You are Here

Academic integrity

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Academic integrity is devotion to academic setting where display of honesty and trustworthy in behavior are crucial fundamentals. This definition is mostly associated with universities since giving credit to other people’s ideas are in the nature of academic research. In summary, the contributions of other people must be assigned. Otherwise, avoiding such acknowledgement is considered plagiarism1.

The International Center for Academic Integrity (ICAI) proposed six fundamental values in academic integrity, which are ‟honesty, trust, fairness, respect, responsibility, and courage.” With these values, research and education results in an ethical environment in science2.

 

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]What are the various types of academic dishonesty?

Plagiarism

Adopting ideas, results, and methods of other people without providing any credit are considered to be plagiarism3.

In other words, do not use someone else’s words or data, or your own, that have already been published elsewhere. If you need to use them, always cite the appropriate sources that you have properly used. While writing a scientific paper, it happens that you use the words of another author or your own words from a published paper or book. In this case, you should put it in quotation marks and show where the words came from4. For example,

  • “Such Ni NP based catalysis under mild reaction conditions represents a promising step toward the practical development of the AB complex as a feasible hydrogen storage medium for fuel cell applications” (Metin et al. 2010)5.

Even if you paraphrase the sentence to indicate an idea previously published by someone else or by you, you should still cite the appropriate source. For example,

  • Metin and co-workers reported the usage of ammonium borane (AB) as a hydrogen storage media with the help of Ni NPs that they developed (Metin et al. 2010) 5.

 

Cheating

In academic activities such as writing and research article, an unapproved use or copy of any information, data or material are considered to be cheating. For example, copying someone else’s homework, exam answers, lab reports, dissertations, text or figure from the journal papers or from anywhere else including internet sources is cheating. Allowing this situation while happening is also contribution to cheating6.

Fabrication

Producing data or experimental results at a desk are examples of fabrication in academic setting. In other words, do not report any experimental data without doing experiment. This is called as the data fabrication, which is one of the most significant research misconducts reducing public trust in science. Keep in your mind that many academic careers have ended up with frustration, even years after the fabrication first took place7.

Falsification

Falsifying, modifying, and altering the research data that you obtained in the lab. This is named as falsification in the research integrity, which is defined as the manipulation of research data, materials by changing or omitting them without justification8.

Making mistakes is in the nature of an academic study. For this reason, instead of presenting wrong data in an academic study where you realize that you made a mistake, it is necessary to accept the error and correct the error properly.

Duplicate submission

University of Manitoba (UM) describe duplicate submission as, “cheating where a student submits a paper, assignment or test in full or in part, for more than one course without the permission of the course instructor”9. Scientific reports require original data and figures that have not published in previous works are done by the same author.

In UM, duplication examples are clearly described as “re-submitting text or data without proper citation, re-submitting the same lab or assignment for another class that has been marked and graded or submitting an old paper”9.

Besides, self-plagiarism, copying yourself are also synonyms of duplication.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]Additional information to academic integrity,

  • Do not manipulate authorship or neglect the role of other researchers in publications10.
  • Do not exaggerate the bibliography of a work, often by citing your own published publications11.
  • Do not engage in scientifically unethical behavior that would allow others to devalue your academic work and achievements with honesty and diligence. Do not hesitate to report academic misconduct that you observe in the academic work of others in a proper way12.

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]References

  1. https://writingcenter.unc.edu/esl/resources/academic-integrity/ (04.07.2021).
  2. International Center for Academic Integrity [ICAI]. (2021). The Fundamental Values of Academic Integrity. (3rd ed.). academicintegrity.org/the-fundamental-valuesof-academic-integrity (04.07.2021).
  3. https://aggiehonor.tamu.edu/Rules-and-Procedures/Rules/Honor-System-Rules#Definitions (04.07.2021).
  4. The European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity (Revised Edition, 3rd), 2017.All European Academies, Berlin, Germany. https://www.allea.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/ALLEA-European-Code-of-Conduct-for-Research-Integrity-2017.pdf (05.07.2021).
  5. Metin, O., Mazumder, V., Ozkar, S., Sun, S., 2010. Monodisperse Nickel Nanoparticles and Their Catalysis in Hydrolytic Dehydrogenation of Ammonia Borane, J. AM. CHEM. SOC., 132, 1468–1469.
  6. https://www.niu.edu/academic-integrity/faculty/types/index.shtml (04.07.2021).
  7. https://www.odu.edu/content/dam/odu/offices/student-conduct-academic-integrity/docs/ai-class-handout-1.pdf (04.07.2021).
  8. https://www.e-education.psu.edu/bioet533/node/654 (04.07.2021).
  9. https://umanitoba.ca/student-supports/academic-supports/academic-integrity (04.07.2021).
  10. https://www.northwestern.edu/provost/policies/academic-integrity/cardinal-rules.html (05.07.2021).
  11. https://learningcommons.ubc.ca/the-golden-rules-of-academic-integrity/ (05.07.2021).
  12. https://academicintegrity.uoguelph.ca/academic-integrity/ten-golden-rules-academic-integrity (05.07.2021).

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]