Publication and research ethics related to geopolitical issues
This page acts as a resource for publisher, journal or university statements and articles on issues related to political or geopolitical concerns. We bring together some of those statements here which may help other journals and publishers in discussions on their own policies. COPE considers that editorial decisions should not be affected by nationality, ethnicity, political beliefs,…- Event
COPE Forum: March 2023
…%3ESubmit%20a%20case%26nbsp%3B%3C%2Fa%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%0A%3Cp%3EThe%20deadline%20to%20submit%20a%20case%20for%20this%20Forum%26nbsp%3Bis%3A%20Thursday%2024%20November%202022.%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%0A%2D%2D%3E--> Forum agenda On Thursday 23 March 2023 the COPE Forum will be held at 15:00-16:30pm (GMT / UTC) 1. Update on COPE activities Update on COPE activities by the Chair. - Case
Victim of article theft wants correction to list their name, not retraction
…preparation of the article for publication (submitting, revising, etc) and the author(s) who stole the paper may have made changes to the paper. The editor may wish to direct the author to their authorship criteria and peer review process to explain why transferring authorship is not appropriate. To prevent theft of a paper, one idea put forward was for the DOI to be reserved in advance, with the… - Guidelines
Ethical guidelines for peer reviewers
Peer review guidelines provide basic principles and standards to which all peer reviewers should adhere during the peer review process in research publication. Peer reviewers play a central and critical part in the peer-review process, but too often come to the role without any guidance and unaware of their ethical obligations. These guidelines are intended to be applied across… - Discussion documents
Predatory publishing
…journals may include community education or criminal charges. Guidance, training, and safe lists should be updated regularly as new journals frequently emerge. Predatory publishers often use the author publication charge business model. Related resources COPE webinar: Understanding text recycling
…="http://publicationethics.org/resources/seminars-and-webinars/european-seminar-2019-text-recycling-research-project">they presented at COPE's European Seminar in 2019. “I've been ‘iThenticating’ all revised papers for several years now, and am continually frustrated by self-plagiarism… You’d think that researcher/authors with MDs and PhDs would be bright enough to know how to reword.” Managing editor of a medical journalHistory and context of the COPE guidelines
…retired. A checklist for the Code of Conduct in 2005, and the first flowcharts in 2006 The Code of Conduct set out standards of good editorial conduct. It called on editors to take all reasonable steps to ensure that allegations of research misconduct were properly investigated. It also established a mechanism for dealing with complaints against COPE member editors that could not be resolved…- Case
Allegation of reviewer malpractice
The Editor provided a signed declaration stating the journal’s practice of asking authors to suggest reviewer(s) who may or may not be used for that purpose. The Editor’s declaration stated that the reviewer in question was nominated by the authors and that no competing interest was declared by either the authors or the reviewer.… - Discussion documents
Citation manipulation
…roles, or removal or rejection of journals from citation indexes. Journals should develop policies and standards to determine self-citation thresholds, provide educational resources to support best practice and establish procedures to respond to potential misconduct. There may be instances where self-citation and requests for citations are legitimate … - Flowcharts
Authorship and contributorship of unpublished data: dealing with concerns
… This flowchart has been developed by the FORCE11 and COPE Research Data Publishing Working Group. Key points Concerns may relate to a change in author order or other authorship and contributorship issues. Where agreement cannot be reached, consider contacting the… - Flowcharts
Authorship and contributorship of published data: dealing with concerns
… This flowchart has been developed by the FORCE11 and COPE Research Data Publishing Working Group. Key points Concerns may relate to a change in author order, or other dataset contributor or authorship issues. Where agreement cannot be reached, consider contacting the… - Flowcharts
Concerns about risk in unpublished data
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7896759 Concerns are raised about a dataset that may be harmful or breach privacy. The flowchart offers data publishers, such as a journal or a data repository, a step by step guide on how to handle these concerns. - Flowcharts
Concerns about risk in published data
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7896759 Concerns are raised about published data that may be harmful or breach privacy. The flowchart offers data publishers, such as a journal or a data repository, a step by step guide on how to handle these concerns. - Case
A falling out
…What do we do about the alleged and apparently disputed erratum? Should journals have a clear policy about authors (all, some, the senior, or only the corresponding) seeing galley proofs? If so,what should the policy be?… - Case
Alleged plagiarism
…different authors and were not the sole provenance of that author. Although it is true that employers may have vested interests, this does not necessarily mean they are corrupt. The notion of conscious plagiarism implies that the plagiarism is intentional; unconscious plagiarism is unintentional. It is the former that attracts sanction, and the intention must be proven. The point of requesting an internal… - Case
A patient was given an experimental course of complementary medicine when a standard treatment was available
…the authors’ medical practice and judgement into question. _ The editor should write to the authors again with a short deadline, informing them that the matter would be referred to both the authors’ employers and the appropriate regulatory body. _ Even if the patient had pleaded for the alternative therapy, the fact that the disease is infectious and potential fatal means that public interest would… - Case
Institutionalised policy of gift authorship?
…explained that the complainant should never have been listed as an author by our definition (which matches the ICMJE criteria), but should have been acknowledged. We are currently in communication with the complainant over the exact nature of their involvement with the manuscript. During discussion of this situation, the submitting author revealed what may be institutionalised authorship problems… - Case
Clear case of duplicate publication?
…not acceptable behaviour. Some of the members of the Forum suggested taking the matter further and contacting the authors’ institution, informing the Dean of the Faculty of the facts of the case. The Forum also raised the question of the three new authors on the second paper and suggested that the author should be reminded of the criteria for authorship.… - Case
Author creates bogus email accounts for proposed reviewers
The Forum agreed that this was a serious form of misconduct and may even be criminal, as the author was impersonating the reviewers. The advice was to contact the author’s institution and inform them of the situation, explaining the author’s inappropriate behaviour. Other advice was to look at the peer review of previous submissions/publications from this author in case they also involved… United2Act launches action against paper mills
…on the identified areas. We are all committed to delivering real progress over the next 12 months and will be reporting on these actions regularly.” There are five key areas for working groups to plan action and execute: education and awareness, improve post-publication corrections, research paper mills, enable the development of trust markers, and continue to bring together the many voices…