Doctoral theses: the court requires evidence after each sentence adopted

In a decision just published, the Berlin Administrative Court reminded of the basic rules of scientific work more clearly than ever before.

Every single thought adopted, including every footnote copied by third parties, must without exception be identified as the work of others, say the judges.

Literally it says in the judgment:

"Ultimately, the doctoral candidate must be asked to identify every line of thought and every footnote that does not originate in his own intellectual achievement, but in the work of someone else, as well as all text passages taken verbatim from other works or similar text passages without exception. In particular, he must also mark indirect, circumscribing foreign text reproductions (paraphrases) so clearly that the reader knows at every point who is speaking to whom. "

In practice, this means that every sentence, the content of which is not completely self-conceived, must be provided with an individual reference to the source. Apart from your own considerations, every sentence of a doctoral thesis should be followed by a receipt or a footnote. Evidence accepted by third parties would also have to be labeled with an indication. So far this has not always happened. Copied footnotes from foreign texts are often used to indicate one's own erudition. Whether the source has actually always been checked is written in the stars. Even if this is the case, there must still be a reference to the origin of the footnote. The court thus confirms the rules for good scientific work that have existed for over a hundred years.The judges also refer to the case of today's Governing Mayor Franziska Giffey in the details of the degree recognition.

Charité is still working on a dissertation

In the present case, the administrative court ruled on the dissertation “Determinants of perioperative mortality of dialysis patients in cardiac surgery” from the Charité in Berlin.

The Free University of Berlin continues to offer the thesis freely accessible on the Internet as a "dissertation" despite the revocation of the doctoral degree in April 2020.

In August 2014, the science platform VroniPlag Wiki informed the university that the dissertation showed literal and analogous correspondence with other dissertations on 62 percent of the pages.

These acquisitions relate not only to the introduction and methods, but also to the results section and the discussion.

What does the new case law mean for other doctoral students?

Inadvertently forgetting individual receipts does not lead to the revocation of the doctoral degree.

Rather, the prerequisite is that one of three alternatives is available: The plagiarism offices must shape a work quantitatively, qualitatively or in an overall view of both possibilities.

A quantitative character is to be affirmed if the number of plagiarism sites and their share in the work get out of hand in view of the overall scope.

Such passages have a qualitative impact on the work if the remainder of the dissertation does not meet the requirements for a considerable academic achievement.

Note in the bibliography is not enough

In the present case, the entire work was characterized by complete plagiarism, i.e. the literal takeover of text passages from another work, or the disguised takeover of such text passages in the sense that only a single word was exchanged or a single sentence structure was changed. It is not enough for sources to be listed in the bibliography. "Because it corresponds to scientific honesty and the legitimate expectation of the reader of a scientific work that references to sources are generally identified as quotations in the respective text passages," explained the judges.

In addition, the court confirmed its case law developed in 2020 on the citation of intermediate sources: An act of deception can also be assumed if only the so-called "final source", i.e. the origin of the content-related statement, is cited, but not the intermediate source.

The literal takeover of the text passage mostly comes from the intermediate source;

this intermediate source in turn refers to the ultimate source.

Anyone who cites incorrectly here does not conceal the fact that he did not interpret the “final source” and interpret it semantically himself.