Projects Funded
…A report on this project will be published shortly. The abstract is available now (Download pdf 17 kb) (uploaded 13 May 2010).…- Case
Paper submitted for publication without consent or knowledge of co-authors
…received although they were copied in on the correspondence. On 14 December 2012, the publisher contacted CA directly, asking him for his point of view. CA replied on 17 December 2012. From his reply it was not clear whether he completely understood the situation. He stated that he had asked co-author A for permission to submit the article but “had no answer for one year”. He states that the… - Case
Lack of ethical approval and not reporting experimental evidence
In May 2011 a letter from the Vice-Rector for Personnel of a reputable university was sent to the editor mentioning that two articles published in the journal contained two statements not supported by documented evidence. The two statements related to: (1) approval of the local ethics committee and (2) representation of the experimental evidence. With regard to point (1), the authors sta… - Case
Author requests for certain experts not to be included in the editorial process
The Editors decided to comply with the author’s request. The manuscript was rejected, based on two peer-review reports and opinions from 11 editors. The author was told that the journal had complied with the request, and that advice had been sought from COPE. The author subsequently appealed the decision; this was not upheld. In light of this, the editorial board were asked to create… - Translated resources
El autor solicita que ciertos expertos no participen en el proceso editorial: caso
…Existe el peligro de que esto envalentone más aún al autor si los revisores que sugirió finalmente están involucrados en el proceso de revisión. Además, los editores tienen el deber de proteger a los revisores. Sejuimiento Los editores decidieron acceder a la solicitud del autor. El manuscrito se rechazó basándose en los informes de dos revisores por pares y en la opinión de 11… - News
Diversity, equity, inclusivity and accessibility: COPE commentary
…within the wider publishing community. In March 2022 we issued a position statement which stated that COPE is committed to creating an inclusive and equitable culture, where all voices are welcomed and heard, and difference is celebrated. Through our words and actions, we intend to work for… - Forum discussion topics
Ethical considerations around watchlists
…that all parties consult legal counsel for individual cases. COPE is exploring the need for guidance on ethical issues surrounding watchlists and welcomes comments on this topic. - News
Case Discussion: Lack of trial registration leads to new concerns about study conduct and ethical review/approval
…Case Summary Case 11-11 The editors of a journal noticed that a published article reported clinical trial results without mentioning trial registration. When… - News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: December 2018
…="https://mailchi.mp/publicationethics/authorship-issues-peer-review-manipulation-cope-digest-december-2018">Read December Digest: Authorship Issues | Peer Review Manipulation (Image credit: Leaf changing colour. License: CC0 Public Domain https://www.publicdomainpictures.net/en/view-image.php?image=59188&picture=leaf-changing-color)… - Case
Unusually frequent submission of articles by a single author
A sixth year medical student, with expected year of graduation of 2013 (Mr X), submitted 29 original articles and 17 letters to the editor in the period February 2012 to October 2012 to our journal. This amounted to an average of five submissions per month. Mr X is an author and corresponding author in every article. Of these, he is the first author of eight original research articles and 12… - News
Authorship and Contributorship focus: an editor view and research institution view
…particular note are the Discussion Document "What constitutes authorship?"; the position statement Responsible research publication: international standards for authors, the… - News
Case discussion: Low-risk study with no ethics committee approval
…Forum case (11-16), a journal rejected a paper on an online questionnaire study for being unethically conducted despite receiving retrospective ethics approval. Advance ethical approval or official exemption is recommended for survey studies (highlighted in… Facilitation and Integrity FAQ
…style="text-decoration:none;">[email protected] with any other queries. COPE resources are available under a CC BY-NC-ND license, and thus the resources may be used by journals and publishers regardless of whether they are COPE members. A reference to COPE materials or COPE standards on the journal’s web pages does not, by itself, imply COPE membership. Therefore, it is…Resources and further reading
…India, 9 December 2013Kusal Das, International Advisory Group COPE/IAMJE Seminar, New Delhi, India, 15 November 2013Charlotte Haug, Vice Chair COPE International Conference on Medical…- News
Case discussion: Suspected plagiarism
…a cut-off value of 15% to be useful. Well trained editorial and publishing staff could monitor trends in submissions for specific journals to make a good guideline for efficient plagiarism checking. If the editor believes that there was no malicious intent on the part of the authors, an educational approach may be appropriate (e.g., junior researchers, students, first-time authors). The editors… - Case
Author of rejected letter blames global bias against his message and undisclosed conflicts of interest
The editor in chief received a letter to the editor criticising a paper published earlier in the journal. The editor first told the author of the letter that he would publish the commentary after he had given the authors of the criticised paper a chance to respond. When asked by the author of the letter, he later added that he would also publish the letter if the authors failed to respond.… - News
In the news: February 2018 Digest
…January 15, 2018 that stated that “the systematic replication of other researchers’ work should be a normal part of science." The academy called for funding agencies, researchers, and research institutions to work together to facilitate replication studies. With this statement, the Netherlands joins other international efforts, including in the US and Great Britain, calling for ways to improve… - News
Case discussion: Editor manipulation of impact factor
…The Forum noted that Clarivate Analytics takes action against journals for citation manipulation. However, because up to 15% of citations are allowed to be journal self-citations, editors could purposefully promote journal self-citation without exceeding that level. A link to the Citation Manipulation section of a Council of Science Editors white paper was provided ( - News
In the news: July Digest
…="_blank">https://www.hindustantimes.com/education/ugc-move-to-thwart-pay-and-publish-trash-culture/story-AP0BFFrbNuL1mN5WNbgCjI.html Peer review An experiment on peer review conducted by researchers at Harvard Business School, found that almost 50% of reviewers of medical funding applications changed their own ratings… - News
In the news: February Digest
…scientific record is, to this editor, awe inspiring. https://retractionwatch.com/2020/01/02/nobel-winner-retracts-paper-from-science/ In other news The New York Times published an analysis by Dana Goldstein of 8 American History texts used by 8th and 11…