History and context of the COPE guidelines
…Publication Practice and underwent wide consultation with COPE Council and with editors and publishers. It was published on the first COPE website in November 2004, with an Editorial in the BMJ. The original Code of Conduct (PDF, 212 KB) is linked here for reference but is now…- Case
Allegation of reviewer malpractice
…other was general and positive, and recommended publication. It emerged in court that the positive review came from an individual who was working on behalf of the plaintiffs as a paid expert and who “had had a relationship with the study author for more than 10 years. ” The primary question from the overseas colleague is whether the reviewer was nominated by the author or was chosen quite… - Case
Possible dual publication
As editor of journal A I am handling a manuscript by an author and it is likely to be accepted, although this is not yet decided. As a reviewer for journal B, I have since been asked to review a manuscript by the same author that uses similar material and comes to a similar conclusion, but pushes the presentation of the results a little further. My gut feeling is that there is insufficient nove… - Case
Supervisor publishes PhD students work
The PhD supervisor and a co-supervisor published a paper. The paper contained the work of a PhD student; approximately 90% of the paper was from the thesis. The PhD student found out when the paper was electronically pre-published. He contacted the supervisor. The supervisor’s first reaction was “How did you find out”? The supervisor did not want to include the PhD student as an author since he… - Case
Paper B plagiarised paper A: what to do if a journal does not respond?
The author X of a paper published by journal A complained to the editor-in-chief of journal A that his/her paper has been plagiarised by a paper that has been published later by journal B. Moreover, the authors of the paper in journal B allegedly did not respond to letters sent by author X asking for an explanation about the apparent plagiarism. The editor-in-chief of journal A compared… - News
In the news: August 2018 Digest
…the first or first ten papers that show up on a search. In any case, which papers are cited by an author may have a complex set of reasons and is worth considering.http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2014/10/12/what-drives-academic-citations/#.W2wCTdhKit… - Case
Exposing citation manipulation and fraud in the community
A publisher has identified a ring of three individuals who acted as guest editors for three special issues. These individuals used nine fake accounts to peer review manuscripts. For some manuscripts, the fake identities were used alongside legitimate reviewers, while in other cases they were used exclusively. The publisher has also identified several submissions to those special issues where th… - Case
Data availability for vulnerable populations
A paper on a vulnerable population was published in a journal. The journal followed their usual procedures for processing papers on vulnerable populations, by requesting and reviewing further information on the ethics approval and consent procedures of the study (e.g.: recruitment procedures; blank version of the consent document participants read and signed; the study protocol that was approve… Membership: universities and research institutes
COPE announced the launch of membership for selected universities and research institutes in May 2022. An initial group of universities and research institutes have joined as members and will help ensure that the dedicated resources provide the appropriate support and guidance that universities and research institutes need: Aston University |- Case
A case of scientific misconduct?
…authors wrote back to us, cc'ing the heads of their two research ethics committees, to say that indeed, the manuscript did not match the two different protocols they sent us. They explained that there was a fault in the manuscript and not in the work carried out. They explained that the paper they sent us did not describe a single study but rather parts of 4 different approved studies taking place over… - News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: December 2018
…How do stresses and strains on researchers, whether as authors or as peer reviewers, play out and what do we do about the consequences? What new opportunities do we need to embrace? Three things feel like relative constants for COPE. Each is a part of our mission, and each is baked into COPE’s mindset. We… - News
Letter from the COPE Chair: December 2020
…quality standards from EASE and a Neurología article calling for consideration for the role of editors during the pandemic, among many other initiatives. In May, arXiv, medRxiv, bioRxiv, and other preprint platforms adjusted their policies to not accept… - News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: September 2018
…href="https://publicationethics.org/about/council/chris-graf">Chris Graf and Geri Pearson - News
Letter from the COPE Chair: June 2019
…scholarly integrity. We hope you all enjoy the summer whether on vacation or using the extra time to work on scholarship. COPE Chair Deborah… - News
Letter from the COPE Chair: July 2020
…href="https://www.stm-assoc.org/standards-technology/peer-review-taxonomy-project/">standard taxonomy for peer review. Wishing you all the best. COPE Chair Deborah Poff, CM, PhD … - Forum discussion topics
COPE Forum 9 December 2014: Publication ethics issues in the social sciences
Background The history of research ethics in general and publication ethics more specifically was initially and primarily grounded in the biomedical sciences. As concern over issues of animal care, human participant protection and research integrity developed throughout the latter part of the 20th century, some members of the Social Sciences and Humanities communities… - Discussion documents
Who 'owns' peer reviews? September 2017
…="https://publicationethics.org/editing-reviewer-comments-forum-discussion-topic-march-2020%20">Editing of reviewer comments Forum discussion, March 2020 Editing of reviewer comments survey, June 2020 Your feedback COPE welcomes feedback to this ongoing debate from publishers, journal editors, reviewers, researchers, institutions, librarians, funders, and other stakeholders.… - Guidelines
Editing peer reviews
…the manuscript under review. Alternatives to editing reviews include editors providing a cautionary note in their decision letter. Journals should have a policy on how to respond to hostile or unprofessional reviews. Related resources Editing of… - Case
A falling out
A research letter was submitted from a team of investigators,A, B, C, and D. In their covering letter they reported that: A was involved in planning the study, collecting patient samples, and in writing the manuscript; B measured IL-10 polymorphisms and analysed the results; C was involved in supervising the measurement of polymorphisms and in writing the manuscript; D was involved in planning… - Case
Parallels between unpublished manuscript and a published article from other authors
I am seeking advice on a confidential ‘letter of concern’ from an author (X) of a manuscript submitted before I was appointed editor of the journal but rejected by me on the advice of the associate editor. Author X is concerned with similarities or parallels between his manuscript, rejected in 2008, and a recently published article. I have looked over our file and contacted the associate…