In the media

KU Leuven is currently investigating some 20 papers from the period 1999 to 2013 that would contain fraudulent images. Two papers have recently been withdrawn, one has been officially corrected. The investigation of the Committee for Academic Integrity is in a final phase. The articles that are under discussion come from the biomedical sciences. Three Leuven professors are a co-author of several indicated papers. In many cases, this was done in collaboration with colleagues from foreign institutions.

On September 24, 2017 the Dutch newspaper de Volkskrant reported on an investigation into self-plagiarism (zelfplagiaat) that was conducted by a Nijmengen research group. The sociologist of science and his PhD student analysed 922 publications by Dutch researchers from recent years. In economics, 14 % of the papers contained text from previous publications of the author(s), in psychology the figure was 5 %. They even found a duplicate article republished with just one small change, and two highly similar articles by the same author in the same issue of a journal. They also found that authors who publish more papers are more likely to reuse text.

Every researcher in the Netherlands is to be questioned about whether they have committed research misconduct or engaged in “sloppy science” as part of a major national effort to bolster scientific standards. In response to rising concerns over a “reproducibility crisis” in science and a series of high-profile fraud cases in the Netherlands, the country is to commit 8 million euros ($9 million) to understanding the problem, finding solutions and trying to reproduce critical studies.

For Dutch Youth Representative for UNESCO, education has to come to the forefront of the development debate. He states that the implementation and effectiveness of many education programmes is hampered by corruption, and that young people can play a vital role in combatting this.

Independent investigations into journalism diplomas awarded at Windesheim University have found that one in four students should not actually have been awarded one. In what is seen as one of the biggest failures of quality assurance in Netherlands higher education, two independent committees that looked into the work of all students who graduated in the past two years concluded that 86 out of 360 students should not have received a diploma.

A world-renowned expert on the reduction of risks involved in heart surgery has been dismissed from Erasmus University Medical Centre in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, after violation of academic integrity. In one study it was found that he used patient data without permission, used fictitious data, and that two reports were submitted to conferences which included knowingly unreliable data.

A Tilburg University inquiry has recommended that details of forgery of documents and fraud committed by a leading social psychologist should be passed to the Dutch public prosecution service.