送交者: 注笔名册 于 2006-6-12, 22:39:41:
回答: 给 由 注笔名册 于 2006-6-12, 22:27:28:
SCIENTIFIC MISCONDUCT:
Crime Scene Investigation: How to Handle Misconduct
Eliot Marshall
Chinese scientists aren't the only ones who may find misconduct investigations a murky business (see main text): Confusion is the norm in much of the world, according to experts who are trying to raise global standards.
Most countries have taken an "ad hoc approach" to probing misconduct allegations, says Chris Pascal, director of the Office of Research Integrity (ORI), the overseer of investigations at biomedical labs and other facilities funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A common experience, he says, is that officials "get an allegation and then try to figure out how to deal with it." Without guidelines, "you don't know what to do first, and you may end up violating legal norms." The mistakes that often follow make it hard to reach a fair decision.
To help dispel some of the fog, Pascal and ORI consultant Nicholas Steneck, a historian at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, are leading a global effort to foster clear standards of conduct and encourage nations to adopt coherent policies. It's critical, Steneck says, to create transparent systems and educate scientists and their bosses so that everyone understands where the community should draw the line. This week, ORI and the European Science Foundation (ESF)--a nongovernmental organization--announced that they will get the international ball rolling by cosponsoring the first "World Conference on Research Integrity," scheduled for September 2007 in Lisbon, Portugal.
Interest in the project is surging, Pascal says, because of publicity over the South Korean stem cell research fraud, as well as recent news of misconduct allegations in China (Science, 19 May, p. 987), Japan (Science, 3 February, p. 595), and Norway (Science, 27 January, p. 448). "People used to fall asleep when I talked about educating scientists" on research integrity, Steneck says. Now they're paying attention--and, critically, offering support. ESF adviser Anthony Mayer says the Lisbon conference got a boost from joining a new initiative proposed by Japan to compare national policies around the world, supported by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The European Union and others are on board.
Models of how to deal with scientific misconduct come in all shapes and sizes, Mayer says. One approach is to leave decisions to employers. The United States and the United Kingdom, for example, rely primarily on universities and research institutions for the first level of misconduct review, but the United States also has a national definition of misconduct and clear procedures for investigations, independent oversight, and appeals. The U.K. in March created a national Research Integrity Office that intends to establish guidelines and give advice. Elsewhere in Europe, Denmark has what may be the most centralized system, in which a judge oversees inquiries in all fields of science; other countries follow a variety of policies.
Organizers of the Lisbon conference say they are loath to create international rules. "We don't want people filling out more forms on the lab bench," says Mayer. One goal of the confab, he says, is to get people talking about practices that may spur cheating--such as using postdocs as "research slaves" or setting rigid productivity targets. That message is likely to resonate with rank-and-file scientists.
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