Unethical Postgraduate Supervision

Dear Editor, Many years ago unprofessional supervisors were identified as one of the main reasons for the withdrawal of a student’s study. Recently in some universities, unethical supervision has become an increasing concern of students and ethic committees. The last few years has witnessed an increase in the withdrawal rate of students who quit their study because of the poor guidance of their supervisors. The unethical supervisors try to delay the graduation of students, who are hardworking and have good scientific writing ability. They request more and more publications from their students before they permit the final submission of their thesis. This may be because of the need for multiple publications in the modern academic environment (Sorooshian 2016a). The supervisor can strengthen his/her profile because of these publications. This becomes more noticeable when supervisors put their name as the first author of the articles. Sometimes supervisors add their friends and colleagues to the list of authors. Unethical supervisors can be a silent part of the scholarly black market which was recently introduced (Sorooshian 2016a, b, c).