Research Integrity Policies in Social Science Research at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

René Bekkers, 7 April 2026

Responsible Research Practices: What You Must and What You Could

Guidance for researchers at the School of Social Sciences, VU Amsterdam

Duties: What You Must Do with Respect to Research Integrity

1. Do the ethics self-check for each study, before collecting data: https://vuamsterdam.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9HMDSbc1ZNVo24C

• If any issues come up, apply for full ethics review here: https://vuamsterdam.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9tBjPqFq6bxv2Sx
• More information: https://vu.nl/en/employee/research-support/research-ethics-review-ssc
• This duty originates in article 3.2.13 of the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity, binding all researchers at universities in the Netherlands.

2. Make sure before collecting data that informed consent procedures for each study involving data collection specify that collected data may be shared for research purposes, https://vunl.sharepoint.com/:w:/s/FSW-OE-ResearchOfficeFSS/ESqv_KBkeEJPnzIe4JwM7YUBVUY_etYwMWDodDm2Yq5pFQ?e=9a3rCQ 

• More information: https://vu.nl/en/employee/research-support/ssc-templates-and-example-documents
• This duty originates in article 3.2.11 of the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity, and the national guideline for the archiving of academic research for Faculties of Behavioral and Social Sciences in the Netherlands, issued by the deans of social sciences (DSW).

3. Write a Data Management Plan for each study before collecting data, and keep it up to date while the project is running, https://dmponline.vu.nl/  

• More information: https://vu.nl/en/employee/social-sciences-getting-started/data-management-ssc
• This duty originates from the VU Research Data and Software Management Policy.

4. Before starting a project with external parties: write a contract specifying ownership of data and rights to publish the report.

• This duty originates in article 3.2.9 of the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity, and the FSS guideline on collaborations.
• More information: ask your head of department and Research Office.

5. Archive the data for your completed study and create a publication package. For 'quantitative' research the package includes ethics review documents, all research materials, data files (raw and processed), the data management plan, and computer code produced in the research. For 'qualitative' research the package includes all data, the data management plan, interview and observation guides, and documentation of data collection activities.

• This duty originates in the guideline for the archiving of academic research for Faculties of Behavioral and Social Sciences in the Netherlands. This guideline will be replaced in the summer of 2026 by a more comprehensive guideline, covering all elements of the empirical cycle.

What you can do to support research integrity

1. Discuss authorships with your colleagues when you are planning a publication and use the CRediT taxonomy at https://credit.niso.org/. Revisit the description of responsibilities during the research, and update them when you publish a preprint, and when you submit the paper to a journal.
2. Pre-register your research design and hypotheses before collecting and analyzing data, https://renebekkers.wordpress.com/2023/09/20/preregistration-why-and-how/ 
3. Execute the Data Management Plan and share data responsibly, https://vu.nl/en/employee/social-sciences-getting-started/data-management-ssc
4. Declare the use of generative artificial intelligence using the GAIDeT, https://panbibliotekar.github.io/gaidet-declaration/
5. Do a codecheck before submitting results for publication, https://codecheck.org.uk/guide/community-workflow-overview 
6. Do a Research Transparency Check of your manuscript before you disseminate it, https://scienceverse.github.io/papercheck/ 
7. Publish your manuscript as a preprint before submitting it to a journal https://help.osf.io/article/376-preprints-home-page 
8. Make sure that the journal you intend to publish is not a predatory journal https://renebekkers.wordpress.com/2023/03/27/beware-of-predatory-publishers/ 
9. Publish your manuscript as a registered report, so that it will be accepted regardless of the empirical results: https://www.cos.io/initiatives/registered-reports  
10. Do the Erasmus University Dilemma Game, https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=nl.eur.dilemmagame&hl=en_US 

At the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities (FSSH) of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, research integrity is governed by eight policies:

