Instances of Scientific Misconduct
General Information about Scientific Misconduct
Scientific research has been established within the highest ethical and scholarly standards. Due to these rigorous codes of conduct, academic journals only allow a small percentage of work to be published; journal rejection rates could be as high as 90-95 percent. Any violation of these rules within academia is called ‘scientific misconduct.’ One definition of scientific misconduct states that it is the intentional distortion or deception of the research process by the fabrication of data, text, hypothesis, methods, etc. This deception can be caused by fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism. Fabrication is when someone invents or makes up any portion of their work within academia. Falsification is when someone manipulates any portion of their work to which the work is not accurately represented by the records. Lastly, plagiarism is the appropriation of another person’s ideas, processes, results, or words without giving appropriate credit. In this portion of the BPS Website, one can explore multiple instances of scientific misconduct.