(De)constructing the ‘scientist with integrity’: A case study of research integrity training for PhD fellows in the medical sciences

This working paper arises from larger research project, ‘Practicing Integrity’, funded by the Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science (2017-19). This project researched the history of the emergence of international and national codes of ‘integrity’, how they were being translated into institutional procedures and educational courses, and how early stage researchers navigated their requirements in the context of management and performance incentives, research and funding conditions and the challenges of career development.
As part of this project, we interviewed the teachers and observed the new research integrity training for early career researchers at four different faculties at a larger Danish university. Whilst a comparative ethnography, comprising our overall findings across disciplinary borders has been published elsewhere (Sarauw, Degn and Ørberg, 2019), this paper provides a detailed analysis of our fieldwork on the integrity course for PhD fellows at the medical faculty. The fieldwork included a series of follow-up interviews and was undertaken by author 1 in the period April 2017 - December 2018.