The density of fraud

Last year we discussed the story of a doctor at Columbia University who was involved in multiple cases of research fraud lasting over a decade—and is still being promoted by the university, years after this fraud came out. In a comment, Sholto David informs us that Columbia is investigating the case, so maybe by the time this post appears, Columbia will have fired the offending researcher.

Following the link at Sholto David’s comment let me to a website called For Better Science, and . . . wow. There’s a lot of corruption out there by medical researchers at top universities. Columbia included, and not just Dr. Oz and not just the doctor mentioned above. Here’s another example, which I only happened to notice because the relevant post is near the top of the webpage right now. For Better Science is run by Leonid Schneider, with whom we corresponded a few years ago regarding the replication crisis.

I read Retraction Watch and I know about fraud—but just the level of this, it’s stunning. I guess my problem is that I haven’t been thinking about the problem statistically. It says here that Columbia’s College of Physicians and Surgeons—I guess that’s what we’d call “the medical school”—has 2600 faculty. If, say, 10% of them are cheaters, then that would be 260 of those people rattling around in the institution. Not all these people will be cheating on research: some of them are cheating on their taxes, others are double-billing patients or fiddling with their expense accounts or selling drugs on the side, or . . . all sorts of things, I suppose!

The point is that I shouldn’t be so shocked to hear that Columbia medical school has prominent faculty who’ve been involved in research fraud. If you’re a medical researcher and a cheater, then research fraud is a natural step. Just as if you’re a storekeeper and a cheater, then ripping off your customers and employees is a natural step; or if you’re a statistician and a cheater, then it makes sense to hire yourself out as a data manipulator; or if you’re a CEO and a cheater, then it makes sense to fake your corporate reports; or if you sell used cars and you’re a cheater, then you’ll hide the flaws in your cars; or if you’re a university administrator and a cheater, then it makes sense to fake your U.S. News statistics . . . ulp! In all these examples, there’s a clear incentive to cheat: if you play honest, it’s easy to fall behind your competitors who could be cheating too. Indeed, you could argue that, if you play by the rules, you’d be letting the side down . . . it’s arguably unethical not to cheat. You’re developing treatments what will save lives, after all!

OK, I don’t buy that last bit. Lots of good research is done without cheating. I strongly disagree with the statement that research fraud serves a greater good, and in any case no one would make such a claim in public even if they might think so privately.

But what I’m hung up on here is the idea that there are so many cases of fraud out there. The error that we make at Columbia and other institutions is the implicit assumption that fraud will almost never happen, so that every newly-discovered instance is treated as a completely new and surprising event.

What should be done about this, I’m not sure. Until looking at that For Better Science, I just hadn’t thought hard about the sheer prevalence of scientific fraud at major university medical centers. It’s just part of the culture, in the same way that shortchanging the rubes is part of carny culture. Seeing the occasional story in Retraction Watch hadn’t given me the sense of the sheer density of fraud in the system.

Maybe Dan Davies, as an author of a thoughtful book on financial fraud, would have some thoughts on this one.