Metlit 1 - Scientific Misconduct 2010

Scientific or
Academic Misconduct
/ Fraud
Cheating Fabrication
Falsification Plagiarism …
Sudigdo Sastroasmoro
Department of Child Health
University of Indonesia
s_sudigdo@yahoo.com Misconduct-Jan-09/SS
Warning
Please be silent during the lectures
You may talk but should be sufficiently loud so
that everyone hear, do not whisper; we all
want to know what is interesting
Sleeping is allowed as long as you do not
snore loudly
The point is: please do not disturb
Misconduct-Jan-09/SS
Please turn off your
mobile
Otherwise a fine of $ 5
per ring
will be applied
Many people say that
it is the intellect
which makes a great
scientist.
They are wrong: it is
character
Albert Einstein
No, it’s Lies, damn lies, statistics
Shania!
Mark Twain
Lies, damn lies, science

NN
Selected references
Plagiarism. http:/www.ehhns.cmich.edu/ ~mspears/whatis.html
Educating professionals. http://www.unisa.edu.au/
adminfo/policies/manual/misconduct.htm. Accessed June 2004
Jones R. Research misconduct. Fam Pract 19:123-4, 2002.
Addison PA. Academic misconduct, definitions, legal issues, and
management. Available from http://cea.curtin.edu.au/tif2001/
addison2.html. Accessed June 2004
Plagiarism, cheating and misconduct. Available from
http://www.wuc.edu.au/call/index.htm. Accessed June 2004
The University of Chicago – Reports of the Provost ‘s Committee on
Academic Fraud. www.uc-edu.sci
Academic honesty. University of Massacchusetts Amherst - Undergraduate
Riaghts and Responsibilities 2001-2002.
Decker C, Burgess C. A taxonomy of plagiarism and academic fraud.
Language Machine, 2003. Misconduct-Jan-09/SS
ICARDA Research Code of Scientific Ethics
I dedicate myself to the pursuit, promotion, and advancement of
scientific knowledge.
I will conduct, manage, judge, and report scientific research
honestly, thoroughly, without conflict of interest
I will prevent abuse of all resources entrusted to me and
endeavor to treat subjects humanely, following established
guidelines where they are available.
I will not willfully hinder the research of others nor engage in
dishonesty, fraud, deceit, misrepresentation, or other
professional misconduct.
I will welcome constructive criticism of my personal scientific
research and offer the same to my colleagues in a manner that
fosters mutual respect amid objective scientific debate.
ICARDA Research Code of Scientific Ethics
I will recognize past and present contributors to my research
and will neither accept nor assume unauthorized and/or
unwarranted credit for another's accomplishments.
I will claim authorship for a research product only if I am willing
to be held responsible for both the interpretation of the data
and the conclusions as presented.
I will claim authorship for a research product only if I have
made a major intellectual contribution (as part of conception,
design, data collection, data analysis, interpretation) and made
significant contributions to its preparation (write, review, edit).
I will not publish or use original ideas, research data, or
unpublished findings of others without written approval.
I will refrain from duplicative publication of the same research
findings as original.
I will show appropriate, diligence toward preserving and
maintaining resources, such as data records entrusted to me.
Cheating
Defined by its general usage
A major academic misconduct
Technique:
• Taking small notes
• Directly see other’s work
• Communicating with other students during exam
• Using false identification during exam
• Using electronic devices & other sophisticated methods
Should have severe penalty (graded, depending on
the frequency and severity)
WARNING !!!
Severe penalty (up to
discontinuation of the study
program) will be applied to
those who cheat in whatever
technique(s) used!
What is scientific misconduct?
F-F-P
Misconduct / Fraud
Misconduct in research is defined as "fabrication,
falsification, plagiarism, or other serious deviation
from generally accepted practices in proposing,
conducting, or reporting research”.
It does not include errors of judgment, error in
recording, selection, or analysis of data, differences in
opinions involving the interpretation of data, or
misconduct unrelated to the research process.
Nat Acad Press 1992
“Honest error” - examples
Improper use of statistical test: using independent t-
test for paired data
Poor understanding of research methods principles:
Consider ‘alternating assignment’ as a valid technique
for randomization
Wrong interpretation: r = 0.16, P= 0.002
 There is a significant correlation between abdominal
circumference and HDL cholesterol level, so that abdominal
circumference measurement can replace HDL cholesterol
measurement.
Misconduct / Fraud (contd)
…plagiarism, or other serious deviation from
generally accepted practices …..
stealing idea or data during the peer review process
dishonesty in authorship
illegal use of research budget
…it does not include…. interpretation of data, or
misconduct unrelated to the research process.
sexual harassment, crude behavior, etc.
Nat Acad Press 1992
Misconduct in research
May occur from idea, proposal development,

