Understanding the Darryll Pines Plagiarism Allegations

On Tuesday, Luke Rosiak at The Daily Wire reported on plagiarism allegations against the University of Maryland President, Darry Pines.

The allegation centers around a 2002 paper Pines, along with his co-author, Liming Salvino, published in “Proceedings of SPIE—The International Society for Optical Engineering.”

The paper, “Health Monitoring of One Dimensional Structures Using Empirical Mode Decomposition and the Hilbert-Huang Transform,” contains roughly 1,500 words that first appeared on a website published in 1996.

When asked about the allegations, a university spokesperson said, “It is not uncommon for historical and technical reviews to use recurrent language to provide a framework for past work.”

Since then, Pines has released a statement acknowledging the “recurrent language in the introductory sections.” He has called for an independent review of the paper, saying that the Office of Research Integrity will perform the review and submit findings to the school’s chancellor via the Office of Faculty Affairs.

Note: It is unclear if Pines refers to the United States Office of Research Integrity or the University of Maryland’s Office of Research Integrity.

All of this raises some serious questions. Did Pines commit plagiarism? If so, how serious is it? What are the likely impacts on his career?

To answer those questions, we must first examine the allegations themselves.

Examining the Allegations

The allegations themselves are fairly straightforward. According to the report, nearly 1,500 words from the paper’s introduction are copied verbatim or near-verbatim from Altmann’s website.

Though Pines does make some changes, including switching from UK to American spellings, most of the work is left intact, with some new material added.

The authors also allege that Pines republished much of that paper, including the copied portions, a second time in a 2006 journal.

For his part, Pines acknowledges the “recurrent language” but seems to indicate that he doesn’t feel that it was unethical to use.

The argument, at least according to the University, is that this is introductory text and that copying it was appropriate. Further, the plagiarism doesn’t indicate any issue with the research or the paper’s findings.

However, that is a difficult argument, especially since the source in question was never cited in any capacity.

My Analysis

To be clear, there is a legitimate debate about when and how text can be reused in the introduction of an academic paper. Many studies use methodologies similar to or identical to previous studies. This is done to replicate prior studies and expand on earlier findings.

As such, some studies repeat the exact language rather than find a novel way to describe the same process or problems. This is both expedient and ensures consistency between the papers.

However, when that is done, the source is usually cited. That did not happen in this case. Pines never mentioned Altmann in the paper.

It’s also unlikely that this text was some form of industry standard at the time. A quick search for various passages in the text shows that it only exists in two places: Pines’ paper and the original site.

In short, it appears that Pines and his co-author copied the text, modified it slightly and never attributed the source. That much is apparent.

However, that doesn’t mean this is the end of Pines’ career. We must first consider several wrinkles in this case.

Issues to Consider

While the evidence is pretty damming, there are still some issues to consider.

First, there is the issue of the co-author. We don’t know if Pines was responsible for the passages at issue. Given the time the paper was published, it’s also unreasonable to expect Pines to have checked his co-author’s work. Plagiarism detection software was not common in 2002.

The paper was written 22 years ago, so we may never know who is responsible for this section.

Second is the age of the paper itself. This paper represents just one work over 20 years ago. While the plagiarism within the paper is serious, it is unclear if any of his other work has similar issues. If this is the only work with integrity violations, it likely isn’t enough to condemn his entire career.

Finally, there’s the issue that this is a bad-faith investigation. It’s the latest in a string of similar allegations intended to target black university officials and others who seek to increase diversity in academia.

While that doesn’t necessarily discredit the findings, it does put a heavier burden of proof on them. The investigators will have to determine whether that’s the case.

In addition to those issues, it’s also worth noting that the allegation of duplicative publication doesn’t hold up. While Pines published the findings twice, the first was in a conference proceedings, not a journal.

It is very common for a paper to be published first in a proceedings and then in a journal. This is not seen as a duplicative publication. However, it would still be appropriate to inform the journal editors of the prior publication. It is unclear if that happened.

Bottom Line

The allegations of plagiarism in this case are serious and clear. The University of Maryland’s initial response was, in a word, horrible. To dismiss this as a standard practice is blatantly untrue.

That said, Pines’ actions since then have been much better. Calling for a transparent and independent investigation is the correct move. However, if that investigation is taking place at the University of Maryland, there are grounds to question its independence.

At this time, there are a lot of unknowns when it comes to the paper or Pines’ other work. He could be wholly innocent of this plagiarism and have a completely clean academic record. He could also be directly responsible and similar issues exist elsewhere in his work. We don’t know.

This is what the investigation should be focusing on.

Trying to deny that this plagiarism didn’t happen or that it is otherwise standard practice demeans plagiarism. It also attempts to deny a truth that is apparent to everyone.

That doesn’t mean that Pines is responsible for the plagiarism or that he should resign if he is. It just means that we need answers and accountability.

Fortunately, we seem to be on a better path for that now.