A paper that made extravagant weight loss claims for green coffee beans has been retracted. This study had been touted by Dr Oz, of course — no fraud is to ludicrous for him — and rebutted by Scott Gavura, and I’m generally suspicious of any dietary supplement that promises weight loss without reducing calories or increasing exercise. But there’s one bit that surprised me. The study was done in India by a guy named Mysore Nagendran, and it was sponsored by Applied Food Sciences, Inc. (AFS), the company trying to exploit this Miracle Weight Loss Supplement. They couldn’t get it published, so…
The FTC charges that the study’s lead investigator repeatedly altered the weights and other key measurements of the subjects, changed the length of the trial, and misstated which subjects were taking the placebo or GCA during the trial. When the lead investigator was unable to get the study published, the FTC says that AFS hired researchers Joe Vinson and Bryan Burnham at the University of Scranton to rewrite it. Despite receiving conflicting data, Vinson, Burnham, and AFS never verified the authenticity of the information used in the study, according to the complaint.
Whoa. They brought in a couple of American ronin to rewrite and publish the story? I’m an innocent; I can’t imagine this. If someone told me they had a pile of data I had no part in generating, could I please write the paper so it’s publishable, I’d say no way, and I can’t imagine an inducement that would persuade me.
Which makes me wonder: were these guys paid to do this? Or was the incentive the privilege of getting a first-authorship on research that they didn’t do?
Money is the most powerful hallucinogen ever invented. The guy probably saw the ‘truth’ in the data.
Money is seldom the incentive for academic fraud. It’s not that hard to understand when 100 post-docs are competing for 15 bottom rungs on the academic ladder, or research professors desperately need grant funding, but it’s very hard to understand established investigators who don’t really need the CV-buffing. Some of these cases are just baffling.
Oh, and BTW, I checked it out — Joe Vinson is a tenured full professor with dozens of publications. Incomprehensible.
Which makes me wonder: were these guys paid to do this
I’d be absolutely shocked to hear they weren’t. In industry, I expect to pay people who do work that I need done. Maybe I can expect to negotiate their rate down if the work helps them too, but down to zero would be rare.
My US-based academic friends generally charge $200-$300/hour to consult for companies, giving them honest advice (not writing papers). They’re doing this on the side, so they maybe do 20 hours a year; it’s a nice bonus but not their main income.
I have no idea what the going rate is for “please write a paper around data that I pulled out of my ass”. But say a box sells for $5 of pure profit, and the paper convinces people to buy 100,000 extra boxes compared to if there were no paper. Millions of people watch Dr Oz, so it doesn’t seem like a crazy number of sales to generate by using a paper. The corporation is up $500k, so it can afford to give each researcher a downpayment on a new home and still come out ahead.
numerobis, I agree that there almost certainly was money involved in this, and potentially tens of thousands of dollars. But I do not agree that this makes it any less incomprehensible. While this episode probably does not rise to the level of actual fraud, it certainly is embarassing both for the guys who put their names on the paper and for the institutions they work for. They are now in the doghouse with their deans and colleagues, and may never regain the respect of their peers. These things are important in finding funding and collaborators for future work.
Basically, these guys just kneecapped their academic careers. It would take a hell of a lot more than tens of thousands of dollars to make that worth it.
It also may have something to do with the fact that the University of Scranton has just opened a medical school and maybe they want publications to make the school look better to prospective students?
I’m surprised they didn’t just create a Wikipedia entry and publish it that way. Actually I’m more surprised Wikipedia doesn’t just have a ‘fill in the blank form’ kind of like a Harlequin romance where the names are simply altered between books for such research. It would make quack medicine so much easier.
autopilot cocked
tribulation forecasting
repetitive harm
Absolutely. If the U of Scranton doesn’t have a rule against this, they should implement one right away, and they should make clear that tenure will not save your job if you pull this kind of shit.
There is just so much wrong done in getting this paper out. Of course, it being retracted will not change much most likely. Just today, as I watched by a natural products store, I saw a giant sign with “As Seen On Dr. Oz – Green Coffee Extract”. Despite Dr. Oz looking like a fool in front of congress when grilled about this over the summer, despite this paper being retracted, it will still be a favourite until something new pops up to replace it.
By the by, the University of Scranton is a Jesuit school. Don’t the Abrahamic religions have a thing about lying?
I remember how Oprah got mad over how “A million little pieces” was faked, how is she going to react to the knowledge that Dr.Phil is full of it?
Alverant,
It’s Oz.. this time. But dr Phil is full of it as well, so your mistake is understandable.
It says right there in the article that they were paid, unless you know some other meaning of the word “hired”:
In my experience, the going rate for such things is about $20K. Maybe split between the two of them. But that’s without the “we’ll send you a bunch of jiggered numbers you had nothing to do with creating” part.
Every researcher of my acquaintance would run, not walk, away from a proposed project like this.
If the scenario presented is true, it represents a clear violation of the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals published by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. To quote them, the requirements for being declared an “author” on a paper include all three of the following:
Throwing someone else’s data and a pile of cash at a “big gun” does not count as a substantial contribution.
Of course, the supplement industry has basically had carte blanche for years in making unsupported health claims. Blame Congress, which specifically prohibited the FDA from regulating the industry.
They analyzed the data, wrote the paper, and gave final approval. So they’re in the clear there. Their failure was elsewhere, but plenty bad enough to merit serious consequences.
Definitely everyone I know would have run. I wonder whether others got a call from AFS and refused to play their dirty game.
I keep reminding myself that one can make a mint selling snake oil since 100% of the value of these products is in the marketing, and that’s what this “study” is, marketing. Some pretty packaging, vague claims and very targeted marketing would result in hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars of sales.
I also remind myself that I haven’t had an ethicectomy, so I’ll just stick to being a wage slave for now.
I must remember this word for future use.
I’ve (ethically) written papers on data that I had no part in generating. There is a place for secondary data analysis, say of census data or large scale assessment data, although this situation doesn’t sound like one of them.
Pffft. Green tea extract is so 2012. Oz and the other scammers have moved on to garcia cambodia extract or whatever it’s called. You can’t swing a dead cat without coming across a web ad for a supplement with the stuff.
Speaking of web ads, I think I remember seeing a lot of such ads on FTB until recently, especially in the Adblade ads. It seems the testosterone boosters and the weight loss pills aren’t showing up for me as much. Did someone do something to change that? Of course, that just means that I’m currently seeing 3 of the same “guaranteed 8% annuity for life” ads on this page at the moment.
Ironically, the ad I see now is for a bioethics degree from a Catholic university. It’s just what the thread ordered. So, can we send one university to study at the other one?
Now would that be a bioethics degree from a Jesuit university? Truly that would be ironic.
I’ve still got the weight loss and testosterone supplement ads showing. Also there are two MacKeeper pop-unders waiting for me to force quit the browser. I hate, hate those ads and the websites they ride in on. You hear me, Ed?
JohnnieCanuck 21
I don’t see any ads, but then I paid the miserly sum of $whatever it was for this service. You might consider doing the same instead of whining “You hear me, Ed?”.
@15…No. That’s wrong. They’re not “in the clear”.
Of course, there are no penalties for violating the guidelines, other than a permanently damaged reputation.
Because that would be deleted as “original research“. Are you new to the Internet? :-)
If you can’t pay, I have two words for you: Firefox, Adblock. No more ads ever; they’re not even downloaded.