study execution, data analysis, publication
May be intentional or non-intentional
Non-intentional misconduct is treated and
managed as severe as intentional misconduct,
especially after being warned or done
repeatedly
Nat Acad Press 1992
The Tuskegee Syphilis
Experiment: Extraordinary misconduct
In 1932 the American Government promised 400 men -

all residents of Macon County, Alabama, all poor, all
African American - free treatment for Bad Blood, a
euphemism for syphilis which was epidemic in the county.
Treatment for syphilis was never given to the men and
was in fact withheld. The men became unwitting subjects
for a government sanctioned medical investigation
The Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male. The
Tuskegee Study lasted for 4 decades, until 1972
1998-2003.thetalkingdrum.com.
The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment
By the end of the experiment, 28 of the men had died

directly of syphilis, 100 were dead of related
complications, 40 of their wives had been infected,
and 19 of their children had been born with
congenital syphilis.
How had these men been induced to endure a fatal
disease in the name of science?
There was no proposal and no informed consent
The largest non-treatment experiment in the history of
medicine
The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment
On July 23, 1973, Fred Gray a prominent civil rights
lawyer, brought a $1.8 billion class action civil suit
Gray demanded $ 3 m for each living participant and
the heirs of the deceased. The case never came to trial.
In 1974, the government agreed to a $10 million out of
court settlement. The living participants each received $
37,500, the heirs of the deceased, $15,000.
PHS officers felt no guilty; on the contrary, they felt they
were acting good conscience. No apologies were ever
tendered; no one ever admitted any wrong doing.
Fabrication
In engineering, the term "fabrication" has a
benign connotation, meaning to make
something.
In research ethics the term "fabrication" means
making up data, experiments or, other
significant information in proposing, conducting,
or reporting research.
Nat Acad Press 1992
John Darsee
John Darsee (born 1948) was a medical researcher with
an impressive publications (>100) but found to have
fabricated data.
He worked at Emory then moved to Harvard, as research
fellow at the Cardiac Res Lab, and considered as the most
remarkable of the 130 fellows who had worked at the lab
Some colleagues caught him labeling data from one short
measurement as if it had been data from several
experiments collected over weeks. Darsee had previously
used false data between 1966 & 1970, while an
undergraduate at Notre Dame. Many papers had to be
retracted, incl. from Emory & Harvard.
Darsee had to give up his research career and became a
critical care specialist.
William Summerlin worked at the Memorial Sloan-
Kettering Cancer Center in New York. He claimed
that he could transplant tissue from unrelated animals
by keeping the tissue in culture for four to six weeks.
He used white mice with patches of black fur which
he had colored with a black permanent marker.
In 1974, Summerlin was discovered when he made a
presentation to immunologist Robert Good; lab
assistants noticed that the patches had been drawn
on the mice and could be removed using alcohol.
Eventually, the forgery was attributed to a mental
health problem. Author Joseph Hixson wrote a book
called "The Patchwork Mouse". Misconduct-Jan-09/SS
Andrew Wakefield (born 1956), best known as the
lead author of a controversial 1998 research study,
published in The Lancet, which reported bowel
symptoms in a selected sample of twelve children with
autistic spectrum disorders and other disabilities, and
alleged a possible connection with MMR vaccination. In
a press conference Dr. Wakefield recommended
separating the components of the injections by at least
a year. The recommendation was responsible for a
decrease in immunisation rates in UK.The section of the
paper setting out its conclusions, known in the Lancet as
the "interpretation", was subsequently retracted by ten
of the paper's thirteen authors.
Scientist fabricated stem-cell data:
panel
By Jon Herskovitz and Kim Yeon-hee
Fri Dec 23 2005, (Reuters) -
South Korea's most famous scientist
quit under a cloud on Friday and
could face prosecution after said
results in a landmark 2005 paper
on producing`tailored embryonic
stem cells were intentionally
fabricated.
A panel from Seoul National University has been examining
the work of Hwang Woo-suk, hitherto regarded in South
Korea as a hero for bringing the country to the forefront of
stem-cell and cloning studies -- and the world the first
cloned dog.
Eric Poehlman, M.D.
Tenured clinical researcher at University of Vermont
specializing in menopause, aging and metabolism
Admitted to submitting false and fabricated research
data in 17 federal grant applications and numerous
published articles over almost a decade
Allegedly obtained $2.9 million in NIH and USDA
funding based on fraudulent applications
Sentenced to 1 year in prison, 2 years probation
Agreed to pay $180,000 to settle civil complaint and
attorney’s fees for research assistant who made
complaint
Eric Poehlman, M.D.
Barred for life from seeking or receiving funding from