1. The overarching policy is the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity adopted by the Royal Academy of Arts & Sciences (KNAW), the Netherlands Association of Universities (Universiteiten van Nederland, formerly VSNU), the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) and other organizations; https://www.universiteitenvannederland.nl/files/publications/Netherlands%20Code%20of%20Conduct%20for%20Research%20Integrity%202018.pdf. The code of conduct is currently being revised. The new version will probably be published later in the Spring of 2026.
2. The 2025 code of ethics for research in the social and behavioural sciences, adopted by the Deans of the Social Sciences (DSW): https://nethics.nl/onewebmedia/Nethics-Code-of-Ethics-digitaal.pdf;
3. The procedures for ethics review at the Faculty of Social Sciences (FSS); https://assets.vu.nl/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/c7e3795f-62b7-4b3f-9282-48859461e87e/RERC-Regulations-Feb18_tcm249-880617.pdf
4. The national guidelines for archiving research data in the behavioural and social sciences; https://zenodo.org/records/7583831. These guidelines will be superseded by a more extensive set of guidelines that will be published in the Summer of 2026.
5. The VU Research Data and Software Management Policy: https://rdm.vu.nl/public/policies-regulations/RDSM-policy-VU-EN-v3.0.pdf
6. The School of Social Sciences data management guidelines, available here: https://vu.nl/en/employee/social-sciences-getting-started/ssc-guidelines-for-data-management
7. For PhD candidates: the doctorate regulations ('promotiereglement') of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam: https://assets.vu.nl/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/08b4502d-de82-47ca-9c4c-fd5ad70d47f0/20220901%20VU%20doctorate%20regulations.pdf
8. For PhD candidates: the Graduate School for Social Sciences policies: see https://vu.nl/en/about-vu/faculties/faculty-of-social-sciences/more-about/the-graduate-school-of-social-sciences under 'Assessments during your PhD trajectory': the 'go/no-go product', https://assets-us-01.kc-usercontent.com/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/a99d5a4e-4a0e-4afc-95c8-091478b99cc1/VU-GSSS%20Go%20No%20Go%20assessment%20-%20introduction%20and%20explanations.docx, the plagiarism check, https://assets-us-01.kc-usercontent.com/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/e4be9bed-388e-45a9-8847-3bc085d0dec0/VU-GSSS%20Plagiarism%20check%20-%20background%20and%20procedure%20%281%29.pdf and particularly the final PhD portfolio, https://assets-us-01.kc-usercontent.com/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/8b1440ff-6056-4471-b697-c719e6b6d266/VU-GSSS%20Go%20No%20Go%20assessment%20-%20portfolio%20%28fill-in%20document%29.docx

In your particular discipline, additional policies or codes of conduct may apply:

• Anthropology: Ethical Guidelines of the Dutch Anthropological Association, https://antropologen.nl/app/uploads/2019/01/ABv_Code-of-Ethics_2019.pdf
• Management Science and Business Administration: Academy of Management Code of Ethics, https://aom.org/about-aom/governance/ethics/code-of-ethics
• Market research: ICC/ESOMAR International Code on Market, Opinion, and Social Research and Data Analytics, https://www.esomar.org/what-we-do/code-guidelines
• Political Science: Beroepscode NKWP, http://politicologie.nl/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Beroepscode-2008.doc
• Psychology: Beroepscode NIP, https://psynip.nl/beroepskwaliteit/beroepscode/
• Sociology: Beroepscode NSV, https://sociologie.nl/werk/beroepscode?highlight=WyJjb2RlIl0=

Throughout the cycle of empirical research, researchers and students at the Faculty of Social Sciences should act in line with the principles and guidelines expressed in the above codes of conduct and policies. The policies employ four instruments to encourage research integrity:

1. Personal responsibility – your own conscience and internalized norms of good research and ethical standards.
2. Transparency – the openness you give about the procedures you have followed in your research.
3. Peer review – the scrutiny of your work by others: supervisors, colleagues, critics.
4. Complaint procedures – violations of norms of good research and ethical standards may be punished by the Board of the Faculty of Social Sciences, the academic integrity committee at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, and ultimately by the Netherlands office of research integrity (LOWI).

Note: The Faculty of Social Sciences does not have audits of research projects.

Step by step guide

At https://vu.nl/en/employee/social-sciences-getting-started/ssc-guidelines-for-data-management you'll find step by step guidelines for the organization of research projects.

A. Planning your research

When you are planning research, check whether your study requires ethics review by the FSS Research Ethics Review Board (RERC). Make sure you complete the checklist well ahead of the start of the data collection. In most cases ethics review takes less than a month, but in case the research plans raise ethics issues, you may need three months to complete the entire ethics review process.

1. Do the ethics review self-check at https://vuamsterdam.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9HMDSbc1ZNVo24C. Save the pdf you get. If the result is that your research does not need further review, you can start with your research. If the result is that your research needs further review, go to step 2.
2. Discuss the risks with your supervisor and your department's representative on the SSC Research Ethics Review Committee (RERC), https://vu.nl/en/employee/research-support/research-ethics-review-ssc. Revise your research plan to reduce and tackle risks. Go back to step 1: complete the self-check again based on the revised plan. If the result is still that full ethics review is necessary, proceed to step 3.
3. Prepare a full ethics review. With your research team, create 1. A short description of the research questions, the societal and scientific relevance of the research, and the research design (max. 1 A4);  2. the information for participants; 3. the consent form; 4. the research materials (manipulations, questionnaire, topic list); 5. the anonymization procedure; and 6. the data management plan. You can find examples of these materials at https://vu.nl/en/employee/research-support/ssc-templates-and-example-documents. Also look up the number of the ethics review self-check you completed (#1 above). If you have everything (i.e., six documents), go to step 4.
4. Complete the online Ethics Review Application Form at https://vuamsterdam.eu.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_9tBjPqFq6bxv2Sx and upload the required documents. Note that only research project leaders can submit an application for ethics review. If you are a PhD candidate, ask your supervisor to submit the materials.

