Professor A suspected that technical researcher B had plagiarised a chapter of a book in a joint article and marked X as the first author of the article without their consent. The university conducted an investigation proper after receiving a statement (2019:18) from TENK. The investigation proper revealed that the case involved a total of four publications, all of which dealt with the same research results. B was an author for all four publications. X could not be contacted during the investigation proper.
Based on the rector’s decision, B was found guilty of both disregard for responsible conduct of research and plagiarism.
B was dissatisfied with the rector’s decision and requested a statement from TENK on the matter. In B’s view, the investigation proper did not take into account the difference between the contributed article, book chapter and survey. According to B, only the contributed articles contain research results that have not previously been published. Publications such as a review article do not tend to refer to chapters in the book that draw together the results of the contributed article. B also stated that he was also not properly consulted during the process.
TENK dealt with this matter also in the statement TENK 2021:5. In the view of TENK, both the review article and the book chapter should have made clearer reference within its images and tables to the contributed articles in which they were first published. The references to previous research results was inadequate and inappropriate in this respect, and B had been guilty of disregard for responsible conduct of research in this area. However, TENK found that the criteria for plagiarism as research misconduct were not fulfilled. In other respects, the university had conducted the investigation proper in accordance with the RCR guidelines.