any federal agency; permanently excluded from all
federal health care programs
Agreed to submit numerous letters of retraction and
correction to scientific journals
ORI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office “acknowledge the
important role that individual scientists have in
identifying and responding to research misconduct. . .
Without their assistance, ORI and HHS would have
great difficulty in taking appropriate actions to protect
the public health.”
Falsification
In research ethics the term "falsification" means
changing or misrepresenting data or
experiments, or misrepresenting other
significant matters, such as the credentials of an
investigator in a research proposal.
Unlike fabrication, distinguishing falsification of
data from legitimate data selection takes
judgment and an understanding of statistical
methods.
Nat Acad Press 1992
Falsification
Bernard Fisher, M.D., is Distinguished Service
Professor of Surgery, University of Pittsburgh School
of Medicine, and Scientific Director of the National
Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP).
He is one of three researchers who were exonerated
from nationally publicized scientific misconduct.
BF: “I’ve done research for 40 years, almost all from

government grants. The charges of scientific misconduct were
brought against me by an official of the National Cancer
Institute (NCI), bringing the charge to the Office of Research
Integrity (ORI). I was accused of having used falsified data in
my publications—not my falsified data—but data which had
been falsified by another investigator from St. Luc Hospital in
Montreal, Canada”. ……..
http://www.physiciansnews.com/spotlight/497wp.html Misconduct-Jan-09/SS
Plagiarism
Plagiarism defined
If you want to converse with me,

define your term (NN)
Every definition is dangerous (NN)
To be intelligible one must be inaccurate,

to be accurate one must be unintelligible
Bertrand Russell
To be a respected and famous person you must be:
a man, old, white, a cigar smoker
Plagiarism defined
If you steal from one author,

it is plagiarism
If you steal from many,
it is research
Wilson Mizner
• Plagiarism, believe it or not, comes from a
Latin verb that means, “to kidnap.”
Plagiarism: What is it?
“The unacknowledged use, as one’s own, of work of
another person, whether or not such work has been
published” (University of Malta Regulations, 1997)
“To take someone else’s words or ideas and present them
as your own without proper acknowledgment” (Marshall &
Roland, 1998)
“The use another person’s idea or a part of their work and
pretend that is your own” <http://dictionary.cambridge.org/>
“The reproduction, in whole or essential part, of a literary,
artistic or musical work by one who falsely claims to be its
creator” http://auth.grolier.com/>
Plagiarism: What is it?
Plagiarisme adalah tindakan yang dapat diartikan sebagai
pencurian ide atau hasil pemikiran dan tulisan orang lain
yang digunakan dalam tulisan seolah-olah ide atau tulisan
orang lain tersebut adalah ide atau hasil tulisannya sendiri
untuk keuntungannya sendiri sehingga merugikan orang lain
baik materiil maupun non-materiil, atau plagiarisme dapat
berupa pencurian sebuah kata, frase, kalimat, atau alinea,
atau bahkan pencurian suatu bab dari sebuah tulisan atau
buku seseorang, tanpa menyebut sumber yang dicuri. (Draft
SK Rektor UI)
Is publication a prerequisite
for plagiarism?
No!!!
Plagiarism is submitting or presenting someone

