Loss Of Credibility Research Articles

Plagiarism in Publications: All about Being Fair!

Upholding the highest standards of publication ethics is critical for ensuring the integrity of scholarly work, maintaining public trust, and advancing knowledge responsibly in academia. Plagiarism, defined as intellectual theft, is a significant ethical issue that undermines these principles. There are many forms of plagiarism, including direct, self, mosaic, and accidental plagiarism. Plagiarism is prevalent across the globe, but the problem is worse in developing countries due to numerous factors, such as social and economic conditions and lack of knowledge. The digital age has further exacerbated the situation, as easy access to artificial intelligence and online content facilitates plagiarism. To combat this problem, it is essential to recognize the importance of originality and the consequences of plagiarism, including damage to one's professional reputation, legal repercussions, and loss of credibility and trust. Educational institutions and publishers can play a crucial role in promoting a culture of fairness by implementing clear guidelines, providing training on ethical research practices, and enforcing strict consequences for violations. By encouraging an environment that values honesty, transparency, and respect for intellectual property, the academic community can uphold high ethical standards and contribute to the evolution of knowledge with integrity.

President’s Column: Inside SPE Governance

Editor’s Note: This is a summary of the December episode of the President’s vodcast. We encourage you to watch the episode to see the full conversation. This month’s column covers SPE’s governance, with a particular focus on the SPE Board of Directors and the way its members are selected. It revisits the 2022 controversy of the SPE-AAPG merger project and the Board petitions that followed. It is concluded with a proposed to-do list to improve our governance processes and increase membership communication and interaction. I will start with an explanation of our current process: In early November 2024, SPE announced the opening of the nomination cycle for the SPE International Board of Directors. A third of the SPE Board positions are open this year with the 2027 President, two regional directors (RD), and three technical directors (TD) to be selected. The process always starts with our members, who are expected to nominate the candidates. It may finish with members’ votes, but this is only in case of petition(s). Candidates must be nominated before 25 January 2025. Explanations are given here: https://www.spe.org/en/about/nominate/. Nomination forms are available here: https://www.spe.org/en/forms/bod/. This year the Nominating Committee is chaired by the 2024 President Terry Palisch. The Nominating Committee will select from qualified candidates, and the new slate of recommended nominees will be approved by the Board and communicated to the membership in the April 2025 edition of JPT. Members who object to any of these nominations will have 45 days to initiate a petition for an alternate candidate from at least 1% of the membership for the position of President and 2% of the concerned members for any other director position. Nominees who are not subject to a successful petition will be confirmed. Successful petitions, if any, will trigger a membership vote between the Board nominee and the petitioners’ nominee. Whatever the outcome, all new members will join the Board for 3 years, commencing at the 2025 SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition (ATCE). Petitions are rare, but we had a memorable set of three in 2022 in the wake of the (failed) attempt at an SPE-AAPG merger. Two TD and one RD nominations were challenged. All three petitions were successful, and three votes took place. The Board nominees (Hamad Al-Marri, Robert Martinez, and Robin Macmillan) were confirmed against petitioners’ nominees with scores ranging between 53% and 57%. Time flies, and this year they are outgoing Board directors and members of the new Nominating Committee. I was an at-large member of the Nominating Committee in 2022 when the petitions were initiated, and I took an active part in the online debate that followed. It was heated at times, with occasional accusations of corruption, collusion, irreversible loss of credibility, a bit of ad hominem trolling, etc. It was tense but also (I confess) entertaining. I was relieved to see our choices approved by the membership, but with an average score of 45% the petitioners turned out to be very relevant candidates. However, the low participation (15%) was a signal that neither side should celebrate: we were royally ignored by 85% of our membership, and with this level of participation, it could have gone either way. As an aside, this 15% turnout is consistent with other professional societies that elect their leadership directly by membership vote.

