Redefining Academic Integrity in the Era of AI: Practices, Perspectives, and Ethical Standards

Abstract

These discussions focus on the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and academic integrity, navigating the current practices and ethics in scholarly communication. As AI technology continues to evolve rapidly, it redefines the concept of academic integrity, particularly in how research is conducted, analyzed, interpreted and presented. This research explores different perspectives on academic integrity and how they are being challenged by the rise of generative AI and AI-assisted tools and techniques. The primary objectives of this study are (i) discussing the guidelines announced by the leading publishers and learned societies regarding scholarly communications. (ii) Proposing a framework for the ethical use of AI in scholarly communication, aiming to establish a standard for transparency, accountability, and integrity. For literature review and concept mapping, researchers can utilize tools such as Scholarcy, Paper Digest, Research Rabbit, Inciteful, and Litmaps for summarization and organization. Citation Gecko, Connected Papers, and CoCites are effective for exploring related literature. For literature searching, credible sources can be accessed through Dimensions.ai and Wisdom.ai, and for Quick Searching and referencing, Scite and Semantic Scholar are used. Additionally, for academic writing, tools like ChatGPT, Claude.ai, Gemini, Perplexity, and Capilot are used to assist in drafting and refining scholarly works. A pilot study was conducted to review the AI Guidelines adopted by various major publishers, such as IEEE, Springer, SAGE, OUP, Elsevier, Palgrave, Cambridge University Press, etc., at individual publisher levels. We have also studied the AI policies so far practised by learned societies such as the American Chemical Society (ACS), PLOS (Public Library of Science), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), Cell Press, American Marketing Association (AMA), Association for Information Systems (AIS), Nature Publishing Group, American Diabetes Association, and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) etc. We have also evaluated the directives given by the COPE and CRediT in this connection. The findings emphasize the importance of transparency, accountability, and integrity in using AI tools in academic publishing. While none of these publishers allows AI systems to be credited with authorship, they all require authors to disclose any use of AI tools in their research, typically in the acknowledgements or methodology sections. Finally, it is recommended that the author/s use AI responsibly, and the editors should not be biased during the editorial process entirely depending on the AI-driven tools. Although the journey of AI started long ago, it has never been used so extensively in almost every sphere of life, and scholarly communication is no exception. The application of AI, like any other new technology, has a strong potential to improve our lives. At the same time, there is an enormous chance

of abuse. Therefore, we must learn to embrace and enjoy them without fearing them, and a set of well- thought-out regulations can only make it a reality.