Ten Years later: Assessments of the integrity of publications from one research group with multiple retractions

ABSTRACT

When a research group has multiple retracted publications and/or research misconduct by a member is evident, there is a risk that its other publications are unreliable, so a comprehensive assessment of the group’s publications is advisable. We analyzed the comprehensiveness of assessment of the integrity of 300 publications by a research group with numerous retractions and known research misconduct, for 292 of which we raised concerns to publishers and academic institutions between 3/2013 and 2/2020. By 4/2023, 91 (30%) publications had not been assessed by either publisher or academic institution. Publishers had assessed 185 (63%) publications. The 4 academic institutions had assessed 5/36 (14%), 56/216 (26%), 30/50 (60%) and 40/66 (61%) publications. Unprompted assessments, those undertaken without our notification of concerns, occurred for 24 (8%) publications, 3 (1%) by publishers and 21 (7%) by academic institutions. Among 32 journals with ≥2 affected publications, no unprompted assessments of the remaining publication(s) occurred after notification of concerns about the index publication(s). Publishers retracted 58/84 (69%) publications which institutions also assessed and decided needed no editorial action. These analyses demonstrate the failure of publishers and institutions to comprehensively and spontaneously determine the integrity of publications in a setting of known misconduct and multiple retractions.

KEYWORDS:

• Publication integrity
• assessment
• journals
• universities
• retraction

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Contributorship

All authors designed the research. AG collated the data, AG and MB performed the analyses, AG drafted the paper. All authors critically reviewed and improved it. AG is the guarantor for the article. All authors had access to all the data. AG takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.

Data availability statement

Study data are either available in the public domain or can be obtained from the lead author upon reasonable request

Transparency statement

AG affirms that the manuscript is an honest, accurate, and transparent account of the study being reported; that no important aspects of the study have been omitted; and that any discrepancies from the study as planned have been explained

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2023.2295996.

Additional information

Funding

The study received no specific funding. MB is the recipient of an HRC Clinical Practitioner Fellowship. The Health Services Research Unit is funded by the Chief Scientist Office of the Scottish Government Health and Social Care Directorates. The authors are independent of the HRC. The HRC had no role in study design, the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data, the writing of the article, or the decision to submit it for publication.