Weekend reads: ‘Why Scientific Fraud is Suddenly Everywhere’; ‘misconduct, intimidation, alcohol abuse and theft’; ‘grimpact’

Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work?

The week at Retraction Watch featured:

• Journal taking ‘corrective actions’ after learning author used ChatGPT to update references
• A retraction milestone: 200 for one author
• ‘Lab shenanigans’: TikTok influencer faked data, feds say

Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up past 400. There are nearly 49,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains more than 250 titles. And have you seen our leaderboard of authors with the most retractions lately — or our list of top 10 most highly cited retracted papers? What about The Retraction Watch Mass Resignations List — or our list of nearly 100 papers with evidence they were written by ChatGPT?

Here’s what was happening elsewhere (some of these items may be paywalled, metered access, or require free registration to read):

• “Why Scientific Fraud Is Suddenly Everywhere.” Our Ivan Oransky speaks with New York magazine.
• “Devastating report: how archaeologist couple got away with misconduct, intimidation, alcohol abuse and theft.”
• “‘Grimpact’: psychological researchers should do more to prevent widespread harm.”
• A new preprint finds “compelling evidence of [Journal Impact Factor] JIF inflation for the two largest [article processing charge] APC publishers.”
• An expression of concern because “the reference list included in this article contains a number of articles that have been retracted.”
• “The emergence of intensified competitiveness, heightened publication pressures, and the context of a post-truth society have fostered an environment encouraging significant scientific misconduct.”
• ““The best home for this paper”: A qualitative study of how authors select where to submit manuscripts.”
• “A national effort is needed to change the culture around addressing research misconduct in the UK, according to a report by the UK Research Integrity Office.”
• “Pay researchers to spot errors in published papers.”
• “Given these factors, ORI’s ability to proactively identify or prevent research misconduct within the NIH-funded research portfolio is likely limited.”
• “We initially requested to retract this paper in February 2020, but the retraction was postponed due to an investigation by McMaster University.” Another retraction for Jonathan Pruitt.
• “Editors, Reviewers, Rag-Pickers, and Garbage-Handlers: Similar Challenges!”
• “AlphaFold3 — why did Nature publish it without its code?” An editorial following an outcry.
• “The GPTs that offer scholarly citations may eliminate the issue of hallucinated (fake) citations, but they pose other problems.”
• “The best peer review reports are at least 947 words.”
• In China, “Universities issue own rules to curb AI-assisted theses.”
• “Data integrity watchdogs call for stronger safeguards in scientific journals.”
• Scientist “will not seek to become next Dutch PM amid ethics probe.” And a story from 2020.
• “Wiley’s ‘fake science’ scandal is just the latest chapter in a broader crisis of trust universities must address.”
• “At the credit crossroads: Modern neuroscience needs a cultural shift to adopt new authorship practices.”
• “The Epidemiology of Errors in Data Capture, Management, and Analysis: A Scoping Review of Retracted Articles and Retraction Notices in Clinical and Translational Research.”
• “Analysis of the retraction papers in oncology field from Chinese scholars from 2013 to 2022.”
• “There’s an arms race in academic publishing between AI, fraud detectors and authorship brokers.”
• “Nicola Sturgeon’s favourite novel in plagiarism row that has rocked Scottish literary world.”
• “Physicists are grappling with their own reproducibility crisis.”
• “These Scientists Are Fighting the Epidemic of Fraudulent Research.”
• “How statistical challenges and misreadings of the literature combine to produce unreplicable science: An example from psychology.”
• “Get to know how ‘paper mills’ work: scientific article factories that operate like the cartels in  the movies.”
• “Hundreds of cancer papers mention cell lines that don’t seem to exist.” Earlier: Misspelled cell lines take on new lives.”
• “Protecting scientific integrity in an age of generative AI.”
• “AHCJ advocacy prompts NEJM Group to abandon ‘unfair’ credential policy.”
• “Why do people become whistleblowers?”
• Fazlul Sarkar, who tried to sue PubPeer commenters and eventually earned more than 40 retractions, has died.

Like Retraction Watch? You can make a tax-deductible contribution to support our work, subscribe to our free daily digest or paid weekly update, follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or add us to your RSS reader. If you find a retraction that’s not in The Retraction Watch Database, you can let us know here. For comments or feedback, email us at [email protected].