Research and Publication Ethics (RPE)
Module-1
Philosophy and Ethics:
(i) Introduction to philosophy: definition, nature and scope, concept, branches.
(ii) Ethics: definition, moral philosophy, nature of moral judgements and reactions. ∎
Module-2
Scientific Conduct:
(i) Ethics with respect to science and research.
(ii) Intellectual honesty and research integrity.
(iii) Scientific misconducts: Falsification, Fabrication, and Plagiarism (FFP).
(iv) Redundant publications: duplicate and overlapping publications, salami slicing.
(v) Selective reporting and misrepresentation of data.
Module-3
Publication Ethics:
(i) Publication ethics: definition, introduction and importance.
(ii) Best practices / standards setting initiatives and guidelines: COPE, WAME, etc.
(iii) Conflicts of interest.
(iv) Publication misconduct: definition, concept, problems that lead to unethical behavior and vice versa, types.
(v) Violation of publication ethics, authorship and contributorship.
(vi) Identification of publication misconduct, complaints and appeals.
(vii) Predatory publishers and journals.
Module-4
(a) Open Access Publishing
(i) Open access publications and initiatives.
(ii) SHERPN/RoMEO online resource to check publisher copyright & self-archiving policies.
(iii) Software tool to identify predatory publications developed by SPPU.
(iv) Journal finder / journal suggestion tools viz.JANE, Elsevier Journal Finder, Springer Journal Suggester, etc.
(b) Publication Misconduct
Group Discussions:
(i) Subject specific ethical issues, FFP, authorship.
(ii) Conflicts of interest.
(iii) Complaints and appeals: examples and fraud from India and abroad.
Software tools:
(i) Use of plagiarism software like Turnitin, Urkund and other open source software tools.
Module-5
Databases and Research Metrics
Databases
(i) Indexing databases.
(ii) Citation databases: Web of Science, Scopus, etc.
Research Metrics
(i) Impact Factor of journal as per Journal Citation Report, SNIP, SJR, IPP, Cite Score.
(ii) Metrics: h-index, g index, i10 index, altmetrics.
