When a former Stanford psychology researcher lost her fifth paper last year due to unreliable results, one researcher took particular notice: Martha Alibali at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Why? She had reviewed the 2006 paper, and took to social media to express her dismay at the result of the time and effort she spent on … Continue reading “My time and energy were stolen:” Peer reviewer reacts to retraction
On December 15, we removed a post from view as a result of a law that some have misused to have content removed from the web. Today, we have reinstated that post. Here’s what the post about, if you’re curious:
A researcher in Brazil is taking responsibility for accidentally mixing up images in three papers in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The corresponding author on the three papers told us the mistake happened because the studies were conducted simultaneously, and relied on one computer. There’s a side note to these retractions: The co-author list on … Continue reading Researcher logs three retractions for image duplications — two of which with familiar co-authors
“Retractions are part and parcel of academic and scientific publication. Court ordered retractions are not.” So ends a judge’s September 30, 2016 opinion dismissing a case brought in 2014 by Andrew Mallon, a former Brown University postdoc, alleging that his advisor and former business partner, John Marshall, had published a paper in 2013 in PLOS Biology that should … Continue reading Judge tosses case, saying that court-ordered retractions are not part of scientific publication
A former postdoctoral researcher at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York has received a five-year funding ban after an investigation concluded that they had falsified data underlying more than 50 images. According to a report released today by the Office of Research Integrity (ORI), Zhiyu Li falsified
A journal is reviewing a paper about trends in rape at U.S. colleges after the author realized a mistake. Although the journal Violence and Gender hasn’t issued any editorial notice about the paper, Inside Higher Ed published a correction July 14 to its original news story about the topic. “Dangerous Colleges: Associations Between School-Level Factors and the Risk … Continue reading Journal taking second look at paper on campus rape
The week at Retraction Watch featured an imposter editor and an author who threatened to sue a journal if it didn’t reverse a retraction. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
An article has been retracted from a proceedings of an economics conference after the publisher identified errors in several parts of the study. The retraction follows criticism from a Romanian blogger, who contacted the journal about several issues, and posted communications she received about the paper, “Sustainability of Social Enterprises: A Discourse Analysis.” It was part … Continue reading Economics paper retracted due to “extensive changes”
A chemist is suing the University of Texas a second time in an effort to keep the PhD she earned in 2008. In 2014, school officials revoked Suvi Orr‘s degree after finding it was based, in part, on falsified data. Some of the data were also included in a paper in Organic Letters that was retracted in 2011 after some steps … Continue reading Chemist sues University of Texas (again) to keep PhD
A correction to a 2011 paper doesn’t change its main conclusion: Hearing song lyrics about violence — “let the bodies hit the floor,” for example — can prompt aggressive behavior, even more so than violent imagery in music videos. The correction follows an investigation by Macquarie University that found errors in data analysis to be an “honest … Continue reading Violent songs can lead to spicy food, and other lessons we learned from corrected graphic