Editorial Policy against Plagiarism and Research Misconduct
The occurrence of malpractice in research and the publication of its results is spreading throughout the publishing world, an evident symptom of the civilizational crisis that humanity is going through nowadays. We cannot be indifferent to this context. That compromises scientific and technological production through the unauthorized appropriation of others' works or the adulteration of results, supporting fake news and casting doubt on the ethical practices of research and technological development. Science & technology, along with education and health, are fields with a strong impact on the well-being of individuals and communities, which calls for the active defense of good practices to perform them.
The Publisher Rede Unida works based on ethical principles disseminated by funding agencies, including the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) regarding research integrity, the Code of Good Scientific Practices of the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP), and the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). They all present recommendations for the publication of articles and books. Thus, we aim to contribute twice to science and technology: by disseminating knowledge and technologies produced by those engaged in research in different territories and institutions, being in the areas related to education and health; or by strengthening ethical and bioethical practices committed to the defense of life and the production of health for individuals and groups.
Regarding the definition of misconduct in the writing of book chapters or manuscripts, the most typical and frequent types are: productions that make statements, or claim that data were obtained or procedures were conducted when they were not; falsification, or presenting data, procedures, or research results in a significantly modified, inaccurate, or incomplete manner that could interfere with the assessment of their scientific weight; and the appropriation and reproduction of ideas from others without giving proper credit, the so-called plagiarism. Among the main types of plagiarism are (Krokoscz, 2012)*:
- Direct plagiarism: an exact copy of another author's content without appropriate identification (referencing) of the original work.
- Indirect plagiarism: the use of paraphrasing or keywords developed by other authors without proper citation, or creating a "mosaic" using excerpts from different authors to compose a final text without immediate referencing.
- Source-based plagiarism: reproduction of content cited by an author without consulting the original document, as if it had been done, or citations retrieved from secondary sources.
- Consensual plagiarism: an intellectual fraud despite the consent of the original author of the work or excerpt.
We include texts produced by artificial intelligence in a similar condition to plagiarism, as they do not represent original authorship. The Publisher Rede Unida does not accept this type of text, as their production dismisses authorship exercise and replaces the ethical management of data in producing essays and original manuscripts.
It is important to note that plagiarism is considered a crime in Brazil, as provided for in the Art. 184 of Decree-Law No. 2,848, of December 7, 1940 - Penal Code, for violation of copyrights. Therefore, manuscripts and book chapters submitted to the Publisher will be reviewed by the editorial team with the assistance of similarity detection software such as Turnitin or Similarity Check. The Editorial Executive Committee will review the system's report and reject productions containing plagiarism before forwarding them to peer review. A single sentence or paragraph copied from an unquoted or improperly quoted source will result in the rejection of the production and the submission of the plagiarism detection report to the authors. Authors will be allowed to correct plagiarized sections and resubmit the article when the nature of the plagiarism involves incorrect citation of sources.
Once plagiarism of long passages or completely plagiarized texts is identified, the authors will not be allowed to correct the text. The authors will also be prevented from submitting new work to the Publisher. For works submitted with more than one author, unless there is an express declaration of individual responsibility, all authors will be considered equally responsible for the frauds identified. This highlights the importance of carefully reading the manuscript and respecting authorship criteria before submitting manuscripts.
For manuscripts from a master's or doctoral thesis already published in an institutional repository by the main author, the Publisher will accept up to 100% similarity as long as the original source is cited and included in the reference list. For manuscripts published in another source and republished, regardless of the original publication language, it is essential that the original publication be properly cited and that the authors resolve any publication rights from the original source.
When the Publisher Rede Unida receives a report of plagiarism in works that have been published, the Editorial Executive Committee will be responsible for investigating them. If plagiarism is confirmed, the published work will be removed from the publications immediately, and a Police Report will be filed with the Civil Police of the State of Rio Grande do Sul. The databases where the publication was indexed will be informed, and, depending on the case, the institution where the research was conducted and the funding agency (if any) will also be notified. The Committee has autonomy in the deliberation and handling of each case and will use guidelines of the scientific community to prevent crimes of this nature.
Total work plagiarism:
When a case of plagiarism of an entire work is confirmed, the original publication will be permanently removed from the Publisher's website. The PDF with the work will be kept, but a retraction letter from the Publisher will be added before the original full text. In addition, the PDF will contain watermark stripes that will make its use impractical and hinder reading, and authors will be prevented from submitting new work to the Publisher.
The authors will be contacted and allowed to send a retraction letter within 30 days. The authors' retraction letter will be published on the webpage where the book chapter or manuscript was originally published, along with a retraction letter from the Publisher. The retraction letter sent by the authors does not prevent them from being held legally responsible by the authors of the original work.
Partial work plagiarism:
When a case of partial plagiarism of another work is confirmed, the Editorial Executive Committee may decide, depending on the percentage and nature of the plagiarism, in favor of its correction through an erratum to be written by the authors. The erratum will be published on the page where the book chapter or manuscript was originally published and added to the published work's PDF. The erratum sent by the authors does not prevent them from being held legally responsible by the authors of the original work.
To report plagiarism in publications by the Publisher Rede Unida, please contact the email revista@redeunida.org.br (for articles) or editora@redeunida.org.br (for book chapters).
Footnotes
*For more details, please consult:
Krokoscz M. Autoria e plágio: um guia para estudantes, professores, pesquisadores e editores. São Paulo: Atlas; 2012.
Published: January 28, 2024
