Understanding research ethics
Plagiarism
#EditorObservations 21 Plagiarism (YouTube, 2m 6s)
As the number of #editorobservations relating to plagiarism shows, this has been the most challenging aspect of publishing ethics. Throughout the entire eight-year period of editing Annals of Tourism Research, I had to reject about 30% of newly submitted manuscripts because they contained an unacceptable level of text duplication. Authors like to ask how much text duplication is too much text duplication. Scott McCabe and I have never used a single percentage or a percentage per source document as a criterion. We have always inspected the plagiarism report, where duplication text is highlighted and the source of duplication displayed.
Sometimes the duplication is innocent. For example, for some reason the plagiarism software sometimes include the references, although it should not. Another relatively innocent example are literature review summary tables where authors do not put the key findings in quotation marks although they must. The concept of self-plagiarism also upsets many researchers. After all the words that they have reused are their own words. I have learned over the years that there is no point arguing with authors. The bottom line is that self-plagiarism is considered to be in breach of research ethics. As such, it must be avoided. If authors feel that a paragraph they have previously written is so perfect that it must be reused, that can be achieved, but the paragraph must be cited as a direct quote to the article or book or book chapter where it was first published.
In most instances, it is quite evident that authors are cutting and pasting from previously published work. Sometimes the duplicated text reoccurs unchanged. Sometimes authors add or modify a few words to hide the fact that the main sentence has been taken from elsewhere. The simplest rule to follow is to write every sentence from scratch.
This short viewpoint provides a bit more detail: Dolnicar, S. (2019) Reduce reuse… and don’t recycle! Annals of Tourism Research, 77, 62-63.
The #editorobservations in this section illustrate just how pervasive the problem is.
#editorobservation
15 new Annals of Tourism Research submissions yesterday
And NOT ONE case of plagiarism
Makes me very, very happy🥰
#editorobservation
I do wonder if some authors assume journal editors are just really overworked and, as a result, careless
Under this assumption it makes sense to just keep submitting manuscripts – new ones, old ones, any old paper really
But I don’t know any careless editors
#editorobservation
No editor enjoys rejecting papers
Fundamental flaws incl. plagiarism often due to lack of research training + mentorship
Heartbreaking to reject articles that give that impression
Tips
Find a good mentor
Run paper past critical friends before submitting
#editorobservation
About 30% of Annals of Tourism Research submissions contain too much text duplication.
Scott McCabe + I have no choice but to desk-reject them to comply with Elsevier ethics policies.
Some authors, then, dedicate a substantial amount of time to writing long emails arguing why our decision is incorrect. That time may be better spent on running a pre-submission text duplication check and making adjustments, if required, such as putting direct citations in quotation marks.
Avoid desk rejection.
Make a text duplication check part of your pre-submission routine.
#editorobservation
CAUTHE 2021 Meet the Editor session
Please run your manuscript through a plagiarism checking software before you submit.
Saves everyone time
Journals cannot publish text that has been published somewhere else before.
#editorobservation
Same paper submitted to Annals of Tourism Research for the 3rd time
Had to desk reject it twice before because of plagiarism: text fragments identical to published texts
Every resubmission has a slightly lower text duplication percentage
But plagiarism remains
Seriously? 😩
#editorobservation
Here we go again…
50% text duplication –> desk rejection
Hard to imagine this was an accident
But often it is not intentional and very easy to avoid.
#editorobservation
I am exhausted!😫
Scott McCabe + I process ~5 papers each day
That takes a lot of time and effort
We simply cannot offer additional services.
Please run your manuscript through your uni’s plagiarism software before you submit.
#editorobservation
Delighted to be receiving fewer manuscripts at risk of plagiarism 😃
Today not so good, tough 😢
9 new submissions
3 with text duplication scores of 26%, 24% and 23% 😭
No bad intentions, but still not OK
#editorobservation
29% of papers that land on my desk get a desk rejection decision because of plagiarism 😢
Unnecessary trouble
Waste of time
So very easy to avoid
Read more about the problem and the solution 😀
#editorobservation
?
?
???
No.
Tips
- It is the authors’ job to ensure that there is no text duplication in their manuscript. Use your university’s plagiarism software before you submit.
- Please think twice before you email editors. Some names we cannot forget.
#editorobservation
Great news: a year ago I desk rejected 30% of papers because of plagiarism.
Now I am down to ~10%
But today an Annals of Tourism Research author complained about our plagiarism report & sent their own showing “only” 19% text duplication with 8% from 1 source.
Shoot for 0%
#editorobservation
Great news: Number of articles with plagiarism issues submitted to Annals of Tourism Research has dropped substantially over the past year
From ~30% to ~10%
Interesting case today: text duplication score only 13%, but caused by verbatim duplication of a few paragraphs
#editorobservation
No, I didn’t inspect IN DETAIL plagiarism reports for papers with low text duplication scores
Mistake
Today a paper with only 9% text duplication contained full paragraphs from previously published work
Here’s how to avoid plagiarism.
#editorobservation
Well, that’s a next level plagiarism experience!
#textduplication report looks like a game of tetris: block after block of duplicated text, most of it from a retracted paper.
Read up on text duplication: Reduce, reuse and don’t recyle and Elsevier policies and guidelines.
#editorobservation
When we identify plagiarism in Annals of Tourism Research submissions, authors have usually taken text from other journal articles.
Today Wikipedia was the source.
It’s OK to cite any source as long as it’s clear that it is a direct quote.
#editorobservation
Another plagiarism highlight today.
