Ethical Violation and Research Misconduct
Al-Adawi, Ali and Al-Zakwani (2016) presents unscrupulous medical research as an ethical violation and research misconduct that threatens to halt progress in medical knowledge alongside other negative consequences. The article specifically talks of the pressure that medical researchers face to present research publications in order to remain relevant. The authors mention that unsubstantiated claims in medical research and interventions can be perceived as information plagiarism, falsification and fabrication. The case is presented of a research into the association between immunization and autism that concocted data and created undesirable scaremongering. In addition, the case of research misconduct was noted to reduce public confidence in the scientific community and jeopardize the reputation of researchers. Five strategies have been proposed to address the presented concern about unsubstantiated claims in research publications. Firstly, there is a need to create a global research policing force to identify, investigate and sanction research misconduct. Ethical Violation and Research Misconduct
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This force would supervise research institutions, hold them to account, and redefine the excellence criteria. Secondly, presenting inherent mechanisms that raise the alarm when research misconduct is suspected (Al-Adawi, Ali & Al-Zakwani, 2016). The third strategy is instituting regulatory reforms that improve the research environment to include presenting a model environment that does not accept unethical conduct, cultural context, and institutional surveillance. The fourth strategy is creating a research integrity body that acts as a supervisory body to support the efforts of the relevant institutional review board (IRB). The final strategy is ensuring that researchers have a personal awareness of research ethics. There are different definitions of research ethics, and researchers must be aware of the relevant definitions as well as receive education on research integrity (Buljan, Barać & Marušić, 2018). Overall, research misconduct is a serious violation of the ethical standards for research and must be addressed in order to improve the value of research results, improve public confidence and maintain the reputation of researchers.
References
Al-Adawi, S., Ali, B., & Al-Zakwani, I. (2016). Research Misconduct: The Peril of Publish or Perish. Oman Medical Journal, 31(1), 5-11. https://doi.org/10.5001/omj.2016.02
Buljan, I., Barać, L., & Marušić, A. (2018). How researchers perceive research misconduct in biomedicine and how they would prevent it: A qualitative study in a small scientific community. Accountability in Research, 25(4), 220-238. https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2018.1463162
Ethical Violation and Research Misconduct