LETHIQUE DANS LA RECHERCHE ET LENCADREMENT DES MEMOIRES ET THESES DANS LES UNIVERSITES PUBLIQUES DU BENIN

This article analyzes the ethics involved in research reports and the supervision of theses and dissertations within the academic environment. It aims to understand the underlying logics behind the behaviors and practices of various categories of actors in light of the ethical principles that structure academic research, on one hand, and to demonstrate that the loss of credibility and the quality of scientific output in academia result from structural problems and a crisis of trust observed between teachers and learners. Our methodological approach, although socio-anthropological in nature, is oriented towards an ethnographic and comprehensive perspective of the practices and behaviors of these two categories of university community members. It is combined with a biographical approach focusing on the analysis of life narratives from students and teachers, data from individual interviews, discussions, testimonials, and observational data. From this research, it emerges initially that the image of academia in Benin is the result of the quality of scientific output, structural issues in research funding, and strategies developed by teacher-researchers concerning the renewal of their academic ranks. This work has shown that these strategies compromise the credibility of scientific publications and betray students trust in their supervisors while also contaminating their relationships and damaging the image of the university. Consequently, the prominence of the university system must rely on profound changes concerning the funding and evaluation of research.

Conceptos, utilidad, mitos y realidades de las alarmas y pronósticos de la amenaza sísmica, desde la perspectiva de la gestión del riesgo en Costa Rica

Risk materializes periodically, near cities and infrastructure through destructive socioeconomic impacts hindering development in Costa Rica, located at a very active and complex tectonic region. Frequent and intense seismic activity has occurred for tens of millions of years and will not stop in the future. Risk, derived from seismicity depends on both earthquake hazard features (magnitude, hypocentral depth, rupture mechanism, strong motion, wave propagation during the events, geomechanical site conditions, local effects, topography), and the vulnerability of exposed elements (population, urban areas, economy). For this reason, compliance with earthquake-resistant design codes and territorial planning must be enforced. These measures have been successful, such as when adobe was banned as building material thus radically reducing vulnerability of houses. The question "Will a major event happen?" is futile because there is no doubt that it will. Engaging in uncertain forecasts and abusing on the frequency of delivering incomplete information to the public induce stress, uncertainty, and affect socioeconomic activity. In Costa Rica, seismic alarms will not give reaction time more than 10 seconds for shallow focus local earthquakes, and 10 to a maximum of 30 seconds for major subduction events. Alarms might create feelings of security without robust basis by making believe that risk has been solved, and paradoxically increasing vulnerability. An excess of alarms of non-destructive tremors, and "false alarms", will cause a loss of credibility and deteriorate response to actual destructive events. Seismic forecasts and alarms, under such circumstances, are luxuries whose technological, scientific, and financial basis should not compete against more urgent priorities for risk management.

Improvising the Malware Detection Accuracy in Portable Document Format (PDFs) through Machine Learning Classifiers

Every time a spike is observed in cyber-attacks, a huge financial loss is incurred that has surpassed $2 trillion according to some estimates. Apart from monetary setbacks, the damages in terms of loss of credibility and quality of services are way more difficult to recover. PDF documents have been considered as innocuous source of data sharing with static meta-tags. However, the structure of PDF file contains different objects, features and characteristics that make it easier for the attackers to invade (by attaching the malicious code with tags). Current research is focused on analyzing the structure of PDF files, data-structures exploited and extracting feature tags with associated feature values of PDFs. A total of 17,884 documents were used, having two categories (8942 malicious documents and 8942 benign files).

The Vicious Circle of Corruption in the Human Side of the Enterprise

The vicious circle of corruption constitutes a bane in the business world. Corruption is a canker that must be eroded to create new incentives for innovative management system and improved productivity in the local and global economies. The dwindling economy many developing nations are facing today (Nigeria inclusive) has raised serious concern. This conference paper adopts historical and descriptive research methods. Many corrupt firms suffer morale decadence and counterproductive work behaviours which culminated in productivity downturn. Corruption had permeated many segments of the society, ravaged the corporate scene of nations and left many firms as travail of woes for investors. The code of morals and leadership ethnics had suffered for years. In Nigeria, illicit acts and counterproductive work behaviours have characterized many firms in recent times. Budgets and financial records do not only lack the attributes of truth and fairness but suffer credibility loss and unreliability in the business population for years. Corruption is cankerous and designated authorities, institutions and agencies (nationally and internationally) have made tremendous efforts to fight and erode this dreadful canker from the business environment. Yet, not much is achieved; rather much is required.

