Good Rese­arch Practice

In its meeting on April 26, 2023, the Senate of the Univer­sity of Applied Science Schwä­bisch Gmünd agreed on a statute to ensure good rese­arch prac­tice. It is based on the 2019 ​„Guide­lines for Safe­guar­ding Good Rese­arch Prac­tice“ (Code of Conduct) by the DFG.

Contact Person for Alle­ga­tions of Scien­tific Misconduct

If you have concrete suspi­cions of scien­tific miscon­duct, please inform the contact person. The infor­ma­tion should be given in writing, and only in excep­tional cases by e‑mail (exclu­si­vely by using the HfG e‑mail addresses on both sides). The HfG contact person accepts inqui­ries while main­tai­ning confidentiality.

At the HfG, there is a right of choice in such way that its members and employees can contact either the local contact person of the HfG or the national German Rese­arch Ombudsman. The German Rese­arch Ombudsman is an inde­pen­dent body that provides advice and support on issues rela­ting to good rese­arch prac­tice and alle­ga­tions of inap­pro­priate conduct.

In the case of exami­na­tion affairs, the respon­sible exami­na­tion board must first deal with the matter. The proce­dure before the exami­na­tion board is based on exami­na­tion regulations.

Ombus­person

Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Ute Margarete Meyer

Department of Architecture and Energy Engineering, Hochschule Biberach für angewandte Wissenschaften, Karlstraße 7
88400 Biberach

Send email

07351 582201

Substi­tute

Prof. Dr. Susanne Schade

Produktgestaltung
Studiengangsleiterin Strategische Gestaltung

Send email

07171 6026785

Scien­tific Misconduct

Scien­tific miscon­duct shall be given, if during the process of scien­tific work false infor­ma­tion is given either inten­tio­nally or due to gross negli­gence, or if intellec­tual property rights of others are violated, or if their rese­arch work is sabo­taged in any other way. In parti­cular, the follo­wing may be considered as poten­ti­ally serious misconduct:

1. Falsi­fying information

  • Inven­ting data
  • Mani­pu­la­tion of data, e.g., by selec­ting and rejec­ting unde­sired results without disclo­sing it, or by mani­pu­la­ting a plot or a figure
  • Incor­rect infor­ma­tion in a letter of appli­ca­tion or a funding appli­ca­tion, inclu­ding incor­rect infor­ma­tion on the publi­ca­tion organ and on publi­ca­tions in print, insofar as these are science-related

2. Infrin­ge­ment of intellec­tual property

  • Unmarked adop­tion of third-party content without the required indi­ca­tion of the source (plagia­rism)
  • Explo­ita­tion of rese­arch approa­ches and ideas, espe­ci­ally as a reviewer (theft of ideas)
  • Presump­tion or unfounded assump­tion of scien­tific author­ship or co-author­ship, espe­ci­ally if no genuine, plau­sible contri­bu­tion to the scien­tific content of the publi­ca­tion was made
  • Falsi­fi­ca­tion of the content
  • Unaut­ho­rized publi­ca­tion and unaut­ho­rized disclo­sure to third parties as long as the work, finding, hypo­thesis, teaching or rese­arch approach has not yet been published

3. Clai­ming the (co-)authorship of another without their consent

4. Sabo­tage of rese­arch activity

5. Elimi­na­tion of primary data

Author­ship

At the HfG, an author is an indi­vi­dual who has made a genuine, iden­ti­fiable contri­bu­tion to the content of a rese­arch publi­ca­tion of text, data or soft­ware. The contri­bu­tion must be added to the rese­arch content of the publication.

An iden­ti­fiable, genuine contri­bu­tion is deemed to exist parti­cu­larly in instances in which rese­ar­chers take part in

  • the deve­lo­p­ment and concep­tual design of the rese­arch project, or
  • the gathe­ring, coll­ec­tion, acqui­si­tion or provi­sion of data, soft­ware, sources, or
  • the analysis/​evaluation or inter­pre­ta­tion of data, sources and conclu­sions drawn from them, or
  • the draf­ting of the manuscript.

Hono­rary author­ship where no such contri­bu­tion was made is not permitted. A leader­ship or super­vi­sory func­tion, as well as the super­vi­sion of a quali­fi­ca­tion work does not itself consti­tute co-author­ship. If a contri­bu­tion is not suffi­cient to justify author­ship, the individual’s support may be properly acknow­ledged in foot­notes, a fore­word, or an acknowledgment.

Commis­sion to inves­ti­gate Alle­ga­tions of Scien­tific Misconduct

The HfG has orga­nized up a commis­sion to inves­ti­gate alle­ga­tions of academic miscon­duct. It is made up of five people who are elected by the Senate for a three-year term. The commis­sion is curr­ently made up of:

Commission
Prof. Dr. habil. Jürgen Held – Univer­sity of Applied Science Schwä­bisch Gmünd
Prof. Dr. habil. Georg Kneer – Univer­sity of Applied Science Schwä­bisch Gmünd
Prof. Dr. Dagmar Rinker – Univer­sity of Applied Science Schwä­bisch Gmünd

The term of office of the current commis­sion runs until August 31, 2027.
The chair is Prof. Dr. habil. Jürgen Held.