BEYOND Guidelines for Preventing and Addressing Research Misconduct

This article presents the BEYOND Guidelines for Preventing and Addressing Research Misconduct. The Guidelines are grounded in the BEYOND project’s evidence-based, behavioural, and complexity-informed approach to research misconduct (RM), viewing the latter not through the simplistic and plainly individualistic “bad apples” approach but from a research ecosystem perspective. In this manner, the project and the Guidelines view research behaviour as shaped by the interaction of individual factors with organisational structures, incentives, norms, cultures, and wider social and institutional conditions. Based on these considerations, the Guidelines promote a multi-stakeholder and shared-responsibility approach to preventing and addressing RM, involving researchers, research performing organisations (RPOs), research funding organisations (RFOs), research ethics and research integrity (RE/RI) bodies, publishers, policymakers, citizen scientists, and other actors across the research ecosystem. They also emphasise prevention and effective responses to RM while addressing the socio-economic consequences of RM, and promoting researcher health and well-being, public trust, supportive research cultures, and the need for clear, accessible, and context-sensitive RE/RI policies. The Guidelines provide principles for the fair, independent, timely, and proportionate handling of RM allegations; safeguards for whistleblowers and others involved in proceedings; institutional learning from RM cases; and measures to address politically sensitive allegations and prevent misuse of investigative processes. They also acknowledge rehabilitation and reintegration as potentially appropriate responses following RM, subject to considerations of proportionality and appropriateness in light of the circumstances of the case, and emphasise institutional support, mentoring, training, and opportunities to rebuild trust. Finally, the Guidelines highlight preventive behavioural and educational approaches, including ethically designed nudges and RE/RI training that is reflective, participatory, context-sensitive, and subject to meaningful evaluation. Taken together, the Guidelines propose a prevention-to-reintegration approach to RM that combines individual and institutional responsibility and seeks to foster more supportive, fair, trustworthy, and resilient research environments across diverse European research contexts.