El impacto del fraude en la competitividad de las instituciones prestadorasde servicios de salud «IPS» de Valledupar

Introduction: Fraud in the healthcare sector is a phenomenon that can have serious consequences, not only in economic terms but also in the quality and accessibility of health services. Objective: To analyze the incidence of fraud on the competitiveness of IPS in Valledupar. Methodology: The epistemic approach of the research was positivist. Regarding the type of study, it was descriptive with a non-experimental field study design. The population selected for this study consisted of officials from the IPS under study. Results: The results show that the IPS in Valledupar under study do not have mechanisms that can be implemented, meaning there is no effective approach to establishing robust internal controls designed to prevent fraudulent activities. Conclusions: Business fraud has been detected, which has had serious consequences not only for the companies and their shareholders but also for the employees, customers, and the economy of Valledupar, causing a loss of credibility in the health service providers

Unveiling image forgery with cutting-edge techniques-a survey

Digital social platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc., driven by multimedia content, has led to billions of photos being shared annually. The ease of image modification has resulted in ‘deepfakes’, causing potential misinformation, emotional distress, and credibility loss. Image forgery has become a widespread problem with the advent of digital manipulation tools. Manipulated pictures are a problem in the digital world, demanding strong detection methods. This survey explores this important field and offers an extensive overview of state-of-the-art methods for identifying picture forgeries. Breaking down well-known techniques such as classic feature analysis, which unmask significant differences by examining pixels in depth and statistical irregularities. Moreover, this paper explores the revolutionary potential of deep learning by highlighting how convolutional neural networks (CNNs) can analyze pictures with unparalleled accuracy and reveal previously unseen alterations. By providing readers with a comprehensive grasp of the most recent developments in picture forgery detection with the datasets, this article gives them the knowledge they need to successfully negotiate the always changing field of visual deception. This survey acts as a launchpad for further research and development.

Hate, crime and epistemic vulnerability: on sense-making and feelings of (un)safety among Danish Muslims.

This article investigates feelings of (un)safety emerging from knowing and sharing knowledge about hate crime and hate incidents. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews with young Muslims living in the greater Copenhagen area, the article explores the way the interlocutors seek to make sense of their experiences through available epistemic categories, and how this sense-making is shaped by reactions from the surrounding society, e.g., whether it is questioned, supported, ignored etc. Combining criminological and psychological research on direct and indirect harms of hate crime with insights from philosophy on epistemic encounters and their ethical implications the article provides a framework for investigating safety in epistemic interactions. Based on this framework, the article show the often hard work that people perform in order to balance epistemic needs (e.g. the need for knowledge and for recognition) with epistemic risks (e.g. the risk of testimonial rejection, of damaged epistemic confidence, or loss of credibility).

Believe me when I say green! Heterogeneous expectations and climate policy uncertainty

We develop a dynamic model where heterogeneous firms take investment decisions depending on their beliefs on future carbon prices. A policy-maker announces a forward-looking carbon price schedule but can decide to default on its plans if perceived transition risks are high. We show that weak policy commitment, especially when combined with ambitious mitigation announcements, can trap the economy into a vicious circle of credibility loss, carbon-intensive investments and increasing risk perceptions, ultimately leading to a failure of the transition. The presence of behavioural frictions and heterogeneity - both in capital investment choices and in the assessment of the policy-maker's credibility - has strong non-linear effects on the transition dynamics and the emergence of ‘high-carbon traps’. We identify analytical conditions leading to a successful transition and provide a numerical application for the EU economy.

