The pursuit of knowledge, ideas, and creativity is fundamental to the work of the University. This leads to excellence in teaching, research, publication, and creative output. These activities must be conducted with the highest degree of rigour, honesty, and ethics. The credibility of individual faculty members, researchers, students, staff, and the entire University rests upon this integrity in the pursuit of knowledge, ideas, and creativity.

In order to protect individuals and the University, policies and procedures are required both to support integrity in research, scholarly and creative activity, and to deal with allegations in misconduct in these matters.

The following document describes the policies and procedures to deal with issues of integrity and misconduct in research, scholarly and creative activity at Mount Allison University.

• Recognizing the substantive contributions of collaborators and students; using unpublished work of other researchers and scholars only with permission and with due acknowledgement; and using archival material in accordance with the rules of the archival source.
  
  
• Obtaining the permission of the author before using new information, concepts or data originally obtained through access to confidential manuscripts or applications for funds for research or training that may have been seen as a result of processes such as peer review.
  
  
• Using scholarly and scientific rigour and integrity in obtaining, recording and analysing data, and in reporting and publishing results.
  
  
• Ensuring that authorship of published work includes all those who have materially contributed to, and share responsibility for, the contents of the publication, and only those people.
  
  
• Revealing to sponsors, postsecondary institutions, journals or funding agencies, any material conflict of interest, financial or other, that might influence their decisions on whether the individual should be asked to review manuscripts or applications, test products or be permitted to undertake work sponsored from outside sources.

Misconduct in research, scholarly and creative activity concerns intentional deception or action, in the course of carrying out such activities. Misconduct in relation to scholarly activity also has degrees of seriousness. Conversely, misconduct in research, scholarly and creative activity does not include any matter involving only an honest difference of opinion or an honest error of judgment.

• Fabrication of data, falsification of results or plagiarism.
  
  
• Taking advantage of one’s privileged access to the work of others, or the deliberate misrepresentation of one’s own work or that of others.
  
  
• Failure to comply with applicable federal or provincial statutes, regulations or guidelines and policies of granting agencies or the university for the protection of researchers, human subjects, or the health and safety of the public, or for the welfare of laboratory animals; or failure to meet other legal requirements (or generally accepted standards) that relate to the conduct or reporting of research.
  
  
• Failure to reveal any material conflict of interest during review of research grant applications or manuscripts, and improper reviewing of a research grant application by another scholar.
  
  
• Failure to reveal any material conflict of interest to the sponsors, the university, or to those who commission work, including the testing of products for sale or distribution to the public.
  
  
• Failure to reveal to the university any material financial interest in a company, organization, partnership or person that contracts with the university to undertake research, particularly research involving the company’s products, or to provide research related materials or services. Material financial interest means ownership, stock holdings, a directorship, significant honoraria or consulting or other fees or payments, but does not include minor stock holdings in publicly traded corporations. Such financial interest may be held or received personally or by any member of the individual’s family.
  
  
• Purposeful destruction of one’s own research data in order to avoid the detection of wrong doing; the tampering with or destruction of the research data of another; or, once the results of the research have been published, refusal to provide access to the data that resulted in the published document (without good and sufficient reason), for the purpose of verification by bona fide academic researchers for a period of five (5) years from the date of publication.
  
  
• Disposing of intellectual property outside the university without due benefit to those entitled to some return on the investment in such intellectual property; or failure to comply with university regulations concerning the disposal of intellectual property, equipment, or other resources.
  
  
• Failure to acknowledge the substantive contributions of others, including students, or the use of unpublished work of other authors without permission, or the use of archival material in violation of the rules of the archival source.
  
  
• Failure to obtain the permission of the author before making significant use of new information, concepts or data obtained through access to confidential manuscripts or grant applications during the peer review process.
  
  
• Attributing authorship to anyone other than those who have had direct involvement in the research and who have formally accepted responsibility for the intellectual content of the published documents.
  
  
• Submitting an article for publication which is substantially identical to one which has been published previously, except where it is clearly indicated in the published work that the article is intended to be a republication.
  
  
• The intentional misuse of funds designated for research purposes.

The primary responsibility for integrity in research, scholarly and creative activity rests with the individuals carrying out these activities.

• Regardless of the specific nature of an allegation, the University has an obligation to examine each allegation and reach a conclusion.
  
  
• Protect the privacy of the person(s) accused and of the person(s) making the allegations as far as is possible given the need for due process in pursuing the enquiry.
  
  
• Allow the accused person(s) due process and full opportunity to respond to the allegations throughout the investigation through mechanisms consistent with due process and natural justice. This principle includes the right of the individual to union representation, if applicable, throughout the process.
  
  
• Ensure allegations are dealt with as expeditiously as possible without compromising due process for all involved.
  
  
• A file containing copies of all correspondence, evidence, written summaries of any meetings or hearings, and a final report, shall be maintained.