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Scientific Ethics
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Scientific Ethics

A special issue of Publications (ISSN 2304-6775).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2017) | Viewed by 31708

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Svetla Baykoucheva

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Guest Editor
UMD Libraries/STEM Library, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Interests: scientific information, chemical information, science information literacy, scientific writing, scientific publishing, academic impact, scientific ethics

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

New digital technologies have facilitated a rapid increase in the number of papers submitted to scientific journals. With the tremendous pressure on researchers to publish in reputable journals, scholarly publishers have seen a dramatic increase in the number of ethics issues. In the last 10 years, many reputable journals have had to retract articles due to the fabrication of data or other unethical behaviors by authors. Although it is becoming increasingly easy to detect such problems with new technologies, it is sometimes difficult to resolve some of the more complex situations. Publishers are revising their publication processes and undertaking additional measures to prevent such cases before publication. Papers submitted to journals are now screened for conflict of interest, plagiarism, image manipulation, and other potential issues. Scientific misconduct comes in many different shades and is sometimes difficult to detect. The most common problems are plagiarism, fabrication or falsification of data, unethical research, duplicate publication, reviewer misconduct, and authorship. Students and researchers should be educated about what constitutes unethical behavior and should be made aware of the consequences for their careers if they are caught in unethical behaviors. The scope of this Special Issue will be broad, and will include any topics related to scientific misconduct and how to prevent unethical behavior from happening.

Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Publications is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • scientific publishing
  • scientific fraud
  • plagiarism
  • misconduct
  • article retraction
  • scientific ethics
  • research
  • authorship

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue polices can be found here.

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Editorial

Jump to: Research, Other

2 pages, 147 KiB  
Editorial
Beyond Plagiarism: Scientific Ethics and Its Other Aspects
by Svetla Baykoucheva
Publications 2018, 6(2), 22; https://doi.org/10.3390/publications6020022 - 8 May 2018
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3556
Abstract
n/a Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific Ethics)

Research

Jump to: Editorial, Other

18 pages, 886 KiB  
Article
Retraction Notices: Who Authored Them?
by Shaoxiong (Brian) Xu and Guangwei Hu
Publications 2018, 6(1), 2; https://doi.org/10.3390/publications6010002 - 3 Jan 2018
Cited by 15 | Viewed by 9899
Abstract
Unlike other academic publications whose authorship is eagerly claimed, the provenance of retraction notices (RNs) is often obscured presumably because the retraction of published research is associated with undesirable behavior and consequently carries negative consequences for the individuals involved. The ambiguity of authorship, [...] Read more.
Unlike other academic publications whose authorship is eagerly claimed, the provenance of retraction notices (RNs) is often obscured presumably because the retraction of published research is associated with undesirable behavior and consequently carries negative consequences for the individuals involved. The ambiguity of authorship, however, has serious ethical ramifications and creates methodological problems for research on RNs that requires clear authorship attribution. This article reports a study conducted to identify RN textual features that can be used to disambiguate obscured authorship, ascertain the extent of authorship evasion in RNs from two disciplinary clusters, and determine if the disciplines varied in the distributions of different types of RN authorship. Drawing on a corpus of 370 RNs archived in the Web of Science for the hard discipline of Cell Biology and the soft disciplines of Business, Finance, and Management, this study has identified 25 types of textual markers that can be used to disambiguate authorship, and revealed that only 25.68% of the RNs could be unambiguously attributed to authors of the retracted articles alone or jointly and that authorship could not be determined for 28.92% of the RNs. Furthermore, the study has found marked disciplinary differences in the different categories of RN authorship. These results point to the need for more explicit editorial requirements about RN authorship and their strict enforcement. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific Ethics)
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158 KiB  
Article
Advancing Scientific Knowledge: Ethical Issues in the Journal Publication Process
by Richard H. McCuen
Publications 2018, 6(1), 1; https://doi.org/10.3390/publications6010001 - 31 Dec 2017
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 5597
Abstract
The goal of this paper is to assess the journal publication process from value and ethical perspectives. The specific objectives are: (1) To define fundamental values relevant to scientific journal publication; (2) To identify stakeholders involved in professional journals and their value rights [...] Read more.
The goal of this paper is to assess the journal publication process from value and ethical perspectives. The specific objectives are: (1) To define fundamental values relevant to scientific journal publication; (2) To identify stakeholders involved in professional journals and their value rights and responsibilities; (3) To discuss the steps of the journal publication process where ethical dilemmas arise and the potential influences of such dilemmas on the advancement of knowledge; and (4) To summarize actions that can minimize unethical practices throughout the steps of the publication process. Values such as honesty, efficiency, accountability, and fairness will be discussed. Issues related to the various stakeholders such as self-citation, plagiarism, dual publication, a lack of timeliness, and issues related to authorship will be a primary focus. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific Ethics)

Other

Jump to: Editorial, Research

16 pages, 909 KiB  
Opinion
Publish and Who Should Perish: You or Science?
by Ádám Kun
Publications 2018, 6(2), 18; https://doi.org/10.3390/publications6020018 - 23 Apr 2018
Cited by 27 | Viewed by 7399
Abstract
Something is wrong with science as there is an increasing amount of unreliable, manipulated and outright faked results appearing in the literature. Here I argue that this is a direct consequence of the pay-structure and the assessment system employed in academia and it [...] Read more.
Something is wrong with science as there is an increasing amount of unreliable, manipulated and outright faked results appearing in the literature. Here I argue that this is a direct consequence of the pay-structure and the assessment system employed in academia and it could be remedied by changing hiring, advancement, and funding criteria. Scientists are paid below average relative to their level of education, unless they are at the top or can secure grants that allow for higher salaries. Positions and grants are mostly awarded based on bibliometric numbers. Consequently, there is a strong competition to accumulate numbers of papers, impact factors, and citations. Those who can increase their value efficiently will be rewarded and the accumulation of higher values will become easier (the Matthew effect). Higher bibliometric numbers can be obtained by unethical or questionable practices, which might tempt some people. If assessments did not employ bibliometric numbers, then these practices would not have a benefit, and would fade out. Throughout the text, data from Hungary, which are similar to data from elsewhere, supplement the argument. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific Ethics)
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5 pages, 149 KiB  
Commentary
Substandard Journal Management: Wastage of Authors’ Motivation
by Shahryar Sorooshian and Yasaman Parsia
Publications 2018, 6(1), 11; https://doi.org/10.3390/publications6010011 - 9 Mar 2018
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 4160
Abstract
Authors who offer papers for publication to professional journals are under the impression that their work is publication-worthy. The editors as well as reviewers adjudge whether the manuscripts should be taken up for publication. This paper presents certain cases of unreliable journals’ management [...] Read more.
Authors who offer papers for publication to professional journals are under the impression that their work is publication-worthy. The editors as well as reviewers adjudge whether the manuscripts should be taken up for publication. This paper presents certain cases of unreliable journals’ management processes with an aim to show how a journal reviewer or editor could squander authors’ time and negatively impact the motivation of scholars to publish. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scientific Ethics)
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