Each researcher has ultimate responsibility for the accuracy and validity of their own work. Each researcher shares this responsibility with colleagues and students with whom they establish collaborative or mentorship relationships. This document applies to all research engaged in by faculty and students. These guidelines are intended to heighten awareness of potential ethical problems. The purpose is to emphasize that the individual researcher has an obligation to maintain high scholarly and ethical standards, and a commitment to foster those standards in collaborators, students, and trainees.
Research can take many forms and vary across disciplines.
The issues addressed by these guidelines are essential to all research within the University community. Research responsibility, quality of scholarly activity, security of scholarly contributions and their sources, responsible authorship, and provision for training in ethics are issues inherent to all areas. The implications of these guidelines apply as fully to the scholar who uncovers an ancient civilization or authors a history textbook as to the laboratory scientist who reports a biological discovery or the clinician who publishes a case report. All faculty members are ultimately responsible for the scholarly character, accuracy, and reliability of their own research and for that conducted under their supervision. Each researcher is also responsible for the integrity and originality of their own research.