ABSTRACT The frequency of scientific retractions has grown substantially in recent years. However, thus far there is no standardized retraction notice format to which journals and their publishers adhere voluntarily, let alone compulsorily. We developed a rubric specifying seven criteria in order to judge whether retraction notices are easily and freely accessible, informative, and transparent. We mined the Retraction Watch database and evaluated a total of 768 retraction notices from two publishers (Springer and Wiley) over three years (2010, 2015, and 2020). Per our rubric, both publishers tended to score higher on measures of openness/availability, accessibility, and clarity as to why a paper was retracted than they did in: acknowledging institutional investigations; confirming whether there was consensus among authors; and specifying which parts of any given paper warranted retraction. Springer retraction notices appeared to improve over time with respect to the rubric’s seven criteria. We observed some discrepancies among raters, indicating the difficulty in developing a robust objective rubric for evaluating retraction notices.

ABSTRACT Although reproducibility is central to the scientific method, its understanding within the research community remains insufficient. We aimed to explore the perceptions of research reproducibility among stakeholders within academia, learn about possible barriers and facilitators to reproducibility-related practices, and gather their suggestions for the Croatian Reproducibility Network website. We conducted four focus groups with researchers, teachers, editors, research managers, and policymakers from Croatia (n = 23). The participants observed a lack of consensus on the core definitions of reproducibility, both generally and between disciplines. They noted that incentivization and recognition of reproducibility-related practices from publishers and institutions, alongside comprehensive education adapted to the researchers’ career stage, could help with implementing reproducibility. Education was considered essential to these efforts, as it could help create a research culture based on good reproducibility-related practices and behavior rather than one driven by mandates or career advancement. This was particularly found to be relevant for growing reproducibility efforts globally. Regarding the Croatian Reproducibility Network website, the participants suggested we adapt the content to users from different disciplines or career stages and offer guidance and tools for reproducibility through which we should present core reproducibility concepts. Our findings could inform other initiatives focused on improving research reproducibility.

ABSTRACT Scientific research requires objectivity, impartiality and stringency. However, scholarly literature is littered with preliminary and explorative findings that lack reproducibility or validity. Some low-quality papers with perceived high impact have become publicly notable. The collective effort of fellow researchers who follow these false leads down blind alleys and impasses is a waste of time and resources, and this is particularly damaging for early career researchers. Furthermore, the lay public might also be affected by socioeconomic repercussions associated with the findings. It is arguable that the nature of scientific research is such that its frontiers are moved and shaped by cycles of published claims inducing in turn rounds of validation by others. Using recent example cases of room-temperature superconducting materials research, I argue instead that publication of perceptibly important or spectacular claims that lack reproducibility or validity is epistemically and socially irresponsible. This is even more so if authors refuse to share research materials and raw data for verification by others. Such acts do not advance, but would instead corrupt science, and should be prohibited by consensual governing rules on material and data sharing within the research community, with malpractices appropriately sanctioned.

ABSTRACT Responsible internationalization is a term increasingly used to promote relationship building in a world shaped by the growing impact of global challenges and geopolitical competition. In these changing global conditions, researchers and universities have learned that they need to adhere to an expanded set of research norms. Today these norms include aspects well known to researchers, such as research integrity, academic freedom, openness, research excellence, and research ethics, but also newer aspects related to societal impact, research security, and science diplomacy. However, managing these aspects is complicated by the fact that they are quite contradictory in tandem. Hence the term responsible internationalization has been used to raise awareness of the changing conditions for academic research and induce more responsible research practices. Nonetheless, the term presently lacks systemization and agreed definitions driving clear narratives, well-articulated goals, or structured responses and behavioral changes. This paper seeks to clarify some of the underlying premises and strategies in working with responsible internationalization and a way forward to the development of clearer guidelines.

ABSTRACT Climate change stood out as an important ethical issue that is contemplated, at least among early-stage researchers, in Buedo and colleagues’ collected views on ethical issues in preclinical research. It is about time that all scientists and researchers, young or old, to stand to be accountable for our contributions toward environmental crises in our work, and conversely to think about how these crises could be mitigated by our research.

