Singapore Statement Urges Global Consensus on Research Integrity

Scientists, scientific journals, and research institutions must adhere to an international set of ethical standards and consider the social implications of their work, says a new statement from 2nd World Conference on Research Integrity, co-sponsored by AAAS.

The Singapore Statement on Research Integrity, released 22 September, acknowledges different cultural and national standards for scientific research. But, it concludes “there are also principles and professional responsibilities that are fundamental to the integrity of research wherever it is undertaken.”

The succinct one-page document lists 14 responsibilities for researchers. Individual scientists should share research findings openly and promptly, disclose conflicts of interest, and take responsibility for the “trustworthiness” of their own work, the statement says. Institutions should create policies and work environments that encourage research integrity and institutions and journals should have clear procedures for addressing research misconduct.

The statement also notes four principles that underlie the statement’s responsibilities:

• honesty in all aspects of research;
  
• accountability in the conduct of research;
  
• professional courtesy and fairness in working with others; and
  
• good stewardship of research on behalf of others

“The globalization of research requires the globalization of basic understandings of responsible behavior in research,” the members of the Singapore Statement Drafting Committee wrote in a news release accompanying the document. “The Singapore Statement is intended to encourage and further the development of these understandings.”

Policymakers, university leaders, publishers, and government ministers first drafted the statement at the conference, held 21-24 July in Singapore. The conference was supported by science associations from China, Japan, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Korea, the United Kingdom, and the United States. More than 300 delegates from 51 countries contributed to the final statement.

Three officials represented AAAS at the conference: Mark S. Frankel, director of the AAAS Scientific Freedom, Responsibility and Law Program; Gerald Epstein, director of the AAAS Center for Science, Technology and Security Policy; and AAAS Senior Program Associate Deborah Runkle. Frankel and Epstein spoke to the conference about responsible advocacy and the ethics of dual-use research, respectively, while Runkle co-chaired a session on digital plagiarism.

The Singapore attendees sought a set of “international norms and standards related to research integrity that would accommodate national differences,” said Frankel, who helped organize this year’s conference.

The harmonization of these standards is part of a larger commitment by AAAS to support the international integration of scientific values. The effort also has included three years of top-level discussions between the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) and AAAS to coordinate work on scientific ethics.

Seeking an international agreement on research integrity is one way to pursue harmonization, said Epstein. “Although many different groups have different conceptions of what a code of conduct should focus on,” he said, “there isn’t any culture in which making up data is good.”

Frankel added that the Singapore Statement “is a start to what we hope will be a global discussion of the issues raised at the conference and a basis for future national or regional ethics guidelines.”

Becky Ham

22 September 2010

SINGAPORE STATEMENT on RESEARCH INTEGRITY

Background

The principles and responsibilities set out in the Singapore Statement on Research Integrity represent the first international effort to encourage the development of unified policies, guidelines and codes of conduct, with the long-range goal of fostering greater integrity in research worldwide.

The Statement is the product of the collective effort and insights of the 340 individuals from 51 countries who participated in the 2nd World Conference on Research Integrity. These included researchers, funders, representatives of research institutions (universities and research institutes) and research publishers. The Statement was developed by a small drafting committee (listed below); discussed and commented upon before, during and after the 2nd World Conference; and then finalized for release and global use on 22 September 2010.

Purpose

Publication of the Singapore Statement on Research Integrity is intended to challenge governments, organizations and researchers to develop more comprehensive standards, codes and policies to promote research integrity both locally and on a global basis.

The principles and responsibilities summarized in the Statement provide a foundation for more expansive and specific guidance worldwide. Its publication and dissemination are intended to make it easier for others to provide the leadership needed to promote integrity in research on a global basis, with a common approach to the fundamental elements of responsible research practice.

