4 ms·
This article puts the onus on publishers / the scientific publication process to catch and prevent fraud. This is like asking merchants to catch and stop fraud
by yawnxyz 3y ago
This article puts the onus on publishers / the scientific publication process to catch and prevent fraud.
This is like asking merchants to catch and stop fraud and crime (e.g. selling alcohol to kids); it's in their best interest to not catch fraud and maximize their income.
The reason they do clamp down on underage drinking is because they'll get fined/arrested / their license will be revoked. The system cares enough to catch and punish the behavior.
If the funding bodies like NIH don't catch, punish and stop this behavior, it creates a system where fraudsters win more. This makes more groups, even if reluctant, participate in fraud because that's the only way to compete. It's a race to the bottom.
Money drives incentives, and clawing it back while blacklisting and publicly humiliating a lab, will change behavior. That would make the lab a toxic collaborator, especially if collaborators ALSO get blacklisted from funding.
- atrettel 3y agoWhat changes to the incentive structure do you think would help here? Blacklisting seems appropriate for repeat offenders but I'd be more interested in changing the incentives for funding to prevent fraud in the first place. The problem with blacklisting in my view is that many fraudsters who get away with it will just continue anyway since they do not "learn their lesson" until long after the damage is already done.
- ta988 3y agoNIH is using volunteers to review grants and some programs. So same problem applies. I've even seen reviewers stealing the work from grants they reviewed (and noted really badly so it wouldn't get funded) and that same reviewer did it multiple times. Nobody cared at NIH, the program officers said they would look into it and many years later still nothing happened. There is nothing really in place to solve blatant abuse.