else’s idea or words without proper
acknowledgment
(UBC Calendar)
“Classification” of plagiarism
According to aspects plagiarized
 idea
 substance or content
 words, sentence, etc
According to intentionality
 deliberate / intentional plagiarism
 reckless plagiarism
According to the proportion of plagiarized materials:

 mild < 30%
 moderate 30-70%
 severe / complete >70%
According to ‘mode’ plagiarism:
 word-for-word plagiarism
 mosaic plagiarism
Self / autoplagiarism
Plagiarism of other’s idea
Research replication is encouraged in medicine (to

lesser extent: in biological sciences)
Large variations related to age, sex, race, study
setting, individual responses make it important to
verify previous study in different populations
The report should explicitly indicates that similar
work has been done in the past, and the present
study was done to verify the results in other setting
or population; otherwise the author confines to
plagiarism
Plagiarism of words,
sentence, etc
Quoting directly, paraphrasing or writing

about someone’s ideas without giving a
reference
Using an author’s exact words without
indicating they are quoted and referenced
Presenting your own version of other people’s
ideas without acknowledgment
Arjuna mencari
cinta….
Plagiarism in film, painting, etc
These are plagiarisms…
Transcribing or modifying text from any

printed material (books, magazines,
encyclopedias, newspapers)
Using photographs, video or audio without
permission
Using another student’s work and claiming it as
your own is plagiarism, also known as
“collusion”
These are plagiarism…
Literal translation from one language to another is

NOT using your own words; thus it is plagiarism
Using an essay that you wrote for another class
without permission from the professor is known as
self-plagiarism or autoplagiarism. It also means
submitting or publishing the your own published
materials without indicating that the work has
been presented or published.
These are plagiarism…
Taking an image, diagram, or artwork from

another source without acknowledgement
Collaborating inappropriately with other
students when individual work is required
Copying another student’s work or someone
else’s work and submitting it as your own
Deliberate plagiarism
Buying, stealing, or using somebody else’s

brain-power to do your work for you are all
acts of deliberate plagiarism
You can expect the most severe of penalties
Avoid accidental plagiarism
You probably don’t want to get into trouble for

accidental plagiarism
“I didn’t mean to” is not an excuse, and may be
punished as severely as a deliberate act of
plagiarism
“Severity” of plagiarism
< 30% - mild

30-70% - moderate
>70% - severe/complete
Why plagiarize?
Misunderstand how to use academic
conventions appropriately
Have poor writing skills
Are too busy to study and have other distractions
Are unmotivated
Lack confidence or have a fear of failure
Find the material complex and abstract and
struggle to grasp the meaning.
Common knowledge / Public domain (1)
If the information is found in several sources, it

can be considered common knowledge and
probably does not need to be cited (UI: > 5
sources).
If the information is a specific author’s
research, you must create a citation within the
paper and include the source in the
References List
Common knowledge/ Public
domain (2)
Examples of “common knowledge”
Aorta arises from the left ventricle and supplies
blood throughout the tissues of the body
In metabolic acidosis the pH, PCO2, and
bicarbonate decrease, while in uncompensated
metabolic alkalosis the reverse are true
But if it is specific for other research, referencing
is a must:
Recent data indicate that the incidence of asthma
in rural area has increased from 5 to almost
10%. Reference!!!
Common knowledge / Public
domain (3)
Writing a textbook with usual arrangements

