A researcher claimed that his unpublished and rejected manuscript had been plagiarized in an article published in a respected scientific journal. The researcher contacted the journal and demanded to be included in the list of authors. The journal’s editor, who also was the corresponding author of the article, was affiliated with the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at UiO. Therefore, the case was referred to The Research Ethics Committee at UiO (REC).
Both the manuscript and the article dealt with historical research and were based on overlapping periods and areas. Both were interdisciplinary projects with contributions from several researchers, including some who participated in both projects. REC’s mandate limited the assessment to solely those researchers affiliated with UiO.
The researcher behind the unpublished manuscript, and two other researchers associated with the published work, gave in-person explanations to REC. Additionally, written documentation was presented.
REC’s starting point was that scientific misconduct according to The Norwegian Research Ethics Act (2017) depends on two conditions: whether there has indeed been a breach of research ethical norms, and whether one or more researchers have acted sufficiently negligent. There must be a clear preponderance of evidence for this to be proven.
REC decided to divide the case into phases. First, they assessed the allegations of plagiarism in the published article and which researchers could potentially be held responsible. They also considered whether the unpublished manuscript was an indivisible collaborative work. Then, REC assessed the claim by the researcher behind the unpublished manuscript to be recognized as a co-author of the published work.
The researcher claimed that three significant paragraphs from the manuscript had been plagiarized, making an independent publication of the manuscript pointless. The opposing party argued that the similarities were either due to the use of the same publicly available information or were written by co-authors who had contributed to both projects. A controversial claim from these co-authors was that the manuscript was not a collaborative work but consisted of independent individual contributions that could be taken forward to other projects. However, REC considered that the manuscript clearly appeared as a collaborative work since a reader could not identify which researcher had written which parts, and the manuscript had also been attempted to be published as a whole. This was in line with the guidelines from The Norwegian National Committee for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (NENT) and the definition of "joint work" in The Norwegian Copyright Act (2018).
All co-authors of the unpublished manuscript were thus entitled to be cited if the work was reused, as the rules on proper referencing also apply to unpublished scientific works and the reuse of one’s own previous works. REC noted that the guidelines on proper referencing also apply to the use of publicly available information.
REC then evaluated the three contested paragraphs and found that the content was very similar in the published article as in the unpublished manuscript. They also found no agreement that allowed the collaborative work to be terminated and individual contributions to be used freely. Consequently, REC concluded that the reproduction of the three paragraphs, and two of the illustrations, in the published article without correct source references constituted a substantial case of plagiarism. The use of a third illustration was deemed to violate referencing principles but was not severe enough to be classified as plagiarism.
Regarding the question of subjective guilt, the conclusions varied. REC pointed out that experienced researchers should generally be well aware of the rules for proper referencing, and those who led the project, including the corresponding author and co-authors who were involved in both projects, had a stricter responsibility.
The two researchers who participated in both projects were deemed to have acted highly reprehensibly by omitting references to the unpublished manuscript. For these researchers, it was established that the conditions for scientific misconduct were met.
The other co-authors of the published article, including the corresponding author, were likely unaware of the unpublished manuscript and therefore could not be held personally responsible for the plagiarism.
REC then assessed whether the researcher behind the unpublished manuscript had the right to be a co-author of the published article. The researcher claimed she had contributed with ideas, the original analysis that identified something substantial, and with the reconstruction of the historical and socio-cultural context. The opposing party argued that they had used a different and more reliable analysis method and that the researcher had not provided significant contributions to either the research foundation or the manuscript, and that the two projects had significantly different perspectives for the research.
REC concluded that the researcher from the unpublished manuscript had not provided significant contributions to the published article, considering its broad perspective and the lack of reporting her data. Consequently, the researcher did not have the right to individual co-authorship, but her initial contribution should be acknowledged.
Nonetheless, the paragraphs from the unpublished manuscript should have been credited, and REC recommended the published article to be corrected so that both references and contribution acknowledgment were added. Since both relevant projects were interdisciplinary, REC based its principles for plagiarism and authorship on those from both NENT and The National Committee for Research Ethics in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (NESH) and pointed out that the Vancouver recommendations were incorporated into the authorship guidelines.
In conclusion, REC found no evidence that the plagiarism was due to a systemic failure, as the published article contained a substantial number of correct references.
REC’s conclusion in the case was unanimous.
References
- The Norwegian Research Ethics Act (2017) §§ 6 and 8
- The Norwegian Copyright Act (2018) § 8, first paragraph
- The Regulations of the Law to The Norwegian Research Ethics Act (2018) § 7, last paragraph
- The draft bill of The Norwegian Research Ethics Act (Prop. 158 L (2015-2016)) Chapter 5.2.2.4
- The Norwegian National Committee for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (NENT): Guidelines for Research Ethics in Science and Technology (2015) Section 4 and 5
- The National Committee for Research Ethics in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (NESH): Guidelines for Research Ethics in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (2016) Section 25 and 26
- International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors (‘Vancouver recommendations’) Mandate for the Research Ethics Committee at the University of Oslo, Section 1.1
The text has been translated and improved by UiO GPT.
More statements and summaries from the Research Ethics Committee at UiO