Misconduct and Research integrity Policy

Misconduct and research integrity are not defined by any single organization globally. Some organizations define misconduct as FFP (falsification, fabrication, and plagiarism), while others interpret it to include a range of unacceptable research practices. The concerns relevant to publishers are behaviors that could negatively impact the reliability of the research record in terms of findings, conclusions, or attribution. In these instances, an institution may find that a researcher is not guilty of misconduct but coordination between institutions and journals is still needed. The guidelines recommend that research institutions designate a nominated contact or office with responsibility for research reliability and integrity, as well as a contact for dealing with allegations of misconduct. The contact person should have no conflicts of interest with individual cases and should be clearly stated in internal institutional policy. Journals should have clear public guidelines on how and to whom concerns about research integrity or allegations of research misconduct should be raised and how these concerns or allegations will be handled. Institutions should directly inform journals where the affected work has been published and answer questions about ongoing investigations necessary to determine the appropriate publishing outcome. They should also be prepared to answer journals' questions about inappropriate publication practices, such as authorship misattribution, redundant publication, duplicate submission, failure to disclose competing interests, or misleading reporting. Journals should cooperate with investigations and respond to institutions' questions about allegations of misconduct in a timely manner. The COPE guidelines: https://publicationethics.org/sites/default/files/research-publication-misconduct-journals-institutions.pdf