Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance最新文献

{"title":"A study on ethical review processes of local ethics committees for animal experimentation in Türkiye.","authors":"Burcu Erdoğan Boz, R Tamay Başağaç Gül","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2025.2487502","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/08989621.2025.2487502","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>In Türkiye, as in other countries, ethical committee approval is mandatory for all animal experimentation. While legal regulations provide a framework for these committees, they often lack specific guidance for studies conducted outside of laboratory settings or involving non-laboratory animals. This deficiency, coupled with variations in committee composition and insufficient expertise among members, frequently results in inconsistent evaluations of similar research proposals.</p><p><strong>Objective: </strong>This study aims to investigate inconsistencies in ethical evaluations of animal research proposals by local ethics committees for animal experimentation and identify weaknesses in the current approval process.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>To assess the issue, five hypothetical projects-involving Merino sheep, Ankara goats, Hatay mountain gazelles, domestic cats, and animal tissues-were submitted to 37 randomly selected ethics committees. The feedback received was analysed to identify inconsistencies and areas of weakness.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>The analysis revealed significant challenges in the evaluation of projects requiring project-based approval, those involving regulated procedures, wild species, multi-center studies, and animal tissues. Many committees demonstrated an inadequate understanding of relevant legislation, species-specific considerations, and procedures performed outside laboratories.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>This lack of standardization and carelessness in evaluations underscore the urgent need for enhanced training and more stringent guidelines for ethics committee members. The article concludes with proposed solutions aimed at standardizing project evaluation processes and improving the consistency and quality of ethical review.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"1-14"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143797017","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Spin in randomized controlled trials of pharmacology in COVID-19: A systematic review.","authors":"Yunkyoung Oh, Youn-Joo Jung, Purja Sujata, Minji Kim, Dong Keon Yon, Seung Won Lee, Kyuyeon Cho, Ai Koyanagi, Zhaoli Dai, Lee Smith, Jae Il Shin, Eunyoung Kim","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2269083","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2269083","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Spin, defined as the misrepresentation of the results of a study, could negate the validity of scientific findings. To explore the manifestation of spin, and identify the factors affecting spin in COVID-19 RCTs, a systematic review was performed from PubMed/Medline, National Institutes of Health, EMBASE, Cochrane, and Web of Science. RCTs on pharmacotherapy for COVID-19 with nonsignificant primary outcomes published in 2020 were included. 21 abstracts (33.9%) and 28 main texts (45.2%) were found to contain spin in at least one section. In the conclusion section, other spin strategies beautifying their findings that were not included in the abstract were found in the main texts. More factors influencing the level of spin were found in abstracts than in the main texts, but most of the levels of spin in abstracts were comparable to those in the main texts. Although common factors that affected the manifestation of spin in the main texts and abstracts were the sample size and type of journal, further research to determine multicollinearity between significant factors and the manifestation of spin is required.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"214-232"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41219414","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Governance of research and product improvement studies in consumer mental health apps. Interviews with researchers and app developers.","authors":"Kamiel Verbeke, Charu Jain, Ambra Shpendi, Pascal Borry","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2281548","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2281548","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Consumer mental health apps (MHAs) collect and generate mental health-related data on their users, which can be leveraged for research and product improvement studies. Such studies are associated with ethical issues that may be difficult for researchers and app developers to assess. To improve ethical study conduct, governance through rules, agreements and customs could be relied upon, but their translation into practice is subject to barriers. This qualitative interview study with 17 researchers and app developers looked into the role and impact of governance standards on consumer MHA studies. Interviewees experienced a significant number of rules, agreements and customs, although not all of the governance standards that can potentially be applicable. Standards did have an impact on the interests of researchers and app developers, app users and society, but this impact was mediated by several barriers related to their conceptualization and implementation. Conceptualization barriers impacted the development of a standard, the inclusion of relevant concepts and the coordination between standards. Implementation barriers concerned the resource cost of understanding a standard, as well as suboptimal enforcement. The framework developed in this study can support more effective efforts to improve the governance of future consumer MHA studies.