10/5/22, 3:17 PM Publication ethics - PMC

Indian J Ophthalmol. 2017 Jun; 65(6): 429–432. PMCID: PMC5508450

doi: 10.4103/ijo.IJO_483_17 PMID: 28643704

Publication ethics
Sabyasachi Sengupta and Santosh G Honavar1

Academic research involves many coordinated steps and processes – appropriate study design,
study execution, data collection, data analysis, and finally publication. While going through
these steps and culminating in a publication can be an exhilarating experience, one should be
aware of ethical code of conduct that binds researchers at every stage. The Committee on
Publication Ethics (COPE) is an international forum for editors and publishers of peer-re‐
viewed journals that provide the “code of conduct” and “best practice guidelines” that define
publication ethics and advises editors on how to handle cases of research and publication mis‐
conduct.[1,2] In this editorial, we introduce concepts collectively called “publication ethics” in‐
cluding statutory and ethics approval, informed consent, data manipulation and research
fraud, plagiarism, simultaneous submission, duplicate publication, self-citation, consent to re‐
produce published material, ethics of authorship, and conflicts of interest [Fig. 1]. We also dis‐
cuss the repercussions and consequences one may face if such misconduct is detected.

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10/5/22, 3:17 PM Publication ethics - PMC

Figure 1

Types of research and publication ethics

Ethics Approval, Informed Consent, and Data Confidentiality

As per the regulations provided in the “Schedule-Y” (Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 2005, the
Government of India) by the Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI), it is mandatory to get
approval from a DCGI-registered ethics committee before commencing a sponsored drug trial.
[3] In addition, since 2009, it is mandatory to register clinical trials with the Clinical Trials
Registry of India. Guidelines for the formation of the ethics committee and its code of conduct
have been outlined in the Schedule-Y. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has also
provided guidelines for ethics approval before commencing studies in India. Authors and re‐
searchers must be aware of these guidelines and adhere to these regulations.

Obtaining informed consent from all the study participants is critical and should not be trivial‐
ized by the authors. The DCGI and ICMR provide templates for the consent form (Appendix V,
Schedule-Y), which must be adopted by all researchers in India. The author should also be
aware of the guidelines provided by the International Conference on Harmonization Good
Clinical Practice and the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki.[4,5] Recording audio-visual con‐
sent is the norm for industry-sponsored randomized clinical trials currently. The consent
forms must commit on protection of patients' personal identity and other confidential data
(e.g., socioeconomic status). In addition, the consent forms must include patient rights clearly

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10/5/22, 3:17 PM Publication ethics - PMC

in a language understandable by patients. The editorial board of journals may ask for docu‐
mented proof of the consent form used by the researchers, and these should be maintained
for a minimum of 5 years from the time of termination of the study.

Data Manipulation and Research Fraud

Research fraud refers to publications that report results and draw conclusions from data that
are not generated by the study (fabrication) or are generated by manipulating the data (falsifi‐
cation). These offences are also applicable to images that are modified to conceal the truth. It is
relatively simple for experienced reviewers and editors to decipher whether the authors in‐
dulged in research fraud by looking at the statistics, tables, P values, 95% confidence intervals,
odds ratios, etc. Fabrication and falsification are extremely serious forms of research miscon‐
duct. If editors or reviewers are suspicious at the time of review process, they may ask the au‐
thors to disclose the raw datasheets to confirm or alleviate the suspicion. Editors may request
for the datasheets even after a few years of publication if sufficient doubt is raised. Hence, all
data from the clinical study should be preserved for a reasonably long period.