58% text duplication
Text literally lights up like a Christmas tree in plagiarism report.
Here’s how authors can ensure they comply with research integrity requirements.
#editorobservation
This desk rejection email is easy to avoid.
Learn about your research ethics obligations in general and those relating specifically to text duplication to increase the chances of your manuscript making it past the editor’s desk and being sent out for review.
#editorobservation
Yes Yes Yes !!
And this is the winner of the 2022 Annals of Tourism Research competition for the smallest percentage of text duplication in a manuscript
1%
Makes me so very happy to see that 
Please send more…
#editorobservation
Despite my many attempts to try to raise awareness for the need to avoid plagiarism, I still have to desk reject ~30% of submissions because of too much text duplication.
Author reactions vary, here’s a particularly charming one:
#editorobservation
Not such a fabulous journal editor today, unfortunately 
4 new manuscript submissions
Text duplication percentages:
- 15%
- 18%
- 18%
- 30%.
What this shows is that mentoring is more important today than ever. PhD and postdoc supervisors must help early career researchers understand research ethics, and colleagues can help by reminding each other of their obligations and resisting temptations to behave borderline unethically for the sake of getting one extra paper published.
The COPE webpage is a great resource to learn about research ethics.
#editorobservation
Oh how wonderful: a text duplication score of only 4%!
I rarely see such low numbers nowadays, so I really just want to give this Annals of Tourism Research author a huge hug for writing a manuscript from scratch 
#editorobservation
My editor observations must sound increasingly bitter.
I am very sorry about that. It is not my intention.
I started writing editor observations because I wanted to offer a backstage view of journal editing – a backstage view I would have loved to have access to in the early stages of my career.
But a lot has changed for journal editors since I wrote my first editor observations a few years ago. The massively increased publication pressure researchers are put under led to:
- MANY MORE weak manuscript submission
- MANY MORE ethical issues (plagiarism, salami slicing, illegitimate authorships, …)
- MANY MORE authors arguing (often quite disrespectfully) with well-meaning journal editors who volunteer their time because they want to contribute to their their scholarly community.
Some days I feel like I am watching the collective suicide of academic research unfold in front of my eyes and there is nothing I can do about it.
#editorobservation
Text duplication percentage never tells the whole story.
94% text duplication, but 0% plagiarism – perfectly legitimate.
94% comes from a preprint.
Abstracts, academic theses & electronic preprints are excluded.
#editorobservation
Stopped keeping records but guessing that I still desk reject ~15% of Annals of Tourism Research submissions because of text duplication / plagiarism / self-plagiarism.
Some authors take offence and mount a counterargument (sometimes aggressively).
Others acknowledge and adapt:
#editorobservation
Had to desk reject an Annals of Tourism Research paper with 49% text duplication – 25% from 1 source
I rarely use templates, but I have one for such occasions
TIP
Before submitting your manuscript to any journal, take 10 min & run it through your uni’s plagiarism software
#editorobservation
Here we go again: 63% text duplication
Good to discuss plagiarism regularly
I never plagiarise, but I check all my manuscripts for accidental text duplication before I submit.
Takes 30 seconds and protects my reputation.
#editorobservation
Nothing surprises me anymore when it comes to plagiarism and self-plagiarism.
Luckily the rules are pretty clear: don’t use previously published text verbatim unless you attribute it to the original source as a direct quote.
#editorobservation
A particularly tragic #editorobservation: desk rejection from Annals of Tourism Research for 44% plagiarism.
41% from one conference paper.
Totally avoidable!
I always present my coolest work at conferences, but I never let organisers publish the paper.
#editorobservation
So sad!
Received manuscript previously published in conference proceedings
Routine check: 58% plagiarism
Annals of Tourism Research cannot publish for copyright reasons.
If you plan to submit an article to a journal, best to publish abstract only in proceedings.
#editorobservation
Today Scott McCabe and I received an email from an author whose paper we had to reject because 24% of the text was reused from articles the author had previously published.
The email was 670 words long and contained additional attachments. It would have taken the authors a long time to compose.
Sadly, we cannot change anything in response to the email because paragraphs from previously published work cannot be reused, even if they have been written by the same author. They can be included in quotation marks as a direct quote, but not reused without indicating the original source.
To avoid dramas, I run all my manuscripts through the The University of Queensland‘s plagiarism software, just to be totally safe. I file the report with the submission files. Only when I have convinced myself that there are no paragraphs or even text fragments that could give the perception of plagiarism do I hit the “submit” button. Saves a lot of time because it allows journals to process my papers without any unnecessary detours.
#editorobservation
In 2019, 30% of Annals of Tourism Research manuscript submissions had to be desk-rejected because of potential (self)plagiarism.
In a Viewpoint, I tried to offer some guidance to authors because many authors genuinely have missed out on good training and mentoring. I was hoping the Viewpoint might make a difference.
Sadly this was not the case. It’s 2022 and my desk-rejection rate due to text duplication is still at 30% 
#editorobservation
I have just realised how the nature of questions I am asked about research ethics and integrity by Annals of Tourism Research authors has changed over the years.
The question used to be: “What’s the right thing to do?”. Now it sounds more like: “How far can I push the boundaries without being seen as breaching principles of research integrity.”
Sad.
It’s like asking which exact types of texts you can exchange with someone without being accused by your partner of cheating. Or how long can you borrow an item before it’s stealing.
Don’t fiddle around at the margins of research integrity.
Just commit to doing what’s right. Every time.
