case Discussion: Lack of trial registration leads to new concerns about study conduct and ethical review/approval
…institution, who was not a co-author and wished to remain anonymous, informed the editors that the ethics committee named in the article did not exist at the institution. After not hearing back from the authors, the editors added a Comment to the article alerting readers of non-adherence to clinical trial requirements. The authors later said that ethics approval had been granted by another… - News
Where next in peer review? Part 2: COPE commentary
…knowledge to fully understand the capabilities and threats presented by AI. On the potential for personal information to make its way back into training data, for example, Dustin Smith (a self-declared ‘AI optimist’) was quite clear. Where LLMs are trained on closed data sets (that is, with no new information added to it over time), there is little risk of material submitted to it reappearing in… Membership application FAQ
…membership is accepted? When your application is accepted, you will receive an email confirming this. You will receive a link to COPE’s Member Handbook which details the benefits of being a COPE member as well as how to manage your membership. If membership fees are applicable, an invoice will be sent to you. Once your membership fees are paid, your journal details will be added to our…- News
Case discussion: gift authorship
…href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08989621.2020.1772060"> Accountability in Research published by Michael Reisig et al in 2020 identified gift authorship to be the most prevalent form of research misconduct, according to replies from tenured or tenure-track faculty at the top 100 research-intensive universities in the USA. This result, and past COPE Forum cases, suggests pervasive disregard, lack, misconception, or misinterpretation of… - News
In the news: June 2021
…-can-universities-and-journals-work-together-better-on-misconduct-allegations/" target="_blank">responded to questions from Retraction Watch about the recommendations. A group of researchers assessed the timeliness and quality of retraction notices for a group of papers, and found that responses to concerns were delayed and incomplete, and that the content of retraction notices did not adhere… Common editorial dilemmas: hypothetical cases
…conclusions, adding that your last letter to them stated you would accept the revision if they took into account the reviewer's comments, which they have done in full. Discussion The editor has already said s/he would accept with minor revisions, which had been done. Arguably the onus is on the editor to accept this article.…New UK Panel for Research Integrity
…instances occur. Project approval was granted through to September 2004. Professor Michael Farthing was appointed to lead the project on account of his expertise in the field and as former chair of COPE. One of the first tasks was to survey the membership to look at the nature and prevalence of research misconduct. Seventy per cent of the membership (86 members)…- Seminars and webinars
Webinar 2022: Managing paper mills
…processes? They are probably equally concerning. They are both bad in terms of contaminating the published record, but they operate in a slightly different way. And paper mills and predatory publishers can overlap eg predatory publishers may run paper mills. We need more research to understand this. Are there any legitimate reasons for adding an author after acceptance? We have seen… - News
Welcome new COPE members April-June 2019
Welcome to our new members who have joined COPE between April and June 2019. The new members have been assessed against criteria outlined in the Principles of Transparency and signing up to COPE shows that they intend to follow the highest standards of publication ethics and to apply COPE principles of publication ethics outlined in the