»Questions & Answers«

»Case 1: Who is an author?«

1: Why should Ms. Jacobs and Dr. Frank have discussed the laboratory’s approach to authorship issues when she started working in his laboratory? »Answer

2: Why is the order of authorship and the listing of authors important in a research paper? »Answer

3: What is the difference between an acknowledgment and a listing as an author? »Answer

4: Although many journals subscribe to the guidelines of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, many do not, and many researchers do not follow the practices that it recommends. What tends to happen, and how are ICMJE standards being challenged? »Answer

5: Who among the authors takes responsibility for submitting the paper to a journal and following up with the editor and peer-review revisions? »Answer

6: What are some potential problems with Dr. Frank’s submitting a paper on preliminary findings and not performing sufficient corroboratory experiments? »Answer

7: What kind of problems may arise if the same data is used in multiple papers in the research literature? »Answer

8: What might happen if someone is listed as an author on a paper for which he or she did not do any work? »Answer

9: What might have been done to resolve Ms. Jacobs’s ethical dilemma with Dr. Frank about the authors on the paper? »Answer

»Case 1: Questions for Further Reflection«

1: What can be done to ensure that parties involved in a research project understand who will be an author on a paper resulting from the work?

2: What are the policies of your institution, department, and laboratory about who should be included as an author on a paper?

3: What role can the ombudsperson at an institution play in dealing with conflicts that arise from problems in authorship?

»Case 2: What is responsible peer review?«

1: What types of conflict of interest might arise when someone is asked to review a paper or grant application? »Answer

2: Is it ever appropriate for a peer reviewer to give a paper to a graduate student for review? If so, how should the reviewer do so? »Answer

3: Is it appropriate for a peer reviewer to use ideas from an article under review to stop unfruitful research in the reviewer’s laboratory? »Answer

4: Is it ever appropriate for a reviewer to use ideas from a paper under review, even if the reviewer’s method to achieve a result is different from that used in the paper under review? If so, how should the reviewer proceed? »Answer

5: What are some of the challenges in the current peer-review process, in which the peer reviewer is anonymous but the author is known to the reviewer? »Answer

6: What recourse is there for Dr. Morris if he suspects that his ideas were plagiarized? »Answer

»Case 2: Questions for Further Reflection«

1: How can one separate oneself from the content of a paper or grant application under review?

2: What are some ways in which the process of peer review might be improved?

3: What kind of credit should be given to peer reviewers?

»Case 3: Peer review and controversial research«

1: How can someone whose research is being "attacked" provide an honest appraisal of the critique? »Answer

2: Could it be that Dr. Rolands’ challenge of Drs. Jones and Marcus is personal and not professional? »Answer

3: Should Dr. Rolands point out to the editor of the first journal his potential conflict of interest? »Answer

4: What recourse does Dr. Rolands have now that her paper has been rejected two times? »Answer

Continue to the next section: → Annotated Case Studies