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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL
OF CURRENT RESEARCH
International Journal of Current Research
Vol. 8, Issue, 11, pp.41212-41214, November, 2016

ISSN: 0975-833X
RESEARCH ARTICLE
ETHICS IN SCIENTIFIC WRITING

*Dr. Sandhya Jain

Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, Govt. College of Dentistry, Indore (M.P)

ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT

Article History: Ethics are moral conduct which we learn throughout life. Ethics are essential in every walk of life. So,
Received 26th August, 2016
ethics are paramount importance in medical and in research. Unethical practices may be harmful for
Received in revised form the subjects being treated in study or may bias the results of study. The objective of this article is to
17th September, 2016 highlight the importance of ethics in medical research.
Accepted 23rd October, 2016
Published online 30th November, 2016

Key words:
Ethics, Plagiarism, Research writing.

Copyright©2016, Dr. Sandhya Jain. This is an open access article distributes under the Creative Commons Attribution
ribution License, which permits unrestricted use,
distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Ethics in scientific writing”, International Journal of Current Research, 8, (11), 41212

Citation: Dr. Sandhya Jain, 2016. “Ethics 41212-41214.

INTRODUCTION Guideline

 Never duplicate work, sentences (Full or partial text).

Ethics in scientific writing: It is important to follow ethics in
 Always write reference for parts of manuscript picked
whatever we do. Same applies to scientific writing also. Often
from previously published articles.
researchers are involved too much in writing and publishing to
 Avoid salami publication. (Publishing one study to
the extent that intentionally or unintentionally, ethics are
several small articles).
forgotten. There is a need to create
ate awareness about scientific
ethics to avoid misconduct in scientific writing.  Never plagiarise (It is unethical to use of ideas, words,
work of others without giving due credit).
Scientific misconduct: There are prescribed guidelines by
If we have to use previously used data than we should obta
obtain
international or national bodies of concern specialty, which we
permission from publisher and should use data after providing
should follow. Scientific misconduct includes malpractices
malpr like
proper citation and acknowledgement to previous work. There
fabrication of data, manipulation of data, duplication of article,
should be proper transparency in using previous data. Cases of
authorship conflicts etc. One should know different ways of
dulplicacy are dealt by COPE, if found guilty, article is
dealing misconduct. How published misconduct is managed by
retracted or withdrawn. Salami publication is another form of
COPE (committee on publication ethics). There are various
scientific misconduct which involves finding of one study into
programmes (software) to check this misconduct. COPE takes
several parts to increase the number of publication of articles.
up cases of published malpractices and plagiarism. These are
The research project is breakup in to smaller parts. Plagiarism
different ways to detect unethical publishing like various
is attemptingg to use ideas, words, or work of other person
plagiarism detection software. These programmes tell us about
without giving due credit. It is extremely unethical not to
which part of the content is copied form where, which site,
mention the name of another person from whom the idea or
book and the percentage of similarity between manuscript and
work has been used.
other articles. The programme gives us the measure of
similarity between the present and published articles in Five types of plagiarism
literature.
 Copy paste
 Word switch
 Style
*Corresponding author: Dr. Sandhya Jain,  Meta phor
Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, Govt.
College of Dentistry, Indore (M.P)
 Idea
41213 Dr. Sandhya Jain, Ethics in scientific writing

