Author A presented a paper to a conference and submitted the paper to the conference proceedings. After the conference and before the papers were selected for consideration for the conference special issue, Author A submitted a paper to Editor A for review. The only comment Author A made regarding the status of the paper is ‘Finally, this paper is our original work and has not been submitted to any other journal for reviews.’ No mention was made that the paper was in a conference proceedings or is under consideration for possible inclusion in other journals.
Editor A decided to handle the review process himself and assigned reviewers to review the submission. Later, Author A sent a letter to the Editorial Assistant indicating that he/she was requesting that the submission be withdrawn from review. Author A’s note is shown below:
Editor A called Editor B and inquired about Author A’s paper. Editor B indicated that he was unaware that the paper was under review when he solicited it. Editor B stated that it was not his intent to solicit papers under review. Editor B indicated that he believed that Author A accepted his offer for special issue consideration after Author A sent a withdrawal letter to Editor A. Editor B agreed that Author A’s paper was under review at the time that the letter from Editor B was sent.
Editor A is willing to retract the use of the term double submission as he can see that the authors can reasonably argue that if the paper submitted to Editor B was given to Editor B after the rejection note was sent by Editor A one can make an interpretation that the paper was not physically under consideration at two places at once.
However, Editor A is not willing to retract the 5 year ban because Author A and Author B have abused the review process. They have wasted the time of two reviewers. Editor A typically waits for a year prior to asking reviewers who are not on the editorial board to consider another paper.
If a 5 year ban is retracted, Editor A fears that Authors A and B will continue to abuse the review process at his journal and that other authors will do the same. As the number of submissions has increased by almost 300% over the past 3 years, Editor A believes that anonymous reviewers warrant as much respect and consideration that can be offered.
The Forum questioned whether or not the authors then believed the paper had been withdrawn and so they were free to submit it elsewhere. As it is unclear if or when the paper was actually withdrawn, the Forum agreed that a 5 year ban was too harsh. Also, COPE reiterated its views on sanctions. COPE believes that sanctions should be imposed only if misconduct has been proved after a proper formal process has taken place, involving an independent panel where the author is allowed to present his case. Otherwise sanctions can be seen to be unfair and could provoke litigation.
(2) If the authors indeed did something wrong, would a simple Concerns on Duplicate Publication be sufficient? Would banning the authors from publishing in Journal A for a few years be appropriate?
Journal A is satisfied with this investigation conducted by the authors’ institution, and the communication regarding proper author/researcher conduct in publications from the authors’ institution to these authors.
论坛质疑它是编辑器的罗依le to police all journals and so rejected the idea that other affected articles should be sought out and other affected journals be alerted. Editors should spend their time editing not policing. However, most agreed that the author’s institution should be informed, asking it to investigate, but warned about making any allegations. The Forum believed that the seriousness of omission of a CoI was compounded by its repetition but only if it had been done knowingly and if the omission occurred after it had been made clear to the author that this was not good behaviour. Some warned that this may not be so clear cut. Instructions to authors can vary widely and often CoI statements are not requested.
In April 2007, an original scientific article was published on line (ahead of print—it is now published in print, September 2007). In July 2007, the editors received the following request from a scientist who read this article: "Since I am interested in this subject and I already work with it, I need to know some technical information from the authors. I have called the group five times and wrote them several emails, but unfortunately there was no response. I have decided to write to the editor to help me get the information I need".
In response to the advice from COPE, the editor had made the following addition to the Instructions to Authors to make it clear what is expected: “Authors should fully describe their methods so they could be reproduced by others. Additional technical information, unique reagents, antisera, cell lines, and genetically modified animals necessary to replicate the work should be made be available to interested parties”.
Soon after, the same allegedly victimised head of department sent a second letter to the same editor saying that he was planning on contacting the author’s university and Ministry of Health, informing them of this matter, and also requesting that these papers be immediately retracted from the journal, with an explanation published. Moreover, he stated that he would be submitting a letter to the editor which he hoped would be published with an editorial comment in the next issue of the editor’s journal.
A paper was submitted to this journal and sent out to be refereed. The paper had five authors, all from the same institution and department. The bulk of the data were contained in four tables. One of the reviewers pointed out that these four tables were identical (verbatim) to those published recently in a paper by the same five authors in another journal.
An article was submitted simultaneously to our journal and another journal (who is a member of COPE) on the same date. Both journals received letters saying that the article had not been submitted to another journal. When they received a favourable response from the other journal, and the article was published, we were informed by the authors that they wished to withdraw the paper from our journal. The authors claim that this was a result of a misunderstanding and poor communication between the authors.
This case regarding the conduct of a reviewer prompted mixed views from the committee. Some argued that the reviewer should be permanently removed from the journal’s list while others argued that such action was too harsh. Bearing in mind that there was no hard evidence, most agreed that the editor had acted correctly. On balance, there was general approval for the editor and his actions.
作者字母三个期刊that the Ms was not under consideration elsewhere. The author withdrew Ms from J6 without explanation. MsB is currently submitted to J7 with outcome pending this investigation. MsB was also submitted to J5 but the dates are not known and the author withdrew the Ms from this journal.
2004/2005 手稿D（MsD）: MsD was simultaneously submitted to J8, J2, and J7. J2 contacted J8 about possible duplicate submission. J8 rejected MsD based on reviewer reports and also added a note to the author informing them that there had been a report of possible duplicate submission with their Ms.
The abstract of MsD has been found to be identical to the abstract of an article published in June 2005 in J10 with the exception of two additional observations that occur in MsD. Are the authors seeking to publish a redundant publication?
The editors of the journals involved met to discuss this case. The consensus of the group was that this case definitely required action. Research by one of the journal editors had determined that there was no official institution and hence no head of department to write to concerning this matter. It was felt that a letter from all the journals that wished to participate would still be very beneficial as this would help to reinforce the fact that journals and editors do not operate in isolation. The draft letter that was taken to the meeting is to be modified and circulated. In order to prevent over reporting of a singular case, it was agreed that an editorial in all journals that wished to do so on duplicate submission, redundant publication, publishing procedures and ethics in general would be very beneficial.