Differences Between Anglophone and Non-anglophone Journals

Abstract

As mentioned in the Preface, in 2011 the author and her colleagues received a grant from the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) in support of a research study intended to develop evidence-based guidance for journal editors on how to deal with different kinds of plagiarism detected through the use of CrossCheck (COPE Research Grant in CrossCheck guidance: an analysis of typical cases of plagiarism in different disciplines, 2010). The first part of the research was a global survey of journal editors and publishers, the results of which were published in an article entitled ‘A survey on the use of Cross Check in detecting plagiarism in academic journals’, which appeared in Learned Publishing in 2012 (Zhang and Jia in Learned Publishing 25, 2012). The article is reproduced in its entirety (with the publisher’s permission) below.

Appendices

Appendices

The survey questionnaire and the breakdown of respondents were made available as an online supplement to this paper when it was published in Learned Publishing in 2012; they remain available at http://www.zju.edu.cn/jzus/download/editorpapers/Authorsversion.pdf.

Appendix 1: Survey Questionnaire (SV1 + SV2)

• Title: Survey on Detecting Plagiarism in Journals using CrossCheck

• #This survey is being carried out as part of a research project funded by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

• (SV1 contains 22 questions, of which 10 (marked with *) were used in SV2)

• *Q1 What is the subject of your journal(s)? Choose firstly a broad category, as below.

• Chemistry/Physics/Engineering (Mechanical/Civil/Environmental/Industrial/Control, Aerospace etc.), Architecture, Mathematics/Statistics

• Life Sciences (including Bio-Sciences, Medicine, Agriculture)

• Computer Science/Electronics/Electrical Engineering/Automation/Artificial Intelligence etc.

• Social Sciences (Anthropology/Economics/Education/Geography/History/Law/Linguistics/Political Science/Public Administration/Psychology/Sociology)

• Others

• *Q2 Basic information about your journal(s)

• Country                _______________

• Language              _______________

• *Q3 Do you use CrossCheck?

• Yes

• No

• Q4 How do you use CrossCheck in checking the originality of submitted articles?

• All submissions are CrossChecked

• Only accepted papers are CrossChecked

• Only suspect papers are CrossChecked

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• Q5 As a journal editor, to what extent do you rely on the CrossCheck similarity report to judge whether submitted papers involve plagiarism?

• Rely entirely on the CrossCheck report—reject, without any review, papers with an unacceptably high score

• Rely entirely on reviewers’ comments; do not consider CrossCheck report

• Rely on both reviewers’ comments and CrossCheck report

• In suspect cases, send the CrossCheck report to reviewers for their advice

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• *Q6 The overall similarity index percentage is one important indicator of a potentially plagiaristic paper.

• Please indicate at what percentage you decide the paper contains:

• Minor plagiarism, minimum (%)                _______________

• Moderate plagiarism, minimum (%)           _______________

• Serious plagiarism, minimum (%)              _______________

• Triggers a reject, minimum (%)                  _______________

• Triggers request to author to rework it, minimum (%)          _______________

• (for SV2, similar Q is “In a journal paper, what percentage of copied content would you consider acceptable with citation?  ______________”

• Q7 The degree of similarity for each single match is also significant. Please indicate for single matches at what percentage you decide the paper contains:

• Minor plagiarism, minimum (%)                _______________

• Moderate plagiarism, minimum (%)           _______________

• Serious plagiarism, minimum (%)              _______________

• Triggers a reject, minimum (%)                  _______________

• Triggers request to author to rework it, minimum (%)              _______________

• Q8 What are your views on verbatim or near-verbatim copying of a short extract from another work?

• Acceptable if the copied text does not form the core of the submitted paper

• Acceptable if both citations are indicated and quotation marks are added

• Acceptable if either the citations are indicated or quotation marks are added

• Unacceptable in any circumstances—would lead to automatic rejection

• Q9 What length of extract (number of words) would you consider acceptable for verbatim copying in the following two cases?

• Without citation (number of words)            _______________

• With citation (number of words)                _______________

• *Q10 What is your policy regarding authors who cut-and-paste materials from other sources and integrate it with their own text?

• Acceptable and excusable if the paper is innovative; advise author either to include proper citation or to rewrite in own words

• Unacceptable in all cases; paper would be rejected

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• Q11 In sections Abstract/Introduction/Discussion, if between 1/4 and 1/3 of the content is copied without citations, what would you do?

• Reject

• Ask author to include citation or rewrite in own words

• Accept

• Q12 In sections Abstract/Introduction/Discussion, what percentage of copied content would you consider acceptable with citation?

• None

• 1–20 %

• 21–40 %

• 41–60 %

• More than 60 %

• Q13 In section Materials & Methods, if between 1/4 and 1/3 of the content is copied without citations, what would you do?

• Accept, as most methods can be repeated/re-used and this similarity has little influence on the paper’s originality

• Suggest the author revises paper using his or her own words

• Suggest the author just gives the citation; no need to repeat the method

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• Q14 In section Materials & Methods, what percentage of copied content would you consider acceptable with citation?

• None

• 1–20 %

• 21–40 %

• 41–60 %

• More than 60 %

• Q15 In section Results and Conclusions, what is your view of authors copying their own previously published tables or figures with no or small changes without citation?

• Reject

• Ask author to add citation to previous work

• Acceptable if paper is innovative

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• *Q16 Do you think papers previously published in conference proceedings can legitimately be republished in a journal with the addition of new content?

• No, it is a duplicate publication even with new content added

• Yes, irrespective of the amount of new content

• Yes, depending on the amount of new content. Please indicate what amount of new content as a minimum percentage   _______________

• *Q17 How do you deal with an article whose title, aims and methodologies are identical or highly similar to those of another paper published by the same research group, and where only the specific examples and materials, etc. are different?

• Reject

• Acceptable if the author can revise to highlight new findings or innovations, and cite the group’s previous publication(s)

• Acceptable without revision (other than citing the group’s previous publication(s)) if there are new findings or innovations

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• *Q18 Authors sometimes reuse significant portions of their own work, either verbatim or near-verbatim (self-plagiarism); they may claim that the papers are a series of studies with the same background, which will inevitably lead to similarity in the text. What is your reaction in cases like this?

• Reject, with or without citation(s)

• Accept, but only with citation(s)

• Accept with no revision if the similar text is not the core of the paper

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• *Q19 In writing a review paper, authors necessarily summarize (and cite) previously published papers. How do you handle cases where they have predominantly used the original authors’ own words?

• Reject

• Accept in any case

• Accept if the author rewrites in his or her own words

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• Q20 In a review paper, what percentage figure for the overall similarity index would you accept?

• Under 35 %

• 35–50 %

• Over 50 %

• Other (please specify)   _______________

• *Q21 In your own journal(s) and hence subject area, approximately what percentage of papers you receive are rejected specifically on account of plagiarism? (We are not asking for the title of your journal(s) to avoid any possible malevolent use of this information)

  ______________________________

• Q22 In your “Instructions for Authors”, would you consider announcing that you use CrossCheck to scan all papers submitted, or would this seem intimidating and counterproductive?

  ______________

  ______________________________

Appendix 2: List of Respondents to SV1, by Publisher (n = 161)