On 18 March 2002, NSF published its research misconduct rule. This revision of the existing NSF research misconduct rule
( which can be found in Chapter IX, Section 930 of the NSF Grant Policy manual at
http://www.nsf.gov/bfa/cpo/gpm95/start.htm
) implements the Federal Policy on Research Misconduct issued by the Executive Office of the President's Office of Science and Technology on December 6, 2000. The revised rule, which is effective 17 April 2002, is essentially the same as the federal rule in its definitions of research misconduct:
- Research misconduct means fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing or performing research funded by NSF, reviewing research proposals submitted to NSF, or in reporting research results funded by NSF.
- Fabrication means making up data or results and recording or reporting them.
- Falsification means manipulating research materials, equipment, or processes, or changing or omitting data or results such that the research is not accurately represented in the research record.
- Plagiarism means the appropriation of another person's ideas, processes, results or words without giving appropriate credit.
- Research, for purposes of paragraph (a) of this section, includes proposals submitted to NSF in all fields of science, engineering, mathematics, and education and results from such proposals.
- Research misconduct does not include honest error or differences of opinion.
The balance of the NSF rule describes NSF procedure in the event of an allegation or suspicion of misconduct. Ordinarily, NSF expects awardee institutions bear primary responsibility for prevention and detection of research misconduct and for the inquiry, investigation, and adjudication of alleged research misconduct. However, there are also provisions for awardee institutions to defer the matter to NSF.
The new rule is summarized in an on-line brochure issued by the NSF Office of the Inspector General at
http://www.oig.nsf.gov/brochure.pdf
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