Stochastic credibility and optimal monetary policy

AbstractIn this paper, I study optimal monetary policy in a simple New Keynesian model with loose commitment and stochastic credibility. The loose commitment framework breaks the commitment‐discretion dichotomy in optimal monetary policy problems and allows for intermediate cases between commitment and discretion. Under this framework, the central bank is imperfectly credible, meaning that it occasionally reneges on promised policy plans. I contribute to the literature by introducing time‐variation in the central bank's credibility. I model credibility as an exogenous two‐state Markov chain and use a recursive saddlepoint functional equation to solve the model. I find that greater persistence and frequency of credibility losses increase welfare losses.

Deviating from the course: How presentational strategies and leadership investments affect leader credibility and collaborative engagement

When changing course, public managers often risk losing credibility in the eyes of their employees. A key question, therefore, is how a manager’s presentational strategy regarding a change in initiatives influences employees’ judgments of the manager’s credibility, especially when substantial investments were made in the prior initiative. We develop a typology of presentational strategies to probe how public managers can navigate such situations. In a preregistered and scenario-based survey experiment, we expose 499 occupational therapists employed in Danish municipalities to video-vignettes that manipulate a manager’s presentational strategy and investment in a leadership initiative. Taking responsibility for the decision increases loss of credibility and engagement compared to the control group. Blaming politicians retains credibility and engagement in cases of low initial commitment but less so for high commitment. These findings show that the way in which decisions are presented matters for credibility and engagement when managers change leadership initiatives.

Tax optimisation in the tax risk management process. Tax-legal analysis and selected managerial issues

ObjectivesThe aim of the article is to theoretically present ways of legally optimising the taxation of entrepreneurs' income, by using the appropriate construction of legal regulations and legal and organisational forms of business. The issues of tax risk in the context of tax management are also presented. The goal of management is to reduce economic risk and to protect against its consequences.Material and methodsResearch in the social sciences, is inspired by numerous and diverse needs. Therefore, we will reduce the existing needs to two main types, to which certain types of research correspond. The first is combined with needs of a theoretical or cognitive nature, that is, it includes all those needs that are associated with the development of a particular science. The second is combined with the various needs of practice.ResultsIncome taxes also have a negative impact on the assets (equity) of entrepreneurs. The reduction in wealth results from the burdening of entrepreneurs with both wealth taxes and corporate income tax in the case of capital companies and, in the case of partnerships, with personal income tax for distributions made to partners.ConclusionsBoth of these risks describe a potential reality, i.e. the possibility of coming into conflict with the tax authorities. Their realisation is random, with the so-called double randomness - both the timing of the event (conflict) and its depth, i.e. the consequences, are unknown. These effects are mainly financial (arrears incurred, financial sanctions, etc.), although loss of credibility, for example, may also be involved. Importantly, both risks are linked to uncertainty, but each with a different one. Speculative risk is linked to the uncertainty of whether an illegal act will come to light.

The Role of the Press in Free and Fair Elections in Uganda: A Case Study of Daily Monitor News Paper

The media is an essential component of any democratic election. This is illustrated in a way that keeps voters informed about the policies and agendas of different political parties and contenders. Until voters are aware of each candidate's position on every issue, they will not be able to completely exercise their right to vote. Conversely, the media can aid voters in their self-education by providing a comparative analysis of important issues. Numerous individuals have viewed the media's above-mentioned job as idealistic and unachievable, asserting that regular reporting on events is rife with "fake news" and falls short of the criteria of superior journalism. Descriptive statistics were used to examine the coded data, and information was generated and presented in the form of graphs, tables, and charts exhibiting frequencies and percentages. The study suggests that false news has existed since the internet's prehistory and is prevalent today. It highlights the negative impact of false news on media organizations, leading to credibility loss and costly investigations. Despite ethical journalism rules, media organizations face threats of closure or censorship. The general population is a significant source of fake news. False news in Uganda leads to various consequences, such as media organization closure, damage to brand reputation, and mistrust of news industries. It can also cause underdevelopment, increased demonstrations, hatred, and even innocent deaths. Despite adhering to ethical journalism rules, media organizations face threats of closure or censorship. False news in media organizations can lead to credibility loss, costly investigations, and threats of closure or censorship, while the general population is a significant source, causing incidents like demonstrations, hatred, deaths, and celebrity reputation damage. Key words: Media, Democracy, Citizenship, Marketization, Election.

