MAJOR CAUSES OF SCIENTIFIC MISCONDUCT.

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The history of scientific misconduct already started long time ago, where Ptolemy used data from Hipparchos without acknowledging him; Galileo Galilei, the founder of the scientific method but appears to have relied more on thought experiments rather than performing empirical experiments (Werner-Felmayer, 2010). In the modern world, the integrity of scientist and scientific research is jeopardized when the discovery of scientific misconduct made headline news. Headline such as “Korean scientist said to admit fabrication in a cloning study” (Wade, 2005), “Dutch university sacks social psychologist over faked data” (Enserink, 2011), “Harvard psychology researcher committed fraud, U.S investigation concludes” (Carpenter, 2012) and “Top Canadian scientist and award-winning student caught in ‘blatant plagiarism’ of text” (Munro, 2012) really makes we think, why they committed such fraud? Before we go into factors that may contribute to scientific misconduct, we have to understand what is the definition of it and also types of misconduct.

What is the definition and types of scientific misconduct?

Definition of scientific misconduct or research misconduct by ORI (The Office of Research Integrity U.S, 2011) is fabrication, falsification or plagiarism in proposing, performing or reviewing research, or in reporting research results. There are three important keywords stated, which are major types of scientific misconduct;
1) Fabrication – making up data or results of scientific research
2) Falsification – manipulating research materials, equipment or processes or changing or omitting data or results such that the research is not accurately represented in the research record.
3) Plagiarism – appropriation of another’s ideas, processes, r...

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...om https://ori.hhs.gov/content/case-summary-savine-adam-c
Wade, N. (2005, December, 16) Korean Scientist Said to Admit Fabrication in Cloning Study. The New York Times. Retrieved on March 5, 2014 from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/16/science/16clone.html.
Werner-Felmayer, G. (2010) Rethinking the meaning of being a scientist – the role of scientific integrity boards and some thoughts about scientific culture. Med Law, Vol 29, pp 329-339
Wislar, J.S., Flanagim, A., Fontanarosa, P.B. and DeAngelis, C. (2011) Honorary and ghost authorship in high impact biomedical journals: a cross sectional survey. BMJ 2011; 343: d6128
Zielinska, E. (2013) Cancer Institute Frustrated with Leadership. The Scientist. Published on 2 April 2013. Retrieved on 13 March 2013 from http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/34930/title/Cancer-Institute-Frustrated-with-Leadership/

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