Although there is no set rule about how much text matter could  Most active should be listed as 1st author or with
be used from published articles but it is generally ignored if corresponding power.
copied matter is less than 20% from already published data.  Senior authors should be listed last.
Code of conduct should be followed by scientific researchers  But all authors deserve fair credit where ever their
to write research articles according to ethical standards. names appear (rank - Right position)
 International committee of medical Journal editor
Following is some criteria to avoid plagiarism (ICMJE) has given guideline for authorship criteria,
which should be followed.
 Ethical medical writers should acknowledge the original
source of data. Even when only the idea is used.
Tips -to avoid authorship criteria
 They must remember to enclose within quotation
marks, all the text that has been copied from another 1. Read authorship guidelines. Describe contribution to
source. paper/articles.
 To use someone else work or for paraphrasing, they 2. Decide in the beginning about authorship order for the
should understand completely. project.
 Citation of references should not depend on exact lines 3. Put in writing about each authors contribution by them.
of any article, if only idea of particular topic has been 4. Clear in the beginning itself that if contribution change
taken than the original article should be in reference. substantially, authorship will also be changed.
 They must cite references accurately. The writer must 5. There should be transparency at different stage of
read the instructions to authors to know what style they project in cases if contribution has changed.
need to use. Biomedical journals commonly use the 6. If disagreement arises, resolve it as early as possible by
Vancouver style. Some textbook publishers prefer the involving some appropriate experienced person.
Harvard referencing style. Insufficient and inaccurate
acknowledgement can also amount to plagiarism. Detecting plagiarism
 Along with the manuscript, they should submit a cover
letter to the editor, clearly stating any instances of  Software is a common procedure nowadays. Example:
overlapping from previous publications and asking for iThenticate software.
advice.  These software measures similarity between two
 Last, but not the least, if he feels he has unintentionally articles (new and millions of published articles)
used somebody else’s ideas or text without appropriate  Plagiarism could be searched through internet by using
referencing, he needs to write to the editor of the words, phrases, or suspect sentences.
journal for advice. Confession is always better than to  Give output of percentage of similarity between
be caught stealing. submitted and other articles.
 Few program for searching plagiarism are Viper,
Data manipulation (scientific misconduct in the form of Turnitin etc.
data manipulation)
 ICMJE international council of medical Journal editor
guideline suggests that if there is sufficient intellectual
1. Falsification (willful distortion of data)
contribution by a person than his or her name should be
2. Fabrication (invention of data /cases)
included as one of the authors.
Falsification is a problematic issue. In this data’s are analyzed,
Contribution in the form of
reanalyzed statistically to find significant relationship. Data
which meets the researcher’s expectation are selectively
 Concept and design of the work
published and presented as original target of the study,
unexpected outcomes are left unpublished.  Work acquisition
 Analysis
Manipulation of data is non ethical, it has deleterious effect on  Interpretation of data
outcome of the study and scientific literature.  Drafting work critically

Authorship conflicts Any help received example

Intellectual contribution should be credited honestly. A  Contribution of funding

deserving author should not be omitted. Bigger and more  General administrative support
recognized names are generally used in the form of gift  Language editing
authorship. Gift authorship is granted as superior and  Proof reading.
recognized personalities in the field of specialty but the most
deserved one should be rewarded. If deserving author name is Also need to be acknowledged
left, in spite of his substantially intellectual contribution, this is
referred to as Ghost authorship. All others involved in research  Generally primary investigator is the 1st author or senior
should be mentioned under as acknowledgments. colleague e.g. Head of department. This should be
followed by other based on their contribution.
Listing the names  Sometimes honorary authorship includes gift authorship
and Ghost authorship.
 Authors should be listed by their degree of  Gift authorship is based on tenuous affiliation with a
involvement. study.
41214 International Journal of Current Research, Vol. 08, Issue, 11, pp.41212-41214, November, 2016

 Guest authorship includes names of senior renamed Das N. and Panjabi M. 2011. Plagiarism: Why is it such a big
person to increase the perceived status of publication. issue for medical writers? Perspect Clin Res., 2:67–71.
 If the decision on authorship is decided in the beginning Padmanabhan S. 2015. Who is an author? Rights and
of the project, chances of conflict would be less. righteousness. J Indian Orthod Soc., [serial online] [cited
2016 Jul 27]; 49:127-8.
REFERENCES Vinod Krishnan, 2013. Etiquette in scientific publishing. Am J
Orthod Dentofacial Orthop., Oct;144(4):577-82. doi:
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