Search Results for: Euphemism

Weekend reads: More allegations at Harvard; plagiarism euphemisms; citation cartels in math

Would you consider a donation to support Weekend Reads, and our daily work? The week at Retraction Watch featured: Our list of retracted or withdrawn COVID-19 papers is up to nearly 400. There are more than 46,000 retractions in The Retraction Watch Database — which is now part of Crossref. The Retraction Watch Hijacked Journal Checker now contains well over 200 titles. And … Continue reading Weekend reads: More allegations at Harvard; plagiarism euphemisms; citation cartels in math

Weekend reads: A new plagiarism euphemism; how Photoshop abuse destroys science; bias against women authors

The week at Retraction Watch featured a look at what happens to authors when a journal is delisted, a reminder of how hard it is to figure out whether a paper has been retracted, and a survey on how common plagiarism is in economics. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:

Caught Our Notice: Is “miscommunication of the rejection” the new euphemism for “paper accepted”?

When Retraction Watch began in 2010, our co-founders Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus quickly realized they couldn’t keep up with the hundreds of retractions that appeared each year.  And the problem has only gotten worse — although we’ve added staff, the number of retractions issued each year has increased dramatically. According to our growing database, more than 1,300 … Continue reading Caught Our Notice: Is “miscommunication of the rejection” the new euphemism for “paper accepted”?

A unicorn: Journal publishes euphemism-free plagiarism notice

It’s always nice when a journal editor actually uses words the way they’re meant to be used instead of employing euphemisms. In 2009, the African Journal of Biomedical Research published an article on the differences in heart rates when people ran backwards versus forwards. Unfortunately, five years later, the journal found out the paper was a … Continue reading A unicorn: Journal publishes euphemism-free plagiarism notice

New favorite plagiarism euphemism: “Inadvertently copied text”

Plagiarism earned genomics researchers an erratum, not a retraction, in BioMed Central journal BioData Mining. We keep a list of best euphemisms for plagiarism, and this one is right up there. Here’s the notice for “An iteration normalization and test method for differential expression analysis of RNA-seq data”:

Mistaken punctuation, misreferencing, and other euphemisms for plagiarism

It’s always amusing to see how far a journal will bend over backward to avoid coming out and calling something “plagiarism.” We’ve got two notices for you that exemplify the phenomenon, which we discussed in our Lab Times column last year. The first, an article about apartheid, was presented at a student conference and published in the Polyvocia: … Continue reading Mistaken punctuation, misreferencing, and other euphemisms for plagiarism

P values: Scientific journals’ top ten plagiarism euphemisms

The other day, we nominated a phrase in a retraction notice for the prize “of most-extra-syllables-used-to-say-the-word-plagiarism” because a journal decided to call the act “inclusion of significant passages of unattributed material from other authors.” That lovely phrase can now be added to our list of best euphemisms for plagiarism, which we highlight in our most … Continue reading P values: Scientific journals’ top ten plagiarism euphemisms

A new plagiarism euphemism: “language from already published sources without using proper citation methods”

A recent issue of Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology (CREST) adds a new euphemism for plagiarism to our rapidly growing list. There are two retractions in the issue of the Taylor & Francis journal. One is for “Remediation of Heavy Metal Contaminated Soils: An Overview of Site Remediation Techniques,” by a group from … Continue reading A new plagiarism euphemism: “language from already published sources without using proper citation methods”

Copy and euphemize: When ‘an honor mistake’ means plagiarism

Readers who have been with us for the long haul may remember we used to collect a catalog of our favorite euphemisms for plagiarism. That list died with the demise of Lab Times, for which we used to write a regular column (although we did write this piece a bit later) – but the magazine’s … Continue reading Copy and euphemize: When ‘an honor mistake’ means plagiarism

‘This has been a nightmare’: One paper was retracted. The other still lingers.

On a Saturday last November, Philip Tsichlis of The Ohio State University received an email no researcher wants to get.  Another scientist had tried to replicate a finding in a recent paper of his, and couldn’t. “We believe that our results should lead to some revision of the model you propose,” stated the email, which … Continue reading ‘This has been a nightmare’: One paper was retracted. The other still lingers.