(Title, Definition, Etiology, Pathogenesis, Clinical
Manifestations, etc…) is not plagiarism of idea
Writing a research report with standard format
is not plagiarism
Re-drawing figure(s), if not original or specific is
not plagiarism (e.g., diagram of clinical trial
process, illustration of cardiac malformation, etc.)
Evidence-based medicine is defined as “The
conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of
current best evidence in making decisions about
the care of individual patients”1,2
Evidence-based medicine, which underlines the

importance of explicitly and judiciously using
current best evidence in patient’s
management1,2 has gained its popularity in the
last decade.
According to National Institute of Health (1996)
Clinical Governance is “a framework through
which NHS organizations are accountable for
continuously improving the quality of their services
and safeguarding high standards of care, by
creating an environment in which excellence in
clinical care will flourish.“
Clinical governance is a framework of quality

improvement process of clinical care that should
be implementation in all levels of medical
services. Excellence in clinical care can be
achieved by creating an environment that
promotes high standard of care (NIH, 1996)
This passage was originally written by
Kamran Abbasi and Iona Heath, and
published in BMJ 2005;330:431-432.
Although correspondence with authors, ethics
committees, university departments, and
hospitals can be a painstaking and thankless
battle with bureaucracy—just like seeking ethics
committee approval—we believe that editors
have a duty to take on issues of unethical audit
or research. Our motivation is not to seek
punishment for the authors but to prevent future
unethical clinical practice and to protect patients.
committees, university departments, and hospitals
can be a painstaking and thankless battle with
bureaucracy—just like seeking ethics committee
approval—we believe that editors have a duty to
take on issues of unethical audit or research. Our
motivation is not to seek punishment for the
authors but to prevent future unethical clinical
practice and to protect patients.
(Plagiarism because of no reference)
committees, university departments, and
hospitals can be a painstaking and thankless
battle with bureaucracy—just like seeking
ethics committee approval—we believe that
editors have a duty to take on issues of
unethical audit or research. Our motivation is
not to seek punishment for the authors but to
prevent future unethical clinical practice and to
protect patients (Abbasi and Heath, 2005).
[Plagiarism despite referencing because the

author(s) used other’s exact words]
Correspondence with authors and other relevant
sources (including ethics committees, university
departments, and hospitals) should be performed
to make sure that unethical audit on research is
incorrect. Editors should try their best despite many
obstacles that may prevent them from getting the
information easily. The primary aim is to prevent
future unethical clinical practice and to protect
patients (Abbasi and Heath, 2005).
[No plagiarism because of paraphrase and reference]
Abbasi and Heath (2005) believe that “Although
correspondence with authors, ethics committees,
university departments, and hospitals can be a
painstaking and thankless battle with
bureaucracy—just like seeking ethics committee
approval—we believe that editors have a duty to
take on issues of unethical audit or research. Our
motivation is not to seek punishment for the
authors but to prevent future unethical clinical
practice and to protect patients”.
[No plagiarism because the use of

quotation mark and reference]
Six steps to effective
paraphrasing
1. Reread the original passage until you

understand its full meaning
2. Write your paraphrase on a note card
3. Jot down a few words below your
paraphrase to remind you how you envision
using this material. At the top of the note card,
write a key word indicating the subject of
your paraphrase.
Six steps to effective
paraphrasing (continued)
4. Check your rendition with the original to make

sure that your version accurately expresses all
the essential information in a new form.
5. Use quotation marks to identify any unique
term you have borrowed exactly from the
source.
6. Record the source (including the page) on your
note card so that you can credit it easily on
your paper.
Example of plagiarism from internet source:
Loose citation of web sources
Persons who are right-brain dominant tend to
process the emotional and artistic aspects of an
advertisement better than persons who are
left-brain dominant (yahoo.com).
Plagiarism: Reference is far too ambiguous.
Use the FULL, COMPLETE web page address
and date accessed.
(http://www.csun.edu/brucelammers/mkt348/splitbrain.doc,
accessed June 12, 2004).
What about slides for
presentation? (Personal view)
If not accompanied by full-text article, all specific

information should be referenced on the slide
If the materials have been presented in other
meeting(s), information to the audience (to avoid
“autoplagiarism”) is recommended. This also
applied for updated “case series”
Using (stealing) slides from other author without
proper credit is a kind of plagiarism
No references are needed for common
knowledge
Misconduct in publication
Authorship
An "author" is generally considered to

be someone who has made substantive
intellectual contributions to a published
study
International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, 2006
Authorship
Authorship credit should be based on
1. substantial contributions to conception and design, or
acquisition of data, or analysis and interpretation of
data;
2. drafting the article or revising it critically for
important intellectual content; and
3. final approval of the version to be published.
Authors should meet conditions 1, 2, and 3
Authorship
The order of authorship on the byline should be

a joint decision of the co-authors. Authors should
be prepared to explain the order in which
authors are listed. (Scientific integrity!!!)
All contributors who do not meet the criteria for
authorship should be listed in an
acknowledgments section
Ghost author is unacceptable

