Ethical issues in the publication

Abstract

Critically watching the investigators by society is getting more and more severe. When the ethical misconducts are revealed, published papers are retracted and posted on the internet. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), the Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED) have published ethical guidelines, and the Japanese Medical Association has published guidelines for editing medical journals on their website. Research misconducts in were fabrication, falsification and plagiarism, while publication misconducts were duplicate submissions/publications, salami publications, and predatory journals. If you have any concerns about the misconducts in submission, you should describe them in the cover letter for the judgement of editorial board. Recently, the criteria of the authorship were clarified and the misconducts based on the criteria are gift, guest and ghost authorship. Scientists should recognize the responsibility to society in our research activity including the publication and try not to disappoint people.