ABSTRACT In recent years there have been calls to improve ethics in preclinical research. Promoting ethics in preclinical research should consider the perspectives of scientists. Our study aims to explore researchers’ perspectives on ethics in the preclinical phase. Using interviews and focus groups, we collected views on ethical issues in preclinical research from experienced (n = 11) and early-stage researchers (ESRs) (n = 14) working in a gene therapy and regenerative medicine consortium. A recurring theme among ESRs was the impact of health-related preclinical research on climate change. They highlighted the importance of strengthening ethics in relations within the scientific community. Experienced researchers were focused on technicalities of methods used in preclinical research. They stressed the need for more safeguards to protect the sensitive personal data they work with. Both groups drew attention to the importance of the social context of research and its social impact. They agreed that it is important to be socially responsible – to be aware of and be sensitive to the needs and views of society. This study helps to identify key ethical challenges and, when combined with more data, can ultimately lead to informed and evidence-based improvements to existing regulations.

ABSTRACT The Monsanto company – now acquired by Bayer – has been accused of ghostwriting articles within peer review literature, with the goal of using influential names to front its content in defence of the herbicide Roundup. Here, I conduct a detailed analysis of three Monsanto review articles and a five-article journal supplement for which detailed information from company emails is publicly available following litigation over Roundup. All the articles had external, but not Monsanto authors, and ghostly practices including ghost authorship, corporate ghost authorship and ghost management were evident in their development. There was clear evidence of ghostwriting – that is, drafting of the manuscript by non-authors – in only two cases. I found no evidence of undeserving authorship among the external authors. The articles complied with the disclosure requirements of their journals, save for the journal supplement. While crude ghostwriting did occur, much of the literature involved subtler practices through which Monsanto exercised control over content, while the attribution of the articles downplayed the company’s role – and correspondingly aggrandized that of the external authors. Such practices are widespread within industry journal literature and are the responsibility of byline authors and journals as well as corporations. I discuss these cultural problems and consider remedies.

ABSTRACT We investigated reasons for retraction, pre-and post-retraction citations and Altmetrics indicators of retracted publications in the medical sciences from 2016 to 2020. Data were retrieved from Scopus (n = 840). The Retraction Watch database was used to identify the reasons for retraction and the time that elapsed from publication to retraction. The findings showed that intentional errors were the most prevalent reasons for retraction. China (438), the United States (130), and India (51) have the largest share of retractions. These retracted publications were cited 5,659 times in other research publications, of which 1,559 citations occurred after the retraction, which should raise concern. These retracted papers were also shared in online platforms, mainly on Twitter and by members of the general public. We recommend that the early detection of retracted papers may help to reduce the rate of citation and sharing of these publications, and minimize their negative impact.

ABSTRACT In February 2023, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released another report acknowledging that we still lack meaningful, validated, widely-accepted measures for evaluating institutional review board (IRB) quality and effectiveness. This challenge is well known to the Consortium to Advance Effective Research Ethics Oversight (www.AEREO.org), a collaborative group of human research protection (HRP) professionals, researchers, and research ethicists founded in 2018 to do precisely what GAO recommends: examine approaches for measuring IRB effectiveness in protecting human subjects, and implement the approaches as appropriate. Two underlying tenets have been central to AEREO’s as approach to thinking about IRB quality and effectiveness: (1) IRBs exist to protect participants and thus the participant perspective should be central to all IRBs do; and (2) because IRBs are tasked with applying subjective ethical and regulatory standards about which people may disagree, their approach and decisions should at least meet the basic standard of reasonableness in terms of accounting for relevant perspectives, considering key factors, and providing defensible justifications. Critical to each of these tenets, IRBs should include diverse perspectives in their deliberations, find ways to meaningfully engage with relevant communities about their views regarding ethical research and appropriate participant protections, and be accountable to the public.