Statements on compliance with ethical standards and standards of research involving humans and animals


Every article must include the following information related to ethical standards, which is easy to formulate using the step-by step manual on this page:

  • Indicate all sources of financial support of each author and the team of authors.
  • Indicate information on conflicts of interest.
  • Include the statement of compliance with standards of research involving animals.
  • Include the statement of compliance with standards of research involving humans as subjects.

Instructions

Step 1:

Indicate all sources of financial support of each author and the team of authors.

There is nothing new here. Simply indicate all the sources.

Example: The study was supported by grant XXXXX from the Russian Foundation of Basic Research. This work was carried out under research program XXXX of XXXX University. Author Х.Х.Х. was supported by grant ХХХХ from Ministry ХХХХ.

In the same section, it is appropriate to thank colleagues, inform about shared use centers, indicate the contributions of authors to the research reported in the manuscript (if necessary), and provide any information that may affect the understanding and assessment of the content. When completed, continue to step 2.

Step 2:

Indicate information on conflicts of interest

A conflict of interest is any relationships or spheres of interest that may directly or indirectly influence or bias the work.

Example: Conflict of interest: Author Х.Х.Х. owns shares of Company Y mentioned in the article. Author Y.Y.Y. is a member of Committee XXXX.

If there is no conflict of interest the authors should state that:

Conflict of Interest: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

For more details click here.

Although an author may feel there is no conflict, the disclosure of relationships makes the process more complete and transparent, which leads to a better, less subjective assessment of the work. A conflict of interest does not entail anything illegal, unlawful, or unethical; it merely something that may affect the reported results.

Examples of potential conflicts of interests directly or indirectly related to the research may include but are not limited to the following:

  • research grants from funding agencies (see. step 1);
  • honoraria for speaking at symposia;
  • financial support for attending symposia;
  • financial support for educational programs;
  • employment or consultation;
  • support from a project sponsor;
  • position on advisory board or board of directors or other type of management relationships;
  • multiple affiliations;
  • financial relationships, for example, equity ownership or investment interest;
  • intellectual property rights (e.g. patents, copyrights, and royalties from such rights);
  • holdings of spouse and/or children who may have financial interest in the work.

It is not necessary to include all such information in the manuscript, only those that may affect the reporting of the results.

In addition, it is necessary to disclose particpation that goes beyond financial interests and compensation (nonfinancial interests) that may be important to readers. These may include but are not limited to personal relationships or competing interests directly or indirectly tied to this research, or professional interests or personal beliefs that may influence your research.

The corresponding author includes the collective statement on behalf of all authors as a separate section of the manuscript before the list of cited works.

A more detailed description can be found on the Springer Nature web site.

Step 3:

Include the statement of compliance with standards of research involving animals.

If your work does not include animals as subjects, continue to step 4.

If your work includes animals, it is necessary to include a statement of compliance with standards of research involving animals.

All applicable international, national, and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed.

Please note that there are no well-defined standards applicable to all types of research. The main idea is to state that in the research you observed humane principles, respected the welfare of animals, and excluded situations when animals were in pain. It is easy to find publications in which various special cases are described in detail. It is considered normal when researchers working with animals study the relevant literature and are informed of these principles. If you publish an article and there are reasons to believe that you could have used animals but did not, then you should write:

This article does not contain any studies involving animals performed by any of the authors.

Step 4:

Include the statement of compliance with standards of research involving humans as subjects.

If your work does not include humans as subjects, you may finish the ethical statement or write:

This article does not contain any studies involving human participants performed by any of the authors.

If your work involves humans, it is necessary to include two additional statements.

First:

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Second:

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants involved in the study.

See commentaries to step 4

The first of these two statements mean that you have followed ethical norms and standards of working with humans as research subjects. The necessary and sufficient condition in this case is to conduct research in accordance with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration. All the necessary information is available here. If your institution has no department that deals with ethics, then you should not mention institutional standards. If your country has no committee that deals with ethics, then you should not mention national standards.

The second statement means that you received written informed consent from all human participants. That is, they have agreed to participate in the research and allow the authors to disclose personal data related to them in the published work.

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