Plagiarism

Fabrication is making up, inventing, or falsifying data, results, observations, or sources and presenting them as genuine. It includes creating nonexistent data points, experiments, survey responses, citations, or participant records. 

• Category: Research misconduct / academic dishonesty  

• Key risk: Misleading scholarship, damaged reputations, retractions, legal and career consequences  

• Typical contexts: Research (lab, field, clinical, social sciences), coursework (lab reports, datasets), publications, grant applications, institutional records 

• Inventing data or results not obtained in experiments or surveys  

• Faking experimental procedures, observations, or field notes  

• Creating fictitious survey or interview responses or participant records  

• Listing authors, collaborators, or participants who did not exist or did not contribute  

• Fabricating references or citations (invented papers, DOIs, publication details)  

• Forging signatures or approval documents (consent forms, ethics approvals) 

• Pressure to publish, graduate, or achieve high grades  

• Time constraints or failed experiments  

• Competitive funding and career incentives  

• Desire for clear, publishable results or to meet unrealistic expectations 

• Statistical anomalies or impossible data patterns  

• Missing raw data, lab notebooks, metadata, or original files  

• Results inconsistent with described methods or with established knowledge  

• Reuse of the same datasets across unrelated studies without explanation  

• Failed attempts at independent replication  

• Nonexistent or unverifiable citations and sources 

• Maintain meticulous, dated lab notebooks and raw data files; keep backups  

• Use version control for data and code; preserve metadata and timestamps  

• Pre-register studies and analysis plans where applicable  

• Share raw data, code, and protocols openly when appropriate  

• Provide clear documentation of methods, data exclusions, and transformations  

• Ensure adequate supervision, mentoring, and oversight of trainees  

• Build realistic timelines; reduce incentives and pressures that encourage misconduct  

• Provide training in research ethics and responsible conduct 

• Academic: failing assignment/course, probation, suspension, expulsion  

• Research: retraction of publications, loss of funding, harm to coauthors’ reputations  

• Professional/legal: termination, debarment from funding, legal action in severe cases  

• Ethical/reputational: loss of trust and long-term career damage