Plagiarism

The use of previously published work by another author in one's own manuscript without
consent, credit, or acknowledgment and fraudulently passing it as one's own work is referred
to as plagiarism. This is the most common form of scientific misconduct in manuscript writing.
Plagiarism can be of two types depending on the extent of the content reproduced: (a) clear
plagiarism, defined by COPE as unattributed use of large portions of text and/or data, pre‐
sented as if they were by the plagiarist and (b) minor copying of short phrases only (e.g.,
phrases in discussion of research paper) without any misattribution of data. Clear plagiarism
could be literal copying, i.e., word–for-word copying of large parts of a previous manuscript,
substantial copying, i.e., reproducing major parts of a previous paper such as text, tables, and
figures, paraphrasing, i.e. copying the idea from a previous paper without copying verbatim
and text, recycling also termed as self-plagiarism when an author uses the same text in multi‐
ple papers without citation of the prior work.

Authors must remember that crediting previous authors for their work is vital in providing
context to their own research. Journals often use plagiarism-checking software that assists edi‐
tors in identifying plagiarists. The COPE provides clear guidelines on the processes to be fol‐
lowed to tackle plagiarism when it is detected in the review phase and when detected after
publication. Besides, the University Grants Commission (UCG) has prepared a proposal to con‐
sider plagiarism a legal offence in India.

Simultaneous Submission

Submitting a manuscript to multiple scientific journals at the same time is termed as simultane‐
ous submission. At the time of manuscript submission, most journals obtain a declaration from
the authors that the manuscript is original and is not being considered for publication by any
other scientific journals. Declaring as such and then disregarding this process leads to submis‐
sion to another journal where the chances of success are perceived to be better by the au‐
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10/5/22, 3:17 PM Publication ethics - PMC

thors. This could lead to publication of the same manuscript by two different journals. As this
type of misconduct occurs at the discretion of the author alone, the onus is on the author to
submit to one journal and wait for a decision before submitting to another journal.

Submitting/presenting a paper for a scientific conference does not preclude authors from sub‐
mitting the same paper for publication to a peer-reviewed journal.

Duplicate Publication

Submitting a new manuscript containing the same hypotheses, data, discussion points, and/or
conclusions as a previously published manuscript is called as duplicate publication. This is sim‐
ilar to plagiarism, but instead of copying phrases verbatim, the same data, images, and study
hypothesis are replicated in another paper. The COPE classifies duplicate publications into ma‐
jor and minor offences. A major offence is defined as a duplicate publication based on the
same dataset with identical findings and/or evidence that authors have sought to hide redun‐
dancy, e.g., by changing title or author order or not referring to previous papers. A minor of‐
fence, also referred as “salami slicing,” is defined as a duplicate publication with some element
of redundancy or legitimate repetition or reanalysis (e.g., subgroup/extended follow-
up/repeated methods). Publications in regional journals or non-English journals are most
commonly used for duplicate publications by authors. Authors must refrain from such miscon‐
duct and recognize that this is unethical behavior.

The COPE provides clear guidelines on handling duplicate publications in addition to rejecting
and revoking the submitted or published papers. Performing a separate confirmatory study
excluding previously published data and with a larger sample size does not amount to dupli‐
cate publication, even though the study hypothesis remains the same.

Self-Citation

Citing one's own published work in subsequent papers that are out of context to the research
being reported is referred to as self-citation. For experienced researchers, the number of
times a paper is cited sometimes matters more than actually publishing it. In addition, total
numbers of citations are used to calculate metrics such as G- and H-index, which may be con‐
sidered for academic promotions, thus driving senior authors to pursue self-citation. This is
perceived as unethical by most of the scientific community and looked down upon by peers.
However, sometimes, authors may have published a large amount of literature in their niche
field and the subsequent paper is a continuation of previous papers, making self-citations in‐
evitable. However, authors should not introduce concepts outside the scope of the current pa‐
per to cite one's own work. The onus remains on the authors to guard against such scientific
conduct.

Ethics With Authorship

Every journal has authorship criteria based on the ICMJE guidelines for qualifying to become
an author in a manuscript. The ICMJE states, “All persons designated as authors should qualify
for authorship, and all those who qualify should be listed.” The ICMJE describes three basic cri‐
teria that must be collectively met to be credited with authorship:[6] Back to Top

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a. Substantial contribution to the conduct of study including its conception and design, data
acquisition, statistical analysis, and interpretation
b. Drafting or revising the article for intellectual content
c. Approval of the final version.

