Research Misconduct and The Scientific process: Continuing Quality Improvement

Abstract

The response to research misconduct involves the attempt to regulate behavior through (a) creating and enforcing a rule and (b) ethics education. The roles of each must be shaped by considerations of the nature of scientific practice. Given the nature of science, the role of (a) must be limited in scope: both in the types of behavior it covers and in the level of intent that must be present for an allegation of misconduct to be proven. Since one important role of ethics education is to fill the gaps that regulatory rules leave open, it is this limitation in scope and its source in theoretical concerns that better reveals the type and kind of education needed. It is argued that much of the current ethics education falls short. Since the gaps left by the rule are largely due to theoretical concerns about the very nature of the scientific process and the nature of that process is constantly evolving, ethics education must focus more heavily on theory and must reach a wider audience. It is argued that ethics education can be more effective if it aims, in part, in creating a discipline-specific, constantly evolving scientific standard of care.

Keywords:

• research misconduct
• standard of care
• torts
• integrity in research
• scientific method
• ethics education

Thanks to my colleague John Halpin for his valuable insights.

Notes

¹ Of course, there are questions as to how specifiable and stringent such methodology really is; and this is precisely what this article addresses. There is some behavior that clearly and uncontroversially violates standard methodology. Yet there are others that are questionable. This is because scientific methodology is not a step-by-step affair; and science needs creativity to thrive. Thus we will argue that any regulatory definition of research misconduct must be limited to behaviors that clearly and uncontroversially violate standard protocol and other more controversial, potentially problematic behaviors must be dealt with by ethics education.

²From the Public Health Service (PHS) version.

³ This, too, is analogous to Tort Law, in that not all “unreasonable” behavior is subject to legal action or sanctions; only unreasonable behavior that results in harm.

⁴ This is important and likely necessary. Working for the Online Ethics Center, the author of this article visited several departments helping to lead workshops on research ethics. Great disparity was found among different labs within the same academic disciplines regarding the handling of many ethical issues.

Definition of Research Misconduct. Federal Register 42CFR50 (title 42, volume 1).