Misconduct in publication
Double publication
Salami / redundant publication
Autoplagiarism
Conflict of interest
A statement on COI is commonly required

Conflict of interest: “None declared”
Sponsorship in details
Failure to provide an honest statement may
result in dysintegrity as a scientist / researcher
What is copyright?
Copyright is legal ownership of a work, whether
printed or online. A work's author "has the exclusive
right to control how a work, including any derivative
works, is reproduced, published, and performed“. A
work is protected under copyright for the life of the
author plus 70 years.
Anything that you post on the Web is immediately
covered by copyright law, even if you don't append a
copyright statement to it. If you want to allow certain
uses for your work (such as educational ones), you can
add a statement to that effect on your pages.
Role of Research Ethics Committee
Research Ethics Committee or Institutional
Review Board (IRB) has the obligation to review
that all researches involving human participants
should be done in accordance with Declaration
of Helsinki
Protects participants, public, researchers,
institutions, and science
Include methodological aspects: a scientifically
unsound research is automatically unethical
(WHO)
What is the scientific world’s attitude on scientific
misconduct?
Unfortunately, medicine and biology, especially,
have been hit hard by fraud. One study found 94
cancer papers ‘likely’ contained manipulated data.
Two years later, many of the papers were still not
retracted. This confirms the conclusion that ‘even
when scientific misconduct is proven, no reliable
mechanism exists to remove bad information from
the literature’.
Obvious Observations
It is impossible to screen every submission
fully for misconduct.
Vigilance on the part of editors and
referees is, however, necessary.
Allegations of misconduct must be taken
seriously and investigated carefully.
Those accused must be given an opportunity
to defend themselves, and their rights to
confidentiality and careful judgment
protected.
Who Should Investigate?
Journals (plagiarism, duplicate
submission/publication, referee misconduct).
Institutions (authorship, fabrication of data,
conflict of interest).
Government agencies and scientific societies.
Courts (to be avoided!).
Who should impose punishment?
Institutions?
Societies?
Government agencies?
Publishers?
Courts?
What should the punishment be? (Obviously
this depends on the nature and severity of
the offense).
Scientific Misconduct:
Most Common Types
Failure to refer and plagiarism

Fabrication / falsification of data
Authorship disputes
Duplicate submission/publication
Referee misconduct
Conflict of interest
If you are not confused,
you are not well-informed

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Scientific or

Lies, damn lies, science

Nat Acad Press 1992

Nat Acad Press 1992

May occur from idea, proposal development,

In 1932 the American Government promised 400 men -

By the end of the experiment, 28 of the men had died

Nat Acad Press 1992

Barred for life from seeking or receiving funding from

BF: “I’ve done research for 40 years, almost all from

If you want to converse with me,

Every definition is dangerous (NN)

To be intelligible one must be inaccurate,

If you steal from one author,

Plagiarism is submitting or presenting someone

According to the proportion of plagiarized materials:

Research replication is encouraged in medicine (to

Quoting directly, paraphrasing or writing

Transcribing or modifying text from any

Literal translation from one language to another is

Taking an image, diagram, or artwork from

Buying, stealing, or using somebody else’s

You probably don’t want to get into trouble for

< 30% - mild

If the information is found in several sources, it

Writing a textbook with usual arrangements

Evidence-based medicine, which underlines the

Clinical governance is a framework of quality

(Plagiarism because of no reference)

[Plagiarism despite referencing because the

[No plagiarism because of paraphrase and reference]

[No plagiarism because the use of

1. Reread the original passage until you

4. Check your rendition with the original to make

If not accompanied by full-text article, all specific

An "author" is generally considered to

International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, 2006

The order of authorship on the byline should be

International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, 2006

A statement on COI is commonly required

Failure to refer and plagiarism

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