APA's Perspective on Naughty Science

1. APA's Perspective on Naughty Science Gerald P. Koocher, PhD, ABPP Dean, School of Health Sciences Simmons College www.ethicsresearch.com August 8, 2008

2. Beyond FFP& DDD • Falsification • Fabrication • Plagiarism • Deception • Dehoaxing • Desensitization

3. FF&P: • Fabrication/Falsification: Inventing data that were never actually collected; altering data that were collected; faking records; unjustifiable data removal or treatment of outlying data points. • Plagiarism: The substantial copying of another's work without appropriate attribution; misappropriation of intellectual property)

4. Stupidity & Bad habits • Incompetence: Examples include: poor research design, methodology, or statistical procedure; inappropriate selection or use of a study technique due to insufficient skills or training. • Careless work habits: Examples include: sloppy record-keeping; haphazard data collection; cutting corners; inadequate monitoring of the project's progress.

5. Intentional bias: Examples include: rigging a sample to maximize support for hypotheses; withholding methodology details; deceptive or misleading reporting of data or its interpretation.

6. Questionable publication practices/authorship: Examples include: publishing a paper or parts of the same study in different publication outlets without informing the readers; undeserved "gift" authorships; coerced authorship; omitting someone who deserved an authorship or other form of credit.

7. Inadequate supervision of research assistants. Examples include: giving assistants more responsibility than they are able or willing to handle, insufficient supervision of assistants' work.

8. Failure to follow the regulations of science. Examples include: sidestepping or ignoring the IRB or its directives; circumventing or ignoring human participant requirements with regarding informed consent, confidentiality, or risk assessment; inadequate care of research animals; violating federal research policy.

9. Contributing to difficult or stressful work environments that could adversely influence research process. • Examples: mistreatment or disrespectful treatment of subordinates; sexual harassment or other form of exploitation; playing favorites and other factors that create poor morale or acting out by subordinates; conflicts with the administration or administrative policies.

10. A dishonest act indirectly related to researcher role. Examples include: unreported conflicts, such as a financial interest in the outcome of an experiment; misuse or misappropriation of grant funds; inflating, distorting, or including bogus accomplishments on a resume.

11. Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct (Section 8.01-8.15) • Comply with local approval. • Get informed consent. • Get special consent if recording. • Take responsibility for participants’ welfare. • Dispense with consent only under special circumstances. • Take care in using inducements for participation. • Using deception in research requires special considerations.

12. Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct (Section 8.01-8.15) • Assign publication credit fairly and accurately • Do not publish duplicate data without full disclosure. • Share data for verification under some circumstances. • Respect confidentiality as a reviewer • Provide opportunity for debriefing, but reduce or minimize harm. • Treat animals humanely • Reporting results: • Don’t Fabricate • Correct errors for the public • Don’t Plagiarize

13. Thank You Gerald P. Koocher, PhD, ABPP Dean, School of Health Sciences Simmons College www.ethicsresearch.com