Responsible Research Policy

1. Purpose and Scope

WUST is committed to research that is honest, methodologically sound, respectful of people and communities, and compliant with applicable law, sponsor terms, professional standards, and University requirements. This policy establishes baseline expectations for research proposed, performed, reviewed, administered, or reported under a WUST affiliation.

It applies to funded and unfunded work involving WUST faculty, staff, students, trainees, visiting scholars, volunteers, and external collaborators when they use the WUST name, data, systems, facilities, funds, or other resources.

2. Core Principles

• Integrity: Present methods, evidence, limitations, and conclusions truthfully.
• Respect: Protect the rights, dignity, welfare, privacy, and autonomy of research participants and affected communities.
• Rigor: Use appropriate methods, maintain complete records, and support reproducibility where feasible.
• Accountability: Accept responsibility for the quality, security, financial stewardship, and public communication of the work.
• Transparency: Disclose funding, affiliations, material limitations, and actual or potential conflicts of interest.
• Fairness: Assign credit based on contribution and conduct review without discrimination, retaliation, or favoritism.

3. Required Review and Approval

Research must not begin until all required institutional and external approvals are in place. The principal investigator is responsible for identifying requirements early and allowing adequate review time.

Human participants and identifiable information

Projects involving interaction with people, intervention, private identifiable information, biospecimens, surveys, interviews, or secondary human data must receive the appropriate human-research determination or ethics review before recruitment, access, or analysis begins. Consent and privacy protections must match the approved protocol.

Other regulated or higher-risk work

Additional review may be required for animals, biological agents, hazardous materials, controlled technologies, export-controlled information, medical devices, international research, dual-use research, or access to restricted systems and data. Researchers must complete required training and follow safety and security controls.

Changes and continuing obligations

Material changes to an approved study, team, location, data source, recruitment plan, or security method must be reviewed before implementation unless an immediate change is necessary to protect safety. Adverse events, unanticipated problems, protocol deviations, and reportable incidents must be communicated promptly through the applicable channel.

4. Standards for Research Conduct

Methods and analysis

Researchers must use methods appropriate to the question, document departures from the protocol, preserve the relationship between source data and reported results, and avoid selective omission that could mislead readers. Statistical and computational procedures should be documented sufficiently for qualified review.

Authorship and contribution

Authorship must reflect substantial intellectual contribution and accountability for the work. Administrative authority, funding acquisition, status, or routine assistance alone does not justify authorship. Contributors who do not qualify as authors should be acknowledged with permission. Author order and responsibilities should be discussed early and revisited when contributions change.

Conflicts of interest and commitment

Researchers must disclose financial, personal, professional, supervisory, or organizational interests that could reasonably appear to affect research judgment. A disclosed conflict may require review, public disclosure, recusal, monitoring, or a management plan.

Collaboration, mentoring, and peer review

Collaborators should document roles, data access, publication expectations, confidentiality, intellectual property, and dispute procedures. Supervisors must provide appropriate training and oversight. Confidential proposals and manuscripts received for review may not be used, retained, or shared beyond the review purpose.

Use of artificial intelligence

Researchers remain accountable for all work produced with automated or generative tools. Confidential, proprietary, export-controlled, or participant data must not be entered into an unapproved system. Material use of AI in analysis, writing, coding, image generation, or review should be documented or disclosed when required by the venue, sponsor, or discipline.

5. Research Data and Records

• Create a data-management plan appropriate to the sensitivity, scale, format, ownership, and sponsor requirements of the project.
• Store working data, consent records, code, instruments, approvals, and analysis decisions in authorized locations with access limited to approved personnel.
• Use encryption, strong authentication, backups, version control, and de-identification or coding where appropriate.
• Maintain records long enough to satisfy law, sponsor terms, publication requirements, approved protocols, intellectual-property needs, and University retention rules.
• Do not destroy, alter, remove, or transfer records when an audit, dispute, legal hold, misconduct review, or sponsor inquiry is pending.
• Share data only when consent, agreements, privacy obligations, security controls, and intellectual-property restrictions permit it.

Research records created under a WUST-administered project are institutional records unless a written agreement or controlling law states otherwise. Departing researchers must coordinate custody, continued access, and permitted copies before leaving the project.

6. Research Misconduct and Other Unacceptable Practices

Research misconduct does not include honest error or a good-faith difference in interpretation. Concerns such as undisclosed conflicts, serious protocol violations, improper authorship practices, misuse of confidential review material, retaliation, unsafe conduct, or financial noncompliance may still violate other requirements and will be addressed through the appropriate process.

7. Reporting and Reviewing Concerns

Anyone who becomes aware of a possible integrity, safety, compliance, privacy, or financial concern should preserve relevant records and report the matter promptly to the appropriate University official. General questions may be directed to [email protected]. Immediate threats to health, safety, or information security should be reported through the relevant emergency or security channel.

Reports should be made in good faith and include available facts rather than conclusions. WUST will seek to limit disclosure to those who need the information, protect the fairness of any review, and prohibit retaliation against a person who raises a concern or participates in a review in good faith. Confidentiality cannot be guaranteed where disclosure is required for safety, due process, sponsor reporting, or law.

8. Roles and Responsibilities

• Principal investigators are responsible for approvals, training, team supervision, data stewardship, project finances, reporting, and compliance with award conditions.
• Research team members must work within their assigned roles, complete training, maintain records, protect information, and raise concerns promptly.
• Mentors and supervisors must set clear expectations, review work proportionate to risk, and model responsible conduct.
• Research administrators support proposal review, award administration, documentation, sponsor communication, and institutional oversight.
• External collaborators must follow written agreements and the requirements applicable to their work, data, and access.