Scientific integrity

The Trusted Intermediaries offer counseling and mediation in concrete situations where research integrity is at stake.

Scientific knowledge strives to be reliable. Researchers as well as industry and society build on it. In order to justify this trust, scientific knowledge must be produced according to acknowledged standards and in a transparent manner. Scientific collaboration can only succeed when nobody acts at the expense of others.  

Scientific integrity is an attitude that responds to these goals. It manifests itself in daily work as much as in encounters and collaboration and is decisive for the long-term success of science. Some of its integral traits are transparency, fairness, and the ability to take criticism. Successfully practiced integrity is referred to as good scientific practice.

Institutional guidelines can provide orientation and confidence on the topics of integrity and good scientific practice. However, since these are social norms, which naturally keep changing and often do so rapidly in the context of research, guidelines must be continuously reflected and adjusted.

The Commission for Good Scientific Practice develops the general foundations of research integrity at ETH Zurich. It collaborates closely with the departments and also is an interface to society.

Here are some specific practical goals that are commonly taken to reflect scientific integrity (and thus good scientific practice):

• Making scientific sources transparent and avoiding plagiarism
  
• Adherence to clear and fair rules in determining authorship
  
• Dealing with research data responsibly
  
• Publishing of results and opennes to scientific exchange and replication
  
• Correct declaration of affiliation(s) in publications
  
• Being a good supervisor for junior scientists
• Adherence to human rights and fairness in international cooperations
  
• Readiness to act as a reviewer
• Declaring conflicts of interest
  

The details of ETH Zurich's policy on research integrity as well as all legal aspects of the topic are laid down in the following documents:

• The core resource are the Guidelines for Research Integrity, which explain in detail how research integrity and good scientific practice are defined at ETH Zurich.
  
• The Code of Conduct for scientific cooperations summarizes the ethical norms that scientific cooperations should be based on if they involve ETH Zurich.
  
• The Code of Conduct for dealing with financial contributions (German only) defines guidelines for researchers on accepting and using donations, inheritances, and legates from private sources.
  
• What happens in case of suspected scientific misconduct is described in the corresponding Rules of Procedure.
  
• Some general guidelines for behavior at ETH Zurich can be found in the Compliance Guide.
  

• Ongoing proceedings: 3
• Completed proceedings since 2015: 3
• Types of misconduct: Data manipulation, plagiarism, authorship