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"341-368"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71523307","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Developing faculty research mentors: Influence of experience with diverse mentees, gender, and mentorship training.","authors":"Louie C Alexander, Elise Demeter, Katherine Hall-Hertel, Lisa M Rasmussen","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2280234","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2280234","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Effective mentoring is crucial for early-career researchers, and formal mentor training programs have demonstrated benefits for participating faculty. To determine how mentor training generalizes to different contexts and populations, we delivered mentor training and evaluated its impact on faculty's self-perceived mentoring skills. We also assessed whether mentor experience with diverse mentee populations or mentor gender influences mentors' self-perceived skills and if training interacted with these self-perceptions. We found mentors with more experience with diverse mentees were more likely to rate their mentoring skills higher than mentors with less experience across most areas assessed. Women rated themselves more highly than men at addressing diversity within the mentoring relationship. Mentors with less experience with diverse mentees gained the most training-related benefits in fostering independence skills. Training improved faculty self-perceived mentoring skills in all areas assessed. These results suggest while mentor training can benefit all involved, it can be especially useful for those newer to mentoring.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"318-340"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89720360","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Transparency in research: An analysis of ChatGPT usage acknowledgment by authors across disciplines and geographies.","authors":"Raghu Raman","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2273377","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2273377","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This investigation systematically reviews the recognition of generative AI tools, particularly ChatGPT, in scholarly literature. Utilizing 1,226 publications from the Dimensions database, ranging from November 2022 to July 2023, the research scrutinizes temporal trends and distribution across disciplines and regions. U.S.-based authors lead in acknowledgments, with notable contributions from China and India. Predominantly, Biomedical and Clinical Sciences, as well as Information and Computing Sciences, are engaging with these AI tools. Publications like \"The Lancet Digital Health\" and platforms such as \"bioRxiv\" are recurrent venues for such acknowledgments, highlighting AI's growing impact on research dissemination. The analysis is confined to the Dimensions database, thus potentially overlooking other sources and grey literature. Additionally, the study abstains from examining the acknowledgments' quality or ethical considerations. Findings are beneficial for stakeholders, providing a basis for policy and scholarly discourse on ethical AI use in academia. This study represents the inaugural comprehensive empirical assessment of AI acknowledgment patterns in academic contexts, addressing a previously unexplored aspect of scholarly communication.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"277-298"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"50159208","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Scientific misconduct: A cross-sectional study of the perceptions, attitudes and experiences of Spanish researchers.","authors":"Cristina Candal-Pedreira, Ali Ghaddar, Mónica Pérez-Ríos, Leonor Varela-Lema, Carlos Álvarez-Dardet, Alberto Ruano-Ravina","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2284965","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2284965","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This study sought to identify the perceptions, attitudes and experiences of Spanish researchers regarding different aspects relating to scientific misconduct, both overall and by gender, years of research experience, and type of research institution. This is a cross-sectional study based on an anonymous online survey, targeting researchers in the field of biomedicine. The survey comprised a first block (13 questions) covering sociodemographic data, and a second block (14 questions) covering researchers' perceptions, attitudes and experiences. A descriptive analysis was performed. 403 researchers answered the survey: 51.1% (<i>n</i> = 205) women, median age 45 years. The observed frequency of scientific misconduct was 78.8%. Additionally, 43.3% of researchers acknowledged having intentionally engaged in some type of scientific misconduct (self-reported frequency). The most frequent type of scientific misconduct was false authorship. The most frequent types of both observed and self-reported scientific misconduct did not appear to differ by years of experience but did differ by gender and type of research institution. In conclusion, there is a high frequency of scientific misconduct among Spanish biomedical science researchers as 4 of 10 researchers recognized that took part in any type of scientific misconduct. There are differences between the most frequent types of misconduct according to different characteristics, mainly type of institution.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"393-416"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138300563","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Safeguarding scientific integrity: A case study in examining manipulation in the peer review process.","authors":"Leslie D McIntosh, Cynthia Hudson Vitale","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2292043","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2292043","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This case study analyzes the expertise, potential conflicts of interest, and objectivity of editors, authors, and peer reviewers involved in a 2022 special journal issue on fertility, pregnancy, and mental health. Data were collected on qualifications, organizational affiliations, and relationships among six papers' authors, three guest editors, and twelve peer reviewers. Two articles were found to have undisclosed conflicts of interest between authors, an editor, and multiple peer reviewers affiliated with anti-abortion advocacy and lobbying groups, indicating compromised objectivity. This lack of transparency undermines the peer review process and enables biased research and disinformation proliferation.Our study is limited by a few factors including: difficulty collecting peer reviewer data, potentially missing affiliations, and a small sample without comparisons. While this is a case study of one special issue, we do have suggestions for increasing integrity.