The Statement is applicable to anyone who does research, to any organization that sponsors research and to any country that uses research results in decision-making. Good research practices are expected of all researchers: government, corporate and academic. To view and download copies of the Statement, click on the links to the right. >>>
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Disclaimer. The Singapore Statement on Research Integrity was developed as part of the 2nd World Conference on Research Integrity, 21-24 July 2010, in Singapore, as a global guide to the responsible conduct of research. It is not a regulatory document and does not represent the official policies of the countries and organizations that funded and/or participated in the Conference. For official policies, guidance, and regulations relating to research integrity, appropriate national bodies and organizations should be consulted. Posted 22 September 2010;
Statement Drafting Committee:
Nicholas Steneck and Tony Mayer, Co-chairs, 2nd World Conference on Research Integrity
Melissa Anderson, Chair, Organizing Committee, 3rd World Conference on Research Integrity

More retractions from Nobelist - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences

Two prominent journals have retracted papers by Nobel laureate Linda Buck today because she was "unable to reproduce [the] key findings" of experiments done by her former postdoctoral researcher Zhihua Zou, according to a statement made by the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC), where Buck worked at the time of the publications.

These retractions, a 2006 Science paper and a 2005 Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences (PNAS) paper, are tied to a 2001 Nature paper that she retracted in 2008, due to the inability "to reproduce the reported findings" and "inconsistencies between some of the figures and data published in the paper and the original data," according to the retraction. Zou was the first author on all three papers and responsible for conducting the experiments.

The FHCRC is currently conducting an investigation into the issue, said Kristen Woodward, senior media relations manager, but no findings of misconduct have been made. John Dahlberg of the Office of Research Integrity declined to comment on the matter.

The paper in PNAS, which has been cited 61 times according to ISI, describes how smells from substances with similar molecular structures elicit "strikingly similar" neuronal patterns in the olfactory cortex of mice brains across individuals, supporting the presence of "olfactory maps" that follow "an underlying logic," according to the paper. The Science paper, cited 73 times, furthers the research and supports that mixed smells, such as chocolate and citrus, activate neurons in the olfactory cortex that chocolate or citrus do not when presented individually, which may explain why these mixtures tend to smell like completely different substances to humans.

Fortunately, the retractions will not have a large impact on the field, Donald Wilson, an olfactory researcher at New York University and Nathan Kline Institute, told The Scientist in an email. "The story of how cortical odor processing occurs doesn't change," he said. "Work in our own lab and others have now also shown the highly distributed, sparse nature of odor processing in the olfactory cortex, and the complex processes involved in dealing with odor mixtures, much as these two now retracted papers showed."

Zou was unavailable for comment, as his current location is unknown, according to FHCRC. After completing his post doctoral research with Buck at FHCRC in 2005, Zou took an assistant professor position at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) in Galveston. In November of 2008, however, Zou was laid off from the institution, along with 2,400 other UTMB staff members, after Hurricane Ike ripped the university apart that September, according to Raul Reyes, the director of media relations at the UTMB.

In 2008, Zou wrote in a statement provided by UTMB that he was "disappointed" by the Nature retraction, and denied any misconduct on his part. While Zou agreed to the Nature retraction, he "declined to sign" the Science retraction, as reported online today in Science. But "we have no information to suspect misconduct," Natasha Pinol, senior communications officer at the AAAS/Science Office of Public Programs, told The Scientist in an email.

In addition to the irreproducible results, the PNAS paper also contained "figures inconsistent with original data," according to the FHCRC statement. While the PNAS retraction is "not embargoed," according to Managing Editor Daniel Salsbury, the journal refused to share any information with The Scientist before deadline, noting that the retraction would appear online after 2:00 p.m. EDT this afternoon.

The research that won Buck the 2004 Nobel Prize, which she shared with olfactory researcher Richard Axel of Columbia University "for their discoveries of odorant receptors and the organization of the olfactory system," was unrelated to the research in the retracted papers.

Read more: More retractions from Nobelist - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57699/#comments#ixzz10Qk5Xy3p