Scientists explain why they plagiarize

[n2doc]

By Dan Vergano, USA TODAY
Scientists don't often turn the microscope on themselves, and when they do, the results sometimes prove disappointing.
"It's just too easy to cut and paste these days," says Harold Garner of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, an expert of scientific plagiarism.

In a report in the current journal Science, his team lists excuses offered by "potential" plagiarists, authors of studies in which the text was, on average, 86.2% similar to previously-published work. Last year, the same team reported in Nature that a sample of the federal government's PubMed database of studies suggests about 1 in 200 papers is plagiarized.

"Over time, the responses just got crazier and crazier," says Tara Long, Garner's colleague at Texas Southwestern. "There's every excuse in the book, from 'my hard drive crashed' to 'the other guy did it.' "

more:

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/columnist/vergano/2009-03-07-plagiarize-scientists_N.htm

[BadgerKid]

1. Sometimes an explanation is so clear

that it's next to impossible to re-word. Either rephrase it anyway and cite it, or cite it.

Authors publishing the same work in two places does happen; I've seen it once.

[n2doc]

2. That second one happens all the time

Frankly, when I see some scientists who publish upwards of 30-40 papers a year, that is the only way I can figure out how they do it.

[BadgerKid]

3. That's what happens when quantity is the metric.

There is definitely a lot of repackaging of results. The more obscure the journal, the easier it would appear to be able to do.

[TZ]

4. Some of it is sheer laziness..

Many scientists are really poor writers.

[n2doc]

5. That is a result of not requiring writing classes

Just like we don't require teaching effectiveness classes either and end up with some really poorly taught classes. There are a lot of ways Scientists let down their students, basically some care and teach these aspects, and some only care about finishing off the latest grant and writing another one.

[Johonny]

6. I think it has more to do with

the kind of writing they do. Which tends to be very different than the standard essay writing that they learn in English class. My undergraduate school had students take a class in scientific writing. Really the only way to get good at it is to do it. I think many scientist simply do not write their own work up enough. Often relying on senior members of the group. The lack of opportunity in writing clearly is a drag in their future writing skill. Scientific writing is a skill like any other that only improves with practice. It's also an art and it's no surprise that some people are more skilled than others. Since there is no real requirement that good writers be good scientists, it's no surprise to find some extremely talent writers are also talented scientists and some terrible writers are also good scientist.

[sofa king]

7. "The greatest who ever got chalk on his coat...."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWsjpt-p1pQ