Scientific fraud, publication bias, and honorary authorship in nuclear medicine

Abstract

Rationale: To investigate nuclear medicine scientists’ experience with scientific fraud, publication bias, and honorary authorship. Methods: Corresponding authors who published an article in one of the 15 general nuclear medicine journals (according to the Journal Citation Reports) in 2021, received an invitation to participate in a survey on scientific integrity. Results: A total of 254(12.4%) of 1,897 corresponding authors completed the survey, of whom 11 (4.3%) admitted to have committed scientific fraud and 54 (21.3%) reported to have witnessed or to suspect scientific fraud by someone in their department in the past 5 years. Publication bias was considered present by 222 (87.4%) and honorary authorship practices were experienced by 100 (39.4%) of respondents. Respondents assigned a median score of 8 (range: 2-10) on a 1-10 point scale to their overall confidence in the integrity of published work. On multivariate analysis, researchers in Asia had significantly more confidence in the integrity of published work, with a β coefficient of 0.983 (95% confidence interval: 0.512 to 1.454, P<0.001). A subset of 22 respondents raised additional concerns, mainly about authorship criteria and assignments, the generally poor quality of published studies, and perverse incentives of journals and publishers. Conclusion: Scientific fraud, publication bias, and honorary authorship appear to be non-negligible practices in nuclear medicine. Overall confidence in the integrity of published work is high, particularly among researchers in Asia.