Fraud in Science—It Makes the Headlines
The image of scientists as invariably dedicated to truth has been tarnished, as these headlined items show.
“Ethics in Science”
“A fight is building in the U.S. House of Representatives over fraud, misconduct, and conflict of interest in science.”—Science, July 7, 1989.
“Do Scientists Cheat?”
“After the initial inquiry by this [congressional] committee into this subject, the committee has had growing reason to believe that we are only seeing the tip of a very unfortunate, dangerous, and important iceberg.”—NOVA broadcast on PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) on October 25, 1988.
“Two New Studies Ask Why Scientists Cheat”
“It was an innocent enough question: how do scientists behave when no one is looking? But it has produced an incendiary answer: not too well, reports a paper this month in the British journal Nature.”—Newsweek, February 2, 1987.
“A Nation of Liars? Scientists Falsify Research”
“A study published last month accused 47 scientists at the Harvard and Emory University medical schools of producing misleading papers.”—U.S.News & World Report, February 23, 1987.
“NIH Sees Plagiarism in Vision Paper”
“Panel says researcher took data from paper he peer-reviewed and used it for his own work; . . . NIH [National Institutes of Health] recommends debarment proceedings.”—Science, July 14, 1989.
“‘Permissive Behaviour’ Breeds Fraud in the Laboratory”
“Biomedical scientists in America are performing sloppy and sometimes fraudulent research in an effort to publish more papers and make more money.”—New Scientist, February 25, 1989.
“Researchers Roll Back the Frontiers of Fraud”
“Scientific fraud and carelessness among researchers could be widespread, warns a study in last week’s issue of Nature.”—New Scientist, January 22, 1987.
“Researcher Accused of Plagiarism Resigns”
“A biochemist accused of plagiarizing a National Academy of Sciences report for a book on nutrition and cancer resigned from his position at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation.”—Science, September 4, 1987.
“The Pill: Professor’s Safety Tests Were Faked”
“His deception puts a question mark over safety checks on pills being taken by up to 2 m[illion] women in Britain and 10 m[illion] worldwide.”—The Sunday Times, September 28, 1986.
“Senior Drugs Researcher Resigns in Disgrace”
“He resigned last week after an independent committee of inquiry found him guilty of scientific fraud.”—New Scientist, November 12, 1988.
“NIMH Finds a Case of ‘Serious Misconduct’”
“A surprisingly long-running, flagrant and deliberate case of scientific fraud according to a draft report of an investigation conducted for the National Institute of Mental Health.”—Science, March 27, 1987.
“Research ‘Fraud’ Puts Poison Into the Ivy League”
“A prominent Bostonian psychiatrist resigned as head of a mental hospital affiliated to Harvard University, following charges of plagiarism.”—New Scientist, December 10, 1988.
“The Case of the ‘Misplaced’ Fossils”
“A prominent Australian scientist has examined two decades of work on ancient Himalayan geology and alleges it may be the greatest paleontological fraud of all time.”—Science, April 21, 1989.
“Now It’s the Journals’ Turn on the Firing Line”
“[He was speaking] specifically about how poorly many [science] journals have handled scientific fraud. . . . The same message previously dispatched to other members of the scientific community has now been addressed to the journals: clean up your act or you may find legislators getting into it.”—The AAAS Observer, July 7, 1989.