Resisting Temptation

You have started your study, but you are not getting many participants. A small little voice in your head suggests that it would be so easy to make up the data… no one would know… When that voice starts whispering to you, hear my voice shouting, "DON'T DO IT!" There are so many ramifications of falsifying data, let us begin with a recent story in the news. Donald Green, a researcher at Columbia University and Michael LaCour, published a study  December 2015 in Science magazine. In the study, Green and LaCour reported results that suggested that voters’ support for same-sex marriage increases following a 20-minute conversation with a gay advocate for same-sex marriage.

Intriguing results are they not? Other researchers attempted to replicate the results. When they were unable to do so, they contacted the original researchers and the journal and wanted to know more about the original data. Green could not produce his data, as more questions were asked; it was found that he lied about funding sources also.

What are the implications of your making up data? You can have your Ph.D. revoked, be dismissed from the university (with no ability to return), if you received any grant funding you could face criminal charges for fraud. In addition, your professional career is finished before you started. You would never be able to use anyone from your institution as a reference, as a result getting a job or entering another program would be difficult to impossible.

Recently IRBs have begun randomly auditing data (particularly collected from students). Falsifying data is not worth it. As a professional, you have a responsibility to be ethical in all aspects of your study. If you are having problems getting enough participants, talk to your committee. If your data is not coming out as expected, talk to your committee. There are ethical solutions, let the experienced researchers guide you to them.

Next time we will consider more aspects of surveys. Do you have an issue or a question that you would like me to discuss in a future post? Would you like to be a guest writer? Send me your ideas! leann.stadtlander@waldenu.edu