Qualified outsiders and maverick insiders are very often right about the need to replace received wisdom in science and society. This site exists to back the best of them in their uphill assault on the massively entrenched edifice of resistance to and prejudice against reviewing, let alone revising, ruling ideas. 
The crumbling ethics of scientists
Bad news today (Thu Jun 9) in Nature for those of us who like to believe that science is one of the last remaining bastions of resistance to lying, cheating and fraud, even if as we all know the professional pressures have risen to new heights with every decade that passes.
According to a Minnesota study of 3,200 young and mid-career US scientists three years ago, while few admitted to falsifying data, a third of them confessed to stealing credit, or changing the results of a study to suit a sponsor.
The lead author is Brian Martinson, a sociologist at the HealthPartners Research Foundation in Bloomington, and as he says the bad behavior amounts to more than “just a few bad apples”.
Apparently this comes as a shock to some, who haven’t yet cottoned on to the fact that that scientists are human, too, and when they have to compete for grants and sponsors and produce results they are going to behave just like other communities in business and in universities.
Possibly all the decent folk who have found this kind of ethical deterioration hard to imagine will finally realize that even science is capable of producing it Enrons and WorldComs, and look a little harder at fields such as AIDS where the science is unproven and the stakes very large.
What is equally surprising is that this is the first time such a study has been carried out. This surely reflects the high level of trust that has been accorded scientists up to this point. Or the naivete of the few sociologists who study them.
Or at least, the fact that those who are aware of the inside story of science have managed to keep it to themselves.
One-third of scientists admit to research violations
One-third of scientists admit to research violations
Maura Lerner, Star Tribune
June 9, 2005 BADSCIENCE0609
One-third of scientists admit to research violations
A third of the scientists in a nationwide survey admitted to violating some
of the bedrock rules of scientific research, according to a report by a team of Minnesota researchers.
The survey, of more than 3,200 U.S. scientists, found that hardly anyone
admitted to falsifying data outright.
But a surprising 33 percent confessed to other kinds of misconduct — such as claiming credit for someone else’s work, or changing results because of
pressure from a study’s sponsor.
The survey indicates that the misconduct involves more than a “few bad
apples,” said the lead author, Brian Martinson.
Martinson is a sociologist at the HealthPartners Research Foundation in
Bloomington.
“Our findings suggest that U.S. scientists engage in a range of behaviors
extending far beyond falsification, fabrication and plagiarism that can damage the integrity of science,” the authors report in today’s issue of the British journal Nature.
The researchers surveyed young and mid-career scientists throughout the
United States in 2002. They asked about a long list of questionable actions, from making up data to improper relationships with research subjects.
Among the findings: only three-tenths of 1 percent admitted to “falsifying or cooking research data.” Slightly more, 1.4 percent, said they had potentially
improper relationships with students or subjects. The survey did not define
improper, but researchers said it could include such things as hiring relatives or having an affair. A significant number –15 percent — said they had changed the design, methods or results of a study in response to pressure from a financial sponsor.
In addition, 7 percent admitted ignoring “minor” rules for protecting human subjects. And 6 percent said that they failed to report data that contradicted their previous work.
Martinson said this was the first survey of its kind, so it is not known
whether the conduct is growing more common.
If anything, he said, the survey probably underestimates the misconduct,
because some scientists may have feared discovery if they admitted their actions.
The survey also suggested that younger scientists (average age 35) were less likely to admit to most types of misconduct than their colleagues in
mid-career (average age 44).
Scientists, Martinson said, are “one of the hardest-working groups of people that I know.” But he said there may be something about their working environment — the mountains of rules, the pressure to compete for grants and to produce results — that leads them to compromise their ethics.
“A lot of other professions engage in a lot of misbehavior — look around at
corporate America,” he said. “There’s been this kind of idea that scientists
… are super-humans or something, that they’re immune from these kinds of
pressure. But scientists are human.”
The survey results came as a surprise to R. Timothy Mulcahy, vice president for research at the University of Minnesota. He called it “a very important study,” but said that some of the categories of misconduct may not be as black or white as they seem.
“I think there are a lot of gray zones,” he said. Scientists may not always
realize they’re crossing a line, he said, and universities should do a better
job training them in research ethics.
A top official with the Association of American Medical Colleges, which
represents major research institutions, declined to comment on the findings, saying she hadn’t had time to study them.
But Susan Ehringhaus, the group’s associate general counsel in Washington, D.C., praised the researchers for raising the issues. “Of course, it’s a matter that should be taken seriously,” she said. “I am glad to see the questions engaged, and look forward to the debate that I’m sure that they will produce.”
The survey was conducted jointly by Martinson and two researchers from the University of Minnesota, Melissa Anderson, an associate professor of higher education, and Prof. Raymond de Vries of the university’s Center for Bioethics.