The term research integrity means to ethically conduct your work through the accurate reporting of data and citing the work of others.
Researchers are expected to conduct their work with honesty and accuracy in order to guarantee the reliability and credibility of the scholarship.
A finding of research misconduct usually includes one or more of the following violations:
The consequences for a finding of misconduct can come from the funder as well as the journal editor. As an example, the Code of Federal Regulations states that "a finding of research misconduct" by the National Science Foundation requires the following:
However, not every mistake or disagreement counts as misconduct:
Gaming the Metrics: Misconduct and Manipulation in Academic Research by The National Science and Technology Council established this definition in 2022:
Scientific integrity is the adherence to professional practices, ethical behavior, and the principles of honesty and objectivity when conducting, managing, using the results of, and communicating about science and scientific activities. Inclusivity, transparency, and protection from inappropriate influence are hallmarks of scientific integrity.
While research integrity applies broadly to all who conduct research, "scientific integrity" is a more specific term largely used by federal agencies who fund research. Adhering to the principles of scientific integrity is expected both for federal employees and those whose research is funded by agencies such as the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Environmental Protection Agency, and others.
Funders who sponsor research pay very close attention to where that funding is going.
This is especially true of federal funders, as government research grants are funded by the public. Different agencies have different means of doing so. All federal agencies have an Office of the Inspector General (OIG); among its other tasks, the OIG of the National Science Foundation tracks use and misuse of agency funding.
For an example of the work done by these offices to track how funding is used, the March 2015 report from the NSF OIG (p. 5) states:
We analyzed over 8,000 proposals awarded by NSF in FY 2011 for evidence of plagiarism, and investigated those which appeared serious. We opened 34 plagiarism investigations, ten of which have resulted in NSF making findings of research misconduct. So far, we have recovered $357,602 in federal funds from these investigations.
While the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) also has an OIG, the vast scope of programs overseen by the HHS led to the creation of the Office of Research Integrity to focus specifically on the research funded by HHS grants.
As an example of publisher policies about research misconduct, IEEE's Publication Manual states:
If the editor of an IEEE publication learns that an author may have acted improperly, which may include but is not limited to misrepresenting data, plagiarizing text, or not informing the editor that an article had been published, accepted for publication, or concurrently under review by another publication, then the editor shall investigate the alleged misconduct.
If misconduct is found to have occurred, consequences range from a notice being posted alongside the article in question to the author being banned from submitting articles to IEEE publications for a period of time, potentially permanently if the offense is repeated.
Be sure to read through a journal's editorial policies before submitting a journal article so you know what's expected of you and what you can expect from the publisher.
While there are federal agencies that track federal funding, there is as yet no official watchdog of the results of misconduct, specifically misconduct that leads to a paper being retracted and taken out of the public record. Journalists Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus began Retraction Watch in 2010 to fill this gap, and their blog has reported on retractions and misconduct scandals to reveal data and trends in the U.S. and internationally.
