The Cape Town Statement on fairness, equity and diversity in research

Abstract

s awareness has grown about fraud and misconduct in science, the World Conferences on Research Integrity have become a leading forum for the discussion and study of ways to promote responsible behaviour in research. Since the first meeting in 2007, which was held in Lisbon, the events have helped to establish an academic field focused on research integrity.Meetings have typically concentrated on issues such as research misconduct, responsible behaviour around data collection, analysis, authorship and publication, and the importance of reproducibility. But last May, attendees to the 7th World Conference on Research Integrity, held in Cape Town, South Africa, took a significant step. They added the myriad ways in which research programmes and practices disadvantage those living in lowand middle-income countries (LMICs) to the suite of issues that threaten the integrity of science.Three of the six previous world conferences have led to the publication of guidelines or principles. We are part of a working group (including bioethicists, researchers, institutional leaders and journal editors) that now presents the Cape Town Statement on The benefits of scientific collaboration are too often skewed towards wealthier countries. Bioethicists and others present guidance on how stakeholders such as researchers can change this.

Aligning the principles and practice of research integrity and research fairness in global health: a mixed-methods study

“… 33 Given that both integrity and fairness share not only determinants leading to these practices but also a goal of increasing both research quality and the societal benefits of research, there is ample scope to make such synergies explicit and to align both agendas in international research collaborations, as has been advocated by the recently published Cape Town Statement on research integrity. 2 …”

“…Global health decisions are often made remotely, without consideration for the people they affect. 1 Ideally, the conduct of global health research should straddle the twin ideals of research integrity and research fairness 2 and should follow practices that guarantee the validity and trustworthiness of science. 3 It should also aim to transcend the ‘distance’ between research teams and researched populations that currently characterises the study of global health problems.…”

A model of the interrelationship between research ethics and research integrity

“…It may be best to understand research integrity concerning researchers’ actions and behaviours that conform to the highest standards of professionalism and rigour when conducting research in ethically robust ways (Hiney, 2015 ). The use of meaning-loaded words, such as professionalism, rigour, and robustness, to describe integrity creates space for researchers, policymakers, and the public to develop principles of integrity, as is evident in diverse documents (e.g., the Cape Town Statement of Fairness, Equity, and diversity in Research (Horn et al, 2023 ), the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (ALLEA, 2023 ), and the Global Research Council’s ( 2022 ) Statement of Principles and Practices for Research Ethics, Integrity, and Culture in the Context of Rapid-Results Research).…”

Strategies and a checklist for increasing diversity, equity and inclusion in your journal

“…Yet as human beings, we are prone to numerous cognitive biases that interfere with our objectivity. Recent years have brought renewed interest in ensuring that scientific research is conducted and evaluated equitably, especially in the light of widespread and chronic underrepresentation of women and racial, ethnic, and other historically underrepresented, underserved groups in science (Horn et al, 2023; Sandi & Carey, 2021; Smith et al, 2023). As a group of neuroscientists and representatives of the European Journal of Neuroscience ( EJN ) and its publisher (Wiley), here, we focus on one key step in the dissemination and communication of scientific findings: scholarly publishing.…”