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"195-213"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138813093","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Article retraction rates in selected MeSH term categories in PubMed published between 2010 and 2020.","authors":"Robert Alexander, Christopher J Peterson, Shengping Yang, Kenneth Nugent","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2272246","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2272246","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Academic article retractions occur across all disciplines, though few studies have examined the association between research topics and retraction rates.</p><p><strong>Objectives: </strong>We assessed and compared the rate of retraction across several important clinical research topics.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>Information about the number of publications, the number of retractions, the retraction rate, and the time to retraction was collected for articles identified by 15 Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) terms. These articles were published between 1 January 2010 and 31 December 2020. The searches took place between 18 September 2021 and 24 October 2021. The MeSH terms were selected based on our clinical experience with the expectation that there will be multiple publications during the timeframe to use for the searches. Additional topics were selected based on the frequency of controversy in the public media and were identified by the Altmetric Top 100 report.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>The mean number of publications for all categories was 181,975 ± 332,245; the median number of publications was 67,991 [Q1, Q3; 31951.5, 138,981.5]. The mean number of retractions was 100.3 ± 251.3, and the median number of retractions was 22 [Q1, Q3; 6.5, 53]. The mean time to retraction ranged from 114 days to 1,409.5 days; the median was 857.3 days [Q1, Q3; 684.7, 1098.6], depending on the topic. The various MeSH term categories used in this study had significant differences in retraction rate and time to retraction. The \"Neoplasms\" category had the highest total number of retractions (993) and one of the highest retraction rates (75.4 per 100,000 publications).</p><p><strong>Discussion: </strong>All PubMed categories analyzed in this study had retracted articles. The median time to retraction was 857 days. The long delays in some categories could contribute to potentially misleading information which might have adverse effects on clinical decisions in patient care and on research design.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>Rate of retraction varies across research topics and further studies are needed to explore this relationship.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"263-276"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49684573","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Do authors need an Ombudsperson to resolve peer-review issues?","authors":"Clovis Mariano Faggion","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2265302","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2265302","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"441-442"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41171687","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Factors related to the severity of research misconduct administrative actions: An analysis of office of research integrity case summaries from 1993 to 2023.","authors":"Brandon Long, Savannah Laux, Benjamin Lemon, Alexa Guarente, Mark Davis, Arturo Casadevall, Ferric Fang, Min Shi, David B Resnik","doi":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2287046","DOIUrl":"10.1080/08989621.2023.2287046","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>We extracted, coded, and analyzed data from 343 Office of Research Integrity (ORI) case summaries published in the <i>Federal Register</i> and other venues from May 1993 to July 2023 to test hypotheses concerning the relationship between the severity of ORI administrative actions and various demographic and institutional factors. We found that factors indicative of the severity of the respondent's misconduct or a pattern of misbehavior were associated with the severity of ORI administrative actions. Being required by ORI to retract or correct publications and aggravating factors, such as interfering with an investigation, were both positively associated with receiving a funding debarment and with receiving an administrative action longer than three years. Admitting one's guilt and being found to have committed plagiarism (only) were negatively associated with receiving a funding debarment but were neither positively nor negatively associated with receiving an administrative action longer than three years. Other factors, such as the respondent's race/ethnicity, gender, academic position, administrative position, or their institution's NIH funding level or extramural vs. intramural or foreign vs. US status, were neither positively nor negatively associated with the severity of administrative actions. Overall, our findings suggest that ORI has acted fairly when imposing administrative actions on respondents and has followed DHHS guidelines.</p>","PeriodicalId":50927,"journal":{"name":"Accountability in Research-Policies and Quality Assurance","volume":" ","pages":"417-438"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11128533/pdf/","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138446929","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}