US National Academies report on integrity in science
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US National Academies report on integrity in science
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ntegrity within research is essential to ensure the quality of scientific results, and is considered a central tenet of a reputable research program. The scientific enterprise is largely self-policing with respect to integrity and quality of research through the use of expert reviewers, the practice of publishing retractions when necessary, and the detrimental consequences to one’s career if research misconduct is discovered. But despite these safeguards, concerns about integrity, transparency, and reproducibility in scientific research have recently been voiced within, and outside of, the scientific community. In an attempt to address these concerns, the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (Academies) have embarked on three studies. Completed in April 2017, the Academies Fostering Integrity in Research concludes, “While the research enterprise is not broken, it faces serious challenges in creating the appropriate conditions to foster and sustain the highest standards of integrity.” The report points out that the research environment is constantly changing with growth in both size and scope, greater
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interest and input from policymakers, the application of new regulatory standards, expanding public–private research partnerships, globalization of the research enterprise, increasing dependence on information technology in research, and the shift in the media toward rapid dissemination of important results and/or controversies. The report also notes both the rise of “predatory” journals (publications that conduct minimal or no peer reviews and charge authors large publication fees) and a significant increase in the number of journal articles retracted due to research misconduct. In addition, the report cites evidence of issues with reproducibility over a range of fields and attributes these issues to differences in research processes or procedures, research misconduct, and detrimental research practices. Research misconduct was defined in a 1992 Academies report titled Responsible Science as “fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reporting research.” Fostering Integrity in Research endorses this definition and further defines detrimental research practice as any practice that has been considered “questionable” until now, including behaviors like misleading use of statistics and failure to retain research data. The report also notes that detrimental research practices are not restricted to an individual, but also include “irresponsible or abusive actions by research institutions and journals.” “The pressure to falsify, rush to publish, or publish unrefereed results is generally lower in materials research than other fields I’ve observed,” says Alan J. Hurd, executive advisor at Los Alamos National Laboratory and former president of the Materials Research Society (MRS). “Even Nobelquality work in materials does not generally have the public or media pressure that leads to problems … our issues [in mate
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