The poor reliability of thermal conductivity data in the aerogel literature: a call to action!

Aerogels are an exciting class of materials with record-breaking properties including, in some cases, ultra-low thermal conductivities. The last decade has seen a veritable explosion in aerogel research and industry R&D, leading to the synthesis of aerogels from a variety of materials for a rapidly expanding range of applications. However, both from the research side, and certainly from a market perspective, thermal insulation remains the dominant application. Unfortunately, continued progress in this area suffers from the proliferation of incorrect thermal conductivity data, with values that often are far outside of what is possible within the physical limitations. This loss of credibility in reported thermal conductivity data poses difficulties in comparing the thermal performance of different types of aerogels and other thermal superinsulators, may set back further scientific progress, and hinder technology transfer to industry and society. Here, we have compiled 519 thermal conductivity results from 87 research papers, encompassing silica, other inorganic, biopolymer and synthetic polymer aerogels, to highlight the extent of the problem. Thermal conductivity data outside of what is physically possible are common, even in high profile journals and from the world’s best universities and institutes. Both steady-state and transient methods can provide accurate thermal conductivity data with proper instrumentation, suitable sample materials and experienced users, but nearly all implausible data derive from transient methods, and hot disk measurements in particular, indicating that under unfavorable circumstances, and in the context of aerogel research, transient methods are more prone to return unreliable data. Guidelines on how to acquire reliable thermal conductivity data are provided. This paper is a call to authors, reviewers, editors and readers to exercise caution and skepticism when they report, publish or interpret thermal conductivity data.Graphical

Implementing integrative therapies in adult critical care: Barriers and strategies

BackgroundCritically ill patients experience intense physical and psychological stressors in the intensive care unit (ICU). More than half of ICU survivors report overwhelming mental health symptoms after ICU discharge, such as post-traumatic stress symptoms, anxiety, and depression. Relaxation-inducing integrative therapies such as guided imagery, massage, therapeutic touch, music therapy, and spirituality-based healing practices have the potential to promote comfort and relaxation and improve patient outcomes. ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to explore the attitudes of healthcare professionals towards the implementation of relaxation-inducing integrative therapies in critical care, barriers to implementation, and potential strategies to overcome them. MethodsWe conducted seven focus group interviews with 23 critical care clinicians (70% nurses, 17% allied health professionals, 13% physicians). Interviews were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim. Data were thematically analysed using an inductive content analysis approach. FindingsResults reveal a constant interplay between mostly positive personal attitudes towards implementation of integrative therapies and the perceived culture and priorities of the unit. The main benefits for critically ill patients as perceived by participants were promotion of comfort, sleep, and coping, increase of trust, and decrease of pain and stress. As for barriers, dominant themes were a perceived lack of evidence, cost, and time constraints and the fear of loss of professional credibility. Participants related nurses’ education and training, family involvement, and leadership were seen as main strategies for implementation. ConclusionsThe dominant ICU culture needs to be considered when implementing integrative therapies. Education, access to evidence, and role modelling are proposed as means to shift the ICU culture towards utilisation of integrative therapies in critical care.

