How do Chinese universities address research integrity and misconduct? A review of university documents

Abstract

Background: Scientific researchers are expected to follow the professional norms in their own domain. With a growing number of scientific publications retracted and research misconduct cases revealed in recent years, Chinese biomedical research integrity is questioned. As institutions educating and training future researchers, universities and the guidance they provide are important for the research quality and integrity of the country. Therefore, through a review of the guidance and policy documents on research integrity in Chinese universities, this work aims to investigate how the professional norms are specified in these documents. Methods: After a stratified sampling, 53 universities were selected. Their guidance and policy documents on research integrity were collected via a web search of their official websites. The search was confirmed by these universities. Then the content of all the collected documents were analyzed using inductive content analysis. Results: 118 active university documents were collected and analyzed. Most of the Chinese universities we investigated had their own guidance or policy on research integrity. They listed principles or examples of desired and undesired academic practices, investigation procedures and punishments of academic misconduct, and put forward measures to promote research integrity. Differences on specific practices and principles were observed between university groups and with European university documents. Conclusion: Despite the discrepancy they have, all these documents were designed to promote research integrity and cultivate a good research environment in Chinese biomedical domain. Nevertheless, there is still room for improvement, for example, through more consultation of international guidance. K E Y W O R D S academic misconduct, academic morality, China, research integrity, research misconduct, university guidance [Correction added on 28 May 2019, after first online publication: The corresponding author has been updated in this current version.] | 65 YI et al.

A study on the content of integrity policies and research integrity management in Chinese universities

“…Reconsideration period 1 15 working days (1) national policies. Inappropriate authorship, ghostwriting, multiple contribution, repetitive publication and published in different languages were specified in detail in a few universities, consistent with other study (Yi et al, 2019). Abuses, such as abuse of academic reputation, abuse of academic power, disclosure of academic secrets, and misuse of research resources, are not readily identifiable in many universities.…”

“…Most colleges and universities in China have promulgated policies to clarify the content and requirements of RI. They have set up a management or advisory office to carry out the specific management work of RI and to formulate norms and systems (Yi et al, 2019). Therefore, in this study, we took the top 50 universities in China, as ranked by the 2021 Best Chinese Universities Ranking (Ranking, 2021), as the research sample.…”

“…Most Chinese universities have their own guidelines focusing on RI (Yi et al, 2019). Previous studies have discussed the differences of specific practices and principles between university groups by comparing them with documents from European universities (Yi et al, 2019) to determine how professional norms are specified in guidance and policy documents on RI in China. The issue of questionable research practices (QRPs) in China has also been investigated (Chi, 2015).…”

Glitches and hitches: sessional academic staff viewpoints on academic integrity and academic misconduct

“…This ensures that other areas of the institution are cognizant of the breach and assists in facilitating a uniform approach to implementing academic integrity policy across the academic community. A recent investigation into the handling of academic integrity infractions in China (Yi et al, 2019) revealed that Chinese institutions are starting to take the phenomenon seriously. The study found that punishments included academic sanctions, such as the retraction of awards or cancellation of funding, institution-imposed sanctions that could include demotions or dismissals and even referral to the Communist Party for consideration of further punitive actions.…”

Estimating the prevalence of text overlap in biomedical conference abstracts

“…Although reliable dissemination of research is critical to the advancement of knowledge, the past 3 to 4 decades have witnessed growing concerns over the integrity of the scientific and scholarly record. In response, governments [ 1 – 4 ] and research institutions across the world [ 5 , 6 ] have developed guidance for avoiding ethically questionable practices and, especially, the more serious forms of research misconduct.…”