Effectiveness of Responsible Conduct of Research Instruction: Initial Findings (Research‪)‬

Introduction Mandates for instruction in the responsible conduct of research (RCR) instruction grew from the investigation of high-profile cases of alleged misconduct, and from a subsequent U.S. congressional investigation and legislation that occurred during the 1980s and 1990s (Anderson, 1988, 1994; Crewdson, 2002; Lang, 1993). Since 1990, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have required trainees supported by either T32 institutional training grants or T34 Minority Access to Research Career program awards to receive formal instruction in KCR (NIH, 1992.). This requirement was later extended to F32 individual postdoctoral fellow trainees and mentored K (career) awardees. Federal agencies, in particular the Department of Health and Human Services, recommended nine core instructional areas: human subjects, animal subjects, data management, responsible authorship and publication practices, peer review, conflict of interest, collaborative science, mentoring, and research misconduct.