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Evolving Codes for Research Integrity and Ethical Conduct

Research integrity and ethical conduct are largely inter-related. Research integrity reflects moral
adherence to the defined ethical code of conduct and professional standards as a personal conviction
rather than because of compulsion of institutional rules and regulations. Ethical principles refer to
honesty and trustworthiness of records and the dissemination of the research output.

Unethical conduct and the societal efforts to curb such undesired practices have been evolving
parallelly since pre-historic times. A breach in integrity in conducting research and disseminating its
output causes serious damage to society’s progress. It also leads to a loss of public faith in scientific
temper. Since maintaining integrity in conduct of research and following ethical practices in the
dissemination of the output are critical for the well-being of society and essential to keep the sanctity
of academic pursuit, research communities in different disciplines have, on their own, formalized
discipline-specific ethical norms for the conduct of research and sharing its output.
Maintaining integrity is a common denominator in all research efforts. The norms for ethical conduct
have, besides the many common guidelines for all disciplines, discipline–specific codes as well. For
example, some of the defined codes for ethical conduct in bio-medical and health sciences do not
apply to research dealing with non-living matter and vice-versa. Within the biomedical and health
sciences, some of the ethical practices for clinical studies that directly deal with human subjects
are different from those followed for research on animals or plants. The ethical codes of conduct of
research are dynamic and evolve in time and space.

One of the first internationally adopted codes of ethical conduct, the “Declaration of Helsinki 1964”,
was in the biomedical field, which was developed by the World Medical Association following the
Nuremberg trials for the Nazi atrocities. Since then, this has undergone multiple revisions.
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Each country and many international agencies have framed guidelines for research integrity and
ethics. The International Science Council (ISC), a non-governmental organization with a unique
global membership of 40 international scientific unions and associations and more than 140 national
and regional scientific organizations including academies and research councils, has articulated code
of conduct for freedom and responsibility in science. The Committee on Publication Ethics or COPE
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was established in 1997 as a non-governmental association to provide advice and guidance on best
practice for dealing with ethical issues in journal publishing and “To educate and advance knowledge
in methods of safeguarding the integrity of the scholarly record for the benefit of the public.” As a
general practice, all standard research journals are expected to follow the best-practice guidelines
periodically issued by the COPE. The All European Academies (ALLEA) have also formulated conduct
for research integrity. Different governmental agencies/departments and academies in India too have
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formulated guidelines for maintaining integrity and ethical conduct in research. Some of these can be
seen as Additional Readings.

Long-term Damaging Impact of Unethical Conduct in Research

As stated earlier, new knowledge builds on the existing knowledge. Consequently, if the existing
knowledge relating to a given phenomenon/process/matter is based on results, the integrity of
which is uncertain because of some unethical conduct, cascading ill-effects would follow on further
advancements in the field. Since knowledge in different domains and fields has to be necessarily
interconnected, the damaging consequences would be felt and visible in many other disciplines as
well.

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