Harvard Fires Star Professor Who Fabricated Data For ‘Dishonesty’ Studies

A celebrated Harvard professor who researched why people are dishonest was fired and stripped of tenure after a probe found she fabricated data on multiple studies.

Francesca Gino, a star behavioral scientist at Harvard Business School whose work focused on why people cheat, was found to have manipulated observations in four studies so that their findings supported her hypotheses – according to a 1,300-page report detailing the university’s months-long investigation.

Of note, Harvard hasn’t revoked a professor’s tenure since the 1940s – when the American Association of University Professors formalized termination rules, the Harvard Crimson reports.

“The committee concludes that Professor Gino has engaged in multiple instances of research misconduct, across all four studies at issue in these allegations,” according to the report.

Gino, a star academic who had authored over 140 academic papers and snagged numerous awards, came under fire last year after a trio of behavioral scientists published a series of explosive posts on their blog Data Colada, writing four academic papers published between 2012 and 2020 that the Harvard professor had co-authored “contained fraudulent data.”

The university report detailed that Harvard began a preliminary investigation of Gino’s work in October 2021 after the Data Colada researchers brought their concerns about the papers’ sketchy data to the school. –NY Post

The university launched a preliminary investigation into Gino’s work after red flags emerged in a study she co-authored that claimed requiring people to sign an honesty pledge at the beginning of a form vs. the end significantly boosts honest responses. The study was retracted in 2021 due to “evidence” of data fabrication relying on three separate lab experiments to support its findings, the Post reports.

The ‘Data Colada’ scientists then found three more studies in the same paper which appeared to rely on manipulated data, prompting a full probe into the allegations which was conducted in 2022 and 2023, in which people who worked with Gino on the papers were interviewed and Harvard Business School faculty analyzed her data, emails, and the papers’ manuscripts.

An outside forensics firm was also hired to assist in the analysis.

When asked, Gino insisted that issued with her work may stem from errors by her or her research assistants – or (Joe Reid is that you?) someone with “malicious intentions” who may have tampered with her work. 

Investigators saw right through that and provided their findings to HBS Dean Datar in March of 2023, after which Gino was placed on unpaid leave.

Gino took to her blog to defend herself – insisting “There is one thing I know for sure: I did not commit academic fraud. I did not manipulate data to produce a particular result,” adding “I did not falsify data to bolster any result. I did not commit the offense I am accused of. Period.”

She then sued Harvard, Harvard Business School Dean Srikant Datar, and the Data Colada bloggers, claiming reputational damage and loss of income and career opportunities due to the investigation and placing her on administrative leave beginning in June 2023.

“Harvard shared their case. And while my lawyers have discouraged me from speaking out, I just need to say that I did not — ever — engage in academic fraud,” she wrote on her website in March 2024. “Once I have the opportunity to prove this in the court of law, with the support of experts I was denied through Harvard’s investigation process, you’ll see why their case is so weak and that these are bogus allegations.“

Except, a Boston judge dismissed her defamation claims against both Harvard and the Data Colada bloggers last September, ruling that her work can be scrutinized under the First Amendment due to her status as a public figure.