B. Data collection

General information about research data management at the Faculty of Social Sciences is available at https://vu.nl/en/employee/social-sciences-getting-started/ssc-guidelines-for-data-management. If your project involves collection or analysis of data, write a Data Management Plan (DMP) before you start the data collection. Go to https://dmponline.vu.nl and create a new plan. DMPonline will guide you through the elements that comprise a good DMP. You can share your DMP with the faculty’s data steward Emily Barabas (e.k.barabas@vu.nl) to get feedback. Share the DMP with everyone involved in the research project. Update the data management plan when things change during the research project. Make sure to properly version the document, so changes can be tracked.

Store the data in a secure location. The Faculty of Social Sciences recommends using Yoda, https://portal.yoda.vu.nl/.

Pseudonymize raw data before analysis to prevent data leaks. Avoid working with the raw data to prevent data loss. Store raw data and the pseudonimyzation key file in a secure location where it cannot be lost, corrupted, or accidentally edited. This could possibly be the same place where your raw data will be archived after the project. Make sure that wherever they are stored, the raw data are accompanied by all information needed to understand the data. This includes metadata on when, where, why and by who the data was collected, and all documentation needed to understand variables, such as interviewer manuals. The faculty data steward can help in identifying what documentation or metadata to include.

C. Analysis & write-up

During the preparation of your research report, it is a good idea to discuss the analysis strategy and the findings with your supervisors and other colleagues. Document the code that produces the results reported. For suggestions see https://renebekkers.wordpress.com/2021/04/02/how-to-organize-your-data-and-code/.

To receive feedback on your work and improve it, you can prepare a working paper that you share with discussants and present at an internal research seminar. After internal discussion, it is a good idea to post a working paper in a public preprint repository such as SocArxiv or Zenodo and invite the academic community to review it and suggest improvements. Next, you can present your working paper at conferences. Based on the comments you received from peers, revise the working paper before submitting it to a journal, book editor, or to the funders of your research.

D. Publication

When you submit research reports based on the data you have collected for peer review to a journal or to book editors, also create a publication package containing pseudonymized data, analysis scripts, documentation, and metadata. Archive the publication package in a public repository. You can use Yoda for this purpose, https://portal.yoda.vu.nl/. Alternatively, you can use Dataverse https://dataverse.nl/dataverse/vuamsterdam, or Zenodo, https://zenodo.org/. You can also store data on the Open Science Framework, https://osf.io/ if you select an EU storage location.

Have a DOI assigned to your data so others can cite the data you have collected. You can choose to upload data, documentation and metadata separately and have multiple publication packages refer to the same data set if this works better for your project.

Never share privacy-sensitive raw data with the public. Such data should be stored securely. The Faculty of Social Sciences recommends using Yoda, https://portal.yoda.vu.nl/.

E. Review

When you are invited to review the work of others, it is a good principle to check whether the authors have made the data and the code available that they have used to produce the results they report. If not, you can request them or the editors of the journal that invites you to review to done so. With the data and code, you can verify whether the data and code produce the results and you can conduct robustness analyses.

When you review research reports by others, do so in a constructive way. Here are some suggestions on how to review empirical research: https://osf.io/7ug4w/ and https://renebekkers.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/scientific-criticism-and-peer-review-workshop-materials.pdf

The guidelines for peer review of the Committee of Publication Ethics apply to all types of research: https://publicationethics.org/files/Ethical_Guidelines_For_Peer_Reviewers_2.pdf

Getting advice on ethics and integrity issues

When you are planning your research and have questions on ethical dilemmas, ask the FSS Research Ethics Review Committee (RERC) for advice. When you have questions on dilemmas during your research, ask colleagues and supervisors for advice. When you find errors in your own research after you published it, write to the journal or book editors to notify them of the error. In case of a minor problem, prepare a correction. When you no longer support the publication as a whole, ask for a retraction.

When you have questions about the integrity of research of others, consult https://vu.nl/en/about-vu/more-about/academic-integrity. Step 1 is to talk to one of the confidential counsellors for integrity (vertrouwenspersoon integriteit). When you have good reasons to believe that others have violated norms of good science or ethical standards, you can submit a complaint to the executive board of the university, which can forward it to the Academic Integrity Committee (CWI). See the complaints procedure at https://assets.vu.nl/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/facfccb1-2b51-4f42-b32c-8bebfb29b89f/Academic%20Integrity%20Complaints%20Procedure%20Vrije%20Universiteit%20Amsterdam%20April%202022.pdf

For issues with your supervisor, consult this guidance https://assets-us-01.kc-usercontent.com/d8b6f1f5-816c-005b-1dc1-e363dd7ce9a5/d70b3e54-13e4-44a3-a0a3-d2b5739776cb/VU-GSSS%20Procedure%20for%20PhD%20candidates%20and%20supervisors%20in%20case%20of%20an%20issue%20in%20a%20PhD%20trajectory.pdf.