The forum aimed to educate and promote awareness across the university on the importance of conducting research responsibly. It introduced important definitions and showed the delicate interconnectivity between ethics and integrity.

November XX, 2022 — Following its first Research Integrity Education Caravan held in June 2022 for the Philippine General Hospital medical staff, the UP Manila Office of Research Integrity (ORI) held its second caravan on October 15, 2022 for the colleges of Allied Medical Professions, Nursing, and Pharmacy. 

The forum aimed to educate and promote awareness across the university on the importance of conducting research responsibly. It introduced important definitions and showed the delicate interconnectivity between ethics and integrity. It provided reflection points on certain issues that might be encountered or those that they may have been confronted with. The ORI timeline was also shown, demonstrating that research integrity is about defining boundaries while exploring frontiers that enables the academic and scientific community in which they belong to build on each other’s work.

Research integrity is the foundation of trust within the academic scientific community of which they are all members of. Dr. Edward H.M. Wang, ORI chair, said that “It makes sure that the research that you read, the public reads, that you submit to your dean, that you submit to DOST (Dept. of Science and Technology), that you submit to the Filipino people is trustworthy.” 

In his lectures entitled “Introduction to Research Integrity” and “Plagiarism,” Dr. Wang gave the historical perspective of the United States Office of Research Integrity and discussed the gravity of scientific misconduct  along with the issue of general unwillingness to guard against fraud and misconduct within their own scientific community.  The research spectrum that goes from “Responsible Conduct of Research” to “Questionable Research Practice” and finally to major violations on research misconduct – fraudulent research – involves Fabrication, Falsification, and Plagiarism then setting the stage for succeeding issues. 

Meanwhile, Dr. Jacinto Blas V. Mantaring III, ORI Member and UPM Research Ethics Board Chair, in his lecture “Fabrication and Falsification,” delved on research integrity, scientific misconduct, and their scope and prevalence. Dr. Jean Anne B. Toral, ORI member and PGH-EHRO coordinator for research, spoke of “Research Integrity & the Issue of Authorship” while Dr. Marilen P. Balolong, ORI Member and College of Arts and Sciences Associate Dean for Research, lectured on “Predatory Journals & Conferences.”

Haziel May C. Natorilla