The extent of involvement decides the order of authors. However, the order of authors, espe‐
cially the first author and corresponding author, can sometimes be a reason for discontent‐
ment and disputes. It is always a good idea for the study team to have a meeting and sort out
authorship issues at the time of commencement of the study, and ideally enter into a contract,
thereby allocating different roles to authors depending on their authorship order.

The three major types of misconduct with authorship are ghost authorship, gifted authorship,
and guest authorship. Ghost authors are those who contribute substantially in the develop‐
ment of the paper but are not given authorship or acknowledgment in the published paper.
These are usually paid authors and should be acknowledged if authorship is not given. Gift au‐
thorship refers to inclusion in the list of coauthors simply due to an affiliation to an institute
where the research was conducted. Gift authorship is typically provided to heads of institu‐
tions or departments even without significant contribution to a particular study. Guest author‐
ship is usually provided to individuals whose presence as a coauthor significantly improves the
chances of acceptance of the manuscript. Changes to authorship (addition/removal) after ac‐
ceptance or sometimes after publication is possible if all coauthors agree to this amendment
and have individually signed the requisition sent to the editor of the journal.

Conflicts of Interest

Conflicts of interest, also called as competing interests, are defined as financial, personal, social
or other interests that directly or indirectly influence the conduct of the author with respect to
the particular manuscript. Having competing interests in a product or device under considera‐
tion is not considered unethical, however, failure to disclose such hidden interests severely
jeopardize the outcomes reported in the paper. Once disclosed, it is the discretion of the read‐
ers to determine the influence of the conflicts of interest on the conclusions of the paper. A re‐
cent study showed a poor understanding of “conflicts of interest” and important ethical issues
among Indian medical scientists or journals.[7]

The ICMJE has produced a common form to disclose any conflict of interest that has to be indi‐
vidually signed by every coauthor and uploaded to the journal along with the manuscript files.
Direct conflict of interest emerges when the author derives employment, owns stocks, or
patents of the product (drug, device, etc.) discussed in the paper. Indirect conflict arises when
the author receives honoraria and research grants to do the study, paid lectures to popularize
the product, etc. What constitutes conflict of interest is left to the discretion of the author and
authors are advised to err on the side of declaration of all their financial disclosures, irrespec‐
tive of whether they are related to the current manuscript or not.

Consequences if Detected

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The COPE provides clear guidelines and steps to be taken when each of the above-mentioned
misconducts is identified.[1] The first step taken by the editorial board is contacting authors
and informing them that their misconduct has been identified. If the authors acknowledge and
accept their fault, the paper is rejected and the leadership in the authors' institution is in‐
formed. If the paper is already published, authors are provided with an opportunity of self-
confession in the form of an erratum in the journal. If the misconduct is major, the editor has
the right to revoke the paper after due diligence is performed and the misconduct confirmed.
The authors can be blacklisted by the journal, and information is shared with COPE so that all
member journals are informed. If authors deny their misconduct, editors can take cognizance
and appropriate action as per the COPE guidelines. In addition, authors can be questioned by
the ethics committee of local bodies such as the Ethics Committee of the All India
Ophthalmological Society, and suitable punishment can be handed out as per the standard op‐
erating procedures.

Conclusion

There are various forms of unethical practices that authors resort to, sometimes intentionally
and occasionally by accident. Being aware of publication ethics enlisted herein will help read‐
ers to consciously avoid such misconduct and perform honest ethical research and pursue
publications.

References

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4. [Last accessed on 2017 Jun 07]. Available from:

https://www.ich.org/fileadmin/Public_Web_Site/ICH_Products/Guidelines/Efficacy/E6/E6_R1_Guideline.pdf .

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