Managerial Dynamics as a Deciding factor for Corporate Social Disclosures among Quoted Manufacturing Companies in Nigeria

The continuous growth and expansion in the global economy with its attendant consequences on the environment and society have necessitated the increasing push by stakeholders for companies’ world over to disclose their social impacts on society. Consequently, the persistent increase in the demand for increase in social information has resulted to loss of credibility by stakeholders in the annual report of companies. The Nigerian business climate is no exception to this dilemma which serves as motivation for this research. Hence, this study investigates the extent to which managerial efficiency influences corporate social disclosures among listed Manufacturing companies in Nigeria. Using Krejcie and Morgan sample selection criteria, the sample size for the ex-post factor research design with a population of seventy-six (76) listed industrial businesses was sixty-three (63). However, because of irregular company listings and inadequate data availability, only forty-nine (49) of the companies were chosen to be included in the sample size spanning seven (7) sectors. Data were analyzed using Panel Corrected Standard Error Estimation. The results showed a significant level of 0.000 and a positive correlation of 0.019 between management effectiveness and corporate social disclosure of Nigerian listed industrial companies. Consequently, the study unquestionably showed that while managerial performance is beneficial, corporate social disclosure is significantly impacted by it. Therefore, the study suggested that the Nigeria Exchange Group (NGX) should implement additional regulations and controls to guarantee that all listed manufacturing companies continue to disclose information on product responsibility, human rights, and the social impact of manufacturing operations.

Realist constructivism: a new perspective on norm theory

We contribute to the advancement of scholarship on realist constructivism by illustrating its potential to enrich norm theory and elucidate the role of states in shaping identities. The primary challenge in fully realizing the potential of realist constructivism lies in reconciling constructivists' perspectives on norms as carriers of universal ethical standards with realists' emphasis on their instrumental value for state interests. We address this contradiction by highlighting the existence of two distinct types of norms: individual and group norms. Individual norms are grounded in fundamental and inalienable human rights, exhibiting universality and resilience. In contrast, group norms primarily address collective rights and interests, rendering them more susceptible to instrumentalization by states and thus more contingent and changeable. Realist constructivism enables us to acknowledge the coexistence of both types of norms and analyze their interactions. Our framework is empirically tested using two norms concerning individual rights (the norm against anti-personnel landmines and the norm against torture), two norms related to group interests (the norm promoting the green energy transition and the norm of world-class universities), and one borderline case (the norm against genocide). We show that efforts to frame norms of the second category and to graft them onto the human rights discource have yielded intriguing outcomes, legitimizing and empowering new principles of interntional governance. Conversely, the instrumentalization of norms from the first category to serve national interests can weaken them, leading to a loss of credibility on the international stage.

Automated web testing over the last decade: A systematic literature review

Web applications play a vital role in every section ranging from business to administration, making operations efficient. Reliability must be ensured to avoid loss of credibility and revenue. Testing modern web applications is very tedious due to their dynamic and asynchronous nature. Web applications evolve rapidly to serve the growing needs of the customers and manual testing is often infeasible to maintain the reliability and validity of the system due to time and resource constraints. Automated web application testing is an ongoing popular research domain due to the complexity imposed by web applications. This paper conducts a systematic literature review on the practices of automated web testing over the past decade. PRISMA framework is used to screen the most relevant research papers using Scopus and Web of Science as the database. A total of 26 papers were selected based on the inclusion criteria and quality assessment. The articles were fetched and their contributions are documented to know about current practices and the effectiveness of such approaches in minimizing human effort. Results indicate broadly two categories of automated testing, one depending on the tester’s expertise to generate test cases, and the other relying on crawlers to exploit the system dynamically.

Fighting against COVID-19: With or without politics?

To respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments frequently resorted to declaring the state of emergency, fuelling contestations over the abuse of public powers and effectiveness of the measures to induce compliance. This article examines how the denial of the political nature of emergency governance known as depoliticisation undermines government credibility and may suit anti-democratic actors. We contribute to understanding the relationship between depoliticisation and democracy by showing how Slovak coalition parties during key parliamentary debates on the state of emergency during the COVID-19 pandemic insisted on depoliticising the pandemic while parliamentary opposition parties with anti-democratic leanings successfully opted for its repoliticisation. Repoliticising a key decision on managing the public health emergency granted credibility to illiberal political actors at the expense of the government, cautioning against depoliticisation strategies to be invoked by democrats in fragile democracies. Instead, accepting that such decisions are political may prevent the loss of credibility due to unsuccessful rhetorical practices of depoliticisation.