A, a doctor in humanities, suspected that B, a professor in the same field, was guilty of misappropriation as well as inappropriate hampering and delaying of research work as A’s name had not been cited as an editor of a scientific symposium of which B was the editor-in-chief. No written agreements had been made on the work at any stage, and the parties had differing views of what had been agreed otherwise. According to both the preliminary RCR inquiry conducted by the university and the statement issued by TENK (see summary TENK 2016:8), B was not guilty of an RCR violation.
When the RCR process was still under way, B made an RCR notification about A’s conduct. B considered A to be guilty of disregard which manifests itself as misleading of the scientific community and several irresponsible measures, such as manipulation of authorship. According to the preliminary inquiry conducted by the university, there was no reason to suspect an RCR violation.
TENK agreed with the assessment made by the university. As the acts were not serious or gross, the university did not need to initiate an investigation proper into the matter.