TY - JOUR T1 - Experience and awareness of research integrity among Japanese physicians: a nationwide cross-sectional study JF - BMJ Open JO - BMJ Open DO - 10.1136/bmjopen-2021-052351 VL - 11 IS - 10 SP - e052351 AU - Rie Nishimura AU - Jiro Takeuchi AU - Mio Sakuma AU - Kazutaka Uchida AU - Miki Higaonna AU - Norito Kinjo AU - Fumihiro Sakakibara AU - Tsukasa Nakamura AU - Shinji Kosaka AU - Shinichi Yoshimura AU - Shinichiro Ueda AU - Takeshi Morimoto Y1 - 2021/10/01 UR - http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/10/e052351.abstract N2 - Objectives To explore the awareness and practice of clinical research integrity among Japanese physicians.Design A nationwide cross-sectional study conducted in March 2020.Setting All hospitals in Japan.Participants Physicians aged <65 years who work at hospitals participated in clinical research over the past 5 years. The sample was stratified according to geographical location and subspecialty, and 1100 physicians were proportionally selected.Primary and secondary outcome measures Knowledge and awareness of research integrity.Results Among the 1100 participants, 587 (53%) had the experience of being the first author, 299 (27%) had been co-authors only and 214 (19%) had no authorship. A total of 1021 (93%) had experienced learning research integrity, and 555 (54%) became aware of research integrity. The experience of learning about research integrity was highest among those with first authorship (95%) and lowest among those without authorship (89%) (p=0.003). The majority of participants learnt about research integrity for passive reasons such as it being ‘required by the institution’ (57%) or it being ‘required to obtain approval of institutional review board (IRB)’ (30%). Potentially inappropriate research behaviours were observed in participants, with 11% indulging in copying and pasting for writing the paper, 11% for gifted authorship and 5.8% for the omission of IRB approval. Factors significantly associated with copying and pasting were being below 40 years old (OR: 1.84; 95% CI: 1.05 to 3.26), being the first presenter (OR: 1.64; 95% CI: 1.05 to 2.57) or having passive reasons for learning research integrity (OR: 2.96; 95% CI: 1.57 to 5.59). Furthermore, gifted authorship was significantly associated with being a co-author only (OR: 1.84; 95% CI: 1.18 to 2.87) and having passive reasons for learning about research integrity (OR: 1.79; 95% CI: 1.03 to 3.12).Conclusions Most physicians conducting clinical research have learnt about research integrity, but potentially inappropriate research behaviours are associated with passive reasons for learning.Data are available upon reasonable request. The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. ER -