Because of a number of heated exchanges in the comments over the past few weeks here at Retraction Watch — mostly in response to our coverage of the shutdown of the Science Fraud site — we’ve added this to our FAQ: We are huge fans of Retraction Watch commenters. They broaden our posts, send us … Continue reading A word about the Retraction Watch comments policy
Earlier this week, we reported on retractions six and seven , in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, for Lawrence Sanna, the former University of Michigan psychologist who resigned last May after questions were raised about his work. Retraction eight has now appeared, also in the JESP. Here’s the notice for “When thoughts don’t feel … Continue reading Retraction eight appears for social psychologist Lawrence Sanna
Diederik Stapel has another retraction, his 32nd. Here’s the notice, for “”Information to go: Fluency enhances the usability of primed information,” which first appeared in 2010 in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology:
Nature published an interesting piece yesterday, titled “Rehab’ helps errant researchers return to the lab.” Excerpt: With the rapid growth of misconduct cases, some scientists are worried that preventative training in research ethics might not be enough. Nor will it be possible simply to dismiss all violators from science. Scientific rehabilitation, they say, will have … Continue reading Can we — or should we — rehabilitate scientists who commit misconduct?
Last week was a busy one at the U.S. Office of Research Integrity (ORI), at least judging by how many cases they posted. There were sanctions against researchers at Ohio State, Texas Tech, and the Gladstone Institutes, as we reported. And it turns out there was another case closed, of a former Harvard dental school … Continue reading Former Harvard dental school researcher committed misconduct: ORI
Milena Penkowa, the former University of Copenhagen scientist found by her university to have embezzled grant funds and to have possibly committed misconduct in 15 papers, has another retraction. An international panel released its findings in July, as Nature reported then:
We’ve learned a lot about retractions in 2012, from the fact that most retractions are due to misconduct to the effects they can have on funding. We’ve seen eyebrow-raising reasons for retractions, from a hack of Elsevier’s peer review system to a researcher peer reviewing his own papers, to massive fraud in psychology to a … Continue reading How many retractions were there in 2012? And, some shattered records
An accounting professor at a Boston-area college has resigned a month after publishing a retraction that has sparked extensive discussion on Retraction Watch. The Boston Globe reported late last week that James E. Hunton will leave Bentley University on December 31, with a spokesperson telling the paper he was leaving for “family and health reasons.” Hunton … Continue reading Accounting professor resigns following retraction
The Journal of the American College of Cardiology, or JACC, has issued expressions of concern for three papers by Don Poldermans, the Dutch cardiologist who was fired earlier this year amid allegations of misconduct. Cardiobrief’s Larry Husten had the story first. The, um, heart of the matter is that neither the investigators at Erasmus Medical … Continue reading Concern — in triplicate — arrives for Poldermans papers
As Retraction Watch readers know, we cover Elsevier’s journals frequently, including a story just last week about their peer review system being hacked. And they’ve written about us, too. So we’re pleased to present a guest post by Elsevier’s Linda Lavelle, General Counsel-North America, about the publisher’s take on plagiarism and other unethical behavior — … Continue reading How is Elsevier promoting ethical publishing? A guest post