- News
Letter from the COPE Chair: March 2021
…questions about publication ethics issues which arise in book publishing. In this issue, Iratxe Puebla, COPE’s Facilitation & Integrity Office, summarises an issue that was raised by an author who published in a COPE member journal some years ago. It describes how the concern was resolved when COPE, the publisher and… - Case
CV study: was ethics approval and consent required?
…overseas doctors might have been subtly pressurised to complete the questionnaire. In response to these concerns, the authors said that the study had been approved by the human resources department, who "own" the CVs, and the postgraduate tutor, who is responsible for pre-registration house officers. The study had also been informally submitted to the local research ethics committee whose view was that… - Case
Duplicate publication in a non-English language journal
…been sent after the case report was published in the non-English language journal. The authors were contacted separately by email, and asked to explain the discrepancy. They were warned that if no satisfactory explanation was provided, the journal would have to retract the case report. At the time of writing, they have both written to say that they will provide an explanation, but have not yet done… - Case
Self plagiarism
Some members of the Forum expressed sympathy for the author. However, the article was submitted as original work (not solicited by the journal) and the author failed to mention the other papers in his covering letter. Some Forum members commented that it may be legitimate to present the same material for different audiences and both articles may therefore have a place. All agreed however that… - Case
Extensive publication errors. Should we 're-publish'?
In March 2012, our journal published a posthumous excerpt of a book by a prestigious scholar, who had died before completing the book. We chose to publish because the unfinished book represented the scholar's life work, and would not find another publication venue. The excerpt included a number of large figures, which we also published. At our publisher, we had a new production team,… - Case
Inadequate assurance of human research ethics for a questionnaire
…study is to explore the relationship between them, and finally their impact on organizational performance. The result of this research will be published by considering privacy issues. It is important to note that the organization’s management has a strong commitment to the above noted subjects. Besides a non-valuable reward, the most important incentive for employees’ participation is that they are in… - Case
Ethics committee approval
…provided by the authors). The journal receives two such studies, one from country A and one from country B. Neither has ethics committee approval. The authors of both manuscripts claim that their studies do not need approval. Question(s) for the COPE Forum• What should best editorial practice be in this situation? —Accept both papers for review. —Accept the paper from… - Case
Publication of a manuscript on an external website after acceptance but prior to journal publication
…and that written consent for subsequent use of the manuscript must be obtained from the Journal. Immediately after submission of a manuscript, all authors receive a confirmation email in which we repeat that the content/manuscript must not be discussed in any form of media until the manuscript is published by the journal, without a specific exception from us. This message is repeated in… - Case
Data anonymity
…sufficient to render the data anonymous? Would we lose clinical significance by removing age and gender for those patients, although the paper does mention that of the 12 patients most were female and gives the median age group?• Should we publish this without patient consent?• The study also mentions controls who underwent biopsy, but what is not clear is whether those controls were also from… - Case
Consequence for dual submission
…that it had been accepted by a different journal. When the editor of journal B asked the author for an explanation, the author did not provide a satisfactory response. Journal B, in consultation with their editorial board, banned the author from submitting to the journal in the future. Editor B contacted us, alerting us to the situation. After verifying the submission records, we… - Case
Self-plagiarism and suspected salami publishing
…was going to be accepted by journal A because of the time between acceptance and publication? The authors may then have slightly altered the paper and submitted it to journal B? The advice from the Forum was to give the authors the benefit of the doubt, and to contact the authors for an explanation. It is always best to first ask the authors to explain how this has happened. It may be that this is… - Case
Ethics approval for survey design
…initial manuscript submission. The corresponding author said that they had missed the IRB deadline in month 2, were triaged and not considered for review by the IRB due to the COVID-19 pandemic at the usual deadline for month 3, but were able to submit on the last day of month 3 and received approval in the middle of month 4 (after which the revised manuscript was submitted). The corresponding author… - Event
Publication Integrity Week 2023
…easier and quicker to resolve. Following the panel discussion the conversation opened to questions from attendees. Tuesday 3 October: PUBLICATION MISCONDUCT AND FRAUD DAY For the first time we dedicated a day of our seminar programme to the threat presented by misconduct and fraud and how we can work together to combat these issues. Editing, reviewing and writing during COVID-19
…their editorial practices to prevent similar problems to those that occurred in the publication and withdrawal of papers submitted by Surgisphere Corporation paper, hydroxychloroquine treatment of COVID-19. The Lancet: learning from retraction September 2020 Article…- News
Diversity, equity, inclusivity and accessibility: COPE commentary
…for inclusive language and inclusive thinking for use by our Education subcommittee in drafting our resources. We hope that these will also be useful in challenging our planning across all areas of our work. The recommendations are based heavily on the C4DISC Guidelines on Inclusive Language… - News
Letter from the COPE co-Chairs: August 2018
…author was working towards promotion or even retaining their university position. Since that early experience, I’ve learned much about publication ethics, identifying violations, and applying this knowledge to the editorial process. Editors must be vigilant and judge the citations in a manuscript by relying on their knowledge of a field to ascertain irregularities in citations, as well as depending on… - Case
Contacting Research Ethics Committees with concerns over studies
A paper was submitted, detailing a small overseas trial of a drug treatment of a politically controversial disease. The treatment was moderately toxic. The paper was seen by two referees (A and B), who had considerable criticisms of the methodology used. Comments were also received from C, who was invited to review but refused, because s/he did not want his/her name known to the authors under… - Case
Possible plagiarism and fabrication
A group of six authors published a study in a peer reviewed journal, comparing the efficacy of the same class of two drugs (A and B) with a placebo and with each other. One year later the lead author of that study was searching in Medline for new evidence on the efficacy of drug A and found a study that had been published in another peer reviewed journal the year after his by three authors… - Case
An author thinks that a journal’s decision not to publish is ethically incorrect
…between the two parties. On the basis of legal advice from his/her institution, the author states that s/he is not bound by an agreement to which s/he was not party; that the handwritten clause in his/her agreement with Company A allows for publication of the article; and that the details of the outbreak were public as they had been presented in abstract form as well as briefly described in a local… - Case
Publication of papers from industry sponsored symposium
Our scientific/medical Society added a Special Symposium to its Annual Meeting Program. The symposium organiser, who is an academic member of the Society, invited seven speakers, all from academic institutions, in addition to himself to speak at the symposium. Support for the symposium as a whole was solicited independently by the Development Committee of the Society and had no influence on…