- Case
Potential figure manipulation with corresponding author uncontactable
A reader contacted the journal to raise concerns about a paper containing a potentially manipulated figure. The editor-in-chief agreed with the assessment that the figure had been manipulated and attempted to contact the corresponding author, without response. Following further contact with the co-authors and institution, it was established that the corresponding author had retired after public… - Case
Unhelpful institution report
An allegation of data fraud was not satisfactorily resolved by correspondence with the authors. We then went to the lead institution and asked for an investigation. Within 10 days we had a report clearing the authors, but interestingly using some of the exact same phrases the authors used in their responses to us. We felt that the report was too superficial and approached the other institution… - Case
Victim of article theft wants correction to list their name, not retraction
Author A contacted us claiming that an article published in the journal recently by author B was stolen from an article author A had earlier submitted to two different publishers, publisher A in 2016 and publisher B in 2017. Author A provided the PDFs of the manuscripts they had submitted to those other publishers. The version submitted to us 2018 by author B was very similar to that submitted… - Case
Guest editors for single articles
A COPE member has noted instances of journals contacting individuals - who are not on their editorial board - to request that they act as guest editor for a single manuscript. The invitation makes it clear that they are being asked to recruit reviewers and to make the editorial decision. This practice includes instances where the invitee has had no prior contact with the journal. C… - Case
Author refusal to sign an ethics form
A journal has received a submission which is based on patient data (CT scan images). The data have been found to have been taken from an open-source repository. The authors are refusing to sign an Ethics Approval and Consent for Authors form. Questions for the Forum Is a signature in these cases compulsory? How would the Forum recommend we hand… - News
In the news: November Digest
…publishing choices. https://thinkchecksubmit.org/2019/10/17/think-check-submit-looks-forward-to-collaboration-on-new-research-programme/ Allegations of misconduct An investigation by King’s College London has found 26 of… - Case
Service evaluation as research in a controversial area of medicine
We received an email from a reader relating to the ethics statement in a research article published in 2011. The article presented data collected at a clinic relating to a controversial area in medicine. The ethics statement in the article indicates that, in accordance with regional guidelines, the research ethics committee deemed that the study was a service evaluation and formal ethical revie… - News
In the news: December Digest
…-we-choose-to-align-open-access-to-research-with-geo-political-borders-we-negate-the-moral-value-of-open-access/ A 2016 survey with a 17% response rate (507 of 3000) researchers in the Global South from the AuthorAID network explored their attitudes and experiences with open access publishing. About 40% noted limited or no access to academic literature. 89% always use Google to search for literature. 17% had deposited research into institutional repositories. 70% thought that OA research was useful or… - News
Data and reproducibility focus
…standardized reporting guidelines to ensure that studies can be replicated. Data sharing policies are one area of - Event
COPE Lightning Talk: Text recycling in research writing
17 April 2024, 13:00-14:00 BST / UTC+1 COPE Members only Clarifying the legalities for authors and editors Over the past six years, the Text Recycling Research Project has conducted empirical studies to better understand text recycling in the research context and used what they’ve learned to develop… - News
Letter from the COPE Chair: February 2021
…on this to follow. On 10 February, we delivered an online authorship cases workshop. This workshop will be repeated for different time zones on 24 February at 17.00-18.30pm (AWST)/9.00-10.30am (GMT). The topic of the COPE Forum on 23 March is book… - Case
Duplicate publication in multicentre consortia
Two closely related journals received a series of manuscripts each based on descriptions of a complex medical procedure by multicentre consortia. At least three separate consortia submitted three separate papers. Each consortium included centres which were shared between the three groups and likely have the same patients/procedures represented in different reports. For example: … - Case
Publishing a letter concerning a paper published in another journal many years ago
Recently, Journal X received a letter to the editor based on an article published in another journal about 8 years previously. The editors of Journal X believe this letter is important to their readers. The original article was a seminal paper which changed practice. However, a group of authors challenged some of the data published in this trial in a subsequent review published about 7 ye… - News
In the news: January 2018 Digest
…-journals-stop-interview-kelly-cobey-larissa-shamseer/ https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2017/12/11/guest-post-authors-get-caught-predatory-illegitimate-publishing-net/#comment-72599 - News
Case discussion: Consequence for dual submission
This month’s highlighted case is about following up duplicate submission. In COPE Forum case number 17-20, journal A was informed by journal B that an author had withdrawn an accepted manuscript because it had already been accepted elsewhere. In fact, the manuscript had been published in journal A in the previous… - News
Complaints and appeals
…upcoming COPE Forum and more. Read April 2018 Digest: Complaints and Appeals… - News
Post-publication discussions and corrections focus
…--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Read November Digest: Post-Publication Discussions and Corrections. This issue of Digest announces new resources What to do if you Suspect Image Manipulation in a Published… - News
Letter from the COPE Chair: November 2019
…publication, publication on vulnerable populations, ethical conduct of research using animals, ethical conduct of research using human subjects, handling confidential data and ethical business/marketing practices”. This makes this core practice an overarching topic for all issues in publication ethics. The case we discuss in this issue is just one example of ethical oversight. It is case 17… - Case
Article sent to reviewer by mistake
An article reviewing approaches to modelling the impact of widescale therapy for a particular condition was submitted to the journal. The editors mistakenly sent the article to an individual (reviewer A) whom the authors had requested be excluded as a reviewer (the article was critical of some of the reviewer's previous work). Upon realizing this mistake, the editorial board decided that they w… - Case
When to conclude correspondence from reader about errors in a published article
A reader, Dr A, wrote to the editors explaining a number of concerns she had with some of the figures in a paper published in the journal. The editors sought the advice of an associate editor with more expertise in the subspecialty of the paper. The associate editor concurred with Dr A’s opinion of the paper and the authors were invited to respond. After some back and forth correspondence, the…