- Case
Should we retract a published paper with a high similarity match?
…necessary to provide a commentary explaining the editor’s decision. If the 2022 paper is a duplicate publication, meaning the content is repeated without any new data or analysis (one can bypass actual copying of text), then retraction would be warranted. If salami-slicing is suspected and the prior article were in the same journal, then the authors could be invited to rewrite the 2022 article as a letter… - Case
Sections of plagiarised text in an e-publication
…for plagiarism are retraction and public admission. The grey area is how to treat the situation as the science does not appear to be flawed, only how it is presented as the big picture. While the case clearly involves plagiarism (true plagiarism, self-plagiarism and unquoted use of text), there is no way to ensure the science is fairly presented while the authors are reprimanded. Accepting… - Case
Redundant publication
- The editors should write to the authors and publish a retraction. - The editors should write to the authors’ institutions.… - Flowcharts
Undisclosed conflict of interest in a published article
…communicate with the author and reader during the investigation. The author's institution should be involved when the author denies an alleged conflict of interest or to inform an institution in cases of suspected misconduct. A published article may need a correction or to be retracted, dependent on whether the editor considers the conflict of interest to have affected the peer review… - Case
Correction, retraction, or expression of concern?
…detail to enable reproducibility. 3. Abstracts that did not provide sufficient detail to describe the content of the article. PMC did not suggest specific actions. However, we checked the review reports for these articles and agree with PMC's comments. We are therefore considering what we should do with these articles. Questions for COPE Council: Is Retraction… - Case
Duplicate publication and alleged image manipulation
…and asking for a response/explanation. The author freely admitted to the duplicate publication and paper 1 is in the process of being retracted. The allegation against paper 2 was image manipulation consisting of false bands being included in an assay figure. The editorial office reviewed the images and believes that they have been manipulated. As such they would like to retract the paper… - Case
Institution alleges that paper includes fabricated data
…perpetrator was or the specifics of the affected data. We were therefore unable to determine how severely affected the validity of the overall paper was and whether a retraction or correction was necessary. Our initial response was to request further information from the institution and the author. Initially, we were informed by both parties that, as a result of Federal privacy laws, they were unable… - 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… - Case
Retraction of false authorship
Dr X asked for a statement to be published to the effect that the letter he had published in the journal with two co-authors was not based on any work that he had done, but on that of his colleagues. The editor asked the other two authors why they had signed a copyright form in these circumstances. Both authors stated that they had not signed any such form, and when presented with a copy, state… - Case
Duplicate publication in possibly four papers
…country in another language, and then in English. A native speaker of the other language was able to read both versions and found only minor differences, and the editor of the foreign language journal also did this, and recommended that our journal retract the papers. The authors checked the box on our submission form that indicated that the submissions had not been published elsewhere, and they made no… - Case
Authors request withdrawal of a 19-year old article
…seriously the mistake will affect the main theorem of the paper. If the original research is truly flawed and the proof was the main intellectual contribution of the article, then the article should be retracted (but not withdrawn: the original article should remain available and linked to the retraction notice). The editors could consider asking the authors to come up with a draft retraction notice,… - Case
Data integrity issues
…validity of the data in both articles had been raised, and that the journal had requested the data from the authors. The third party contacted the editor-in-chief again, suggesting that the papers should be retracted. The journal sent a third notice to the author requesting the same information. The author responded stating that the situation was currently being investigated by their university.… - Case
Concerns regarding image manipulation and inconsistent figure legends
…the investigation and assuming the issue is considered a priority by the University, is it ethically acceptable to publish an Expression of Concern based on the information the journal has at their disposal? And can this Expression of Concern be further modified (retracted or replaced by a Retraction decision) once the final outcome of the University investigation is known? Are current… - Case
Author dispute over internal report
…to their company, they were entitled to re-use the content without permission. They proposed a resolution whereby author A was included as an author of the journal article via an erratum. This erratum was published, but author A remains discontent and has made it clear that he would like the journal article to be retracted. Authors B, C and D have yet to be consulted on retraction, although… - Case
The fraudulent letter
Letters to the editor are difficult to authenticate. The journal should publish a retraction and highlight this with an editorial. The dean should be notified and advised to write to every student pointing out this breach of ethics.… - Case
Author alleges discrimination by institutional report
In 2020, the corresponding author of an article published online three years previously notified the journal of an authorship conflict and explained that the institution was requesting retraction. Because authorship conflict does not typically warrant retraction, the publisher requested further details from the author and the author's institution about the conflict. The author provided two… - Case
Possible plagiarism
…gave me some personal advice. I was advised that plagiarism is not a matter of percentages but of principle and to take another look at the flowchart and decide if the author had given a satisfactory explanation for the “overlap”. If there was no satisfactory explanation, I should consider a retraction and informing the author’s institution. In considering what to do, I was advised to take… - Case
Request to remove an author post-publication
…safety. Author B also requested that, should removal of author A’s name not be possible, author A’s name could be replaced with a pseudonym or with ‘anonymous’. Several options are being considered by the journal: Remove author A from the published article, but do not retract the published article. The journal would publish a correction notice explaining author A’s removal… - Case
Authors requesting withdrawal of articles from similarity check database in order to re-publish
The Forum noted that retracting an article when the indexing of the article in a database such as Scopus or Web of Science changes is not an acceptable practice and is not in accordance with COPE’s Retraction Guidelines. This practice could be considered gaming the system. The authors should be disclosing, in their cover letter to the new journal, that the article was previously… - Flowcharts
Inappropriate image manipulation in a published article
A reader suspects inappropriate image manipulation in a published article. The guidance offers editors a step by step process when handling the issue, including who to contact and when to consider a retraction, correction or expression of concern. Inappropriate image…