Veteran Whistleblowers Advise Other Would-Be 'Ethical Resisters' To Carefully Weigh Personal Consequences Before Taking Action

A prominent committee of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) advises beginning researchers that, if they suspect a colleague of violating the ethical standards of the scientific community, they have "an unmistakable obligation to act"--that is, to blow the whistle on the misconduct. VINDICATED BUT . . . Carolyn Phinney won $1.246 million in court; however, she suffered post-traumatic stress disorder and is now unemployed. Historically, however, many researchers who have tried to carry through on this "obligation" have lost their careers, been ostracized by their fellow scientists, and suffered intimidation, defamation, and reprisal at the hands of their employing institutions. Some who have studied whistleblowing call the academy's advice--given in On Being A Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research, recently revised by the Committee on Science, Engineering, and Public Policy (Washington, National Academy Press, 1995)--facile, even irresponsible. "That's a wonderful, ideal statement, but it's an unfortunate one, because it sets forth an unrealistic and very often unsupported path," says Myron Peretz Glazer, a professor of sociology at Smith College. Glazer is coauthor- -with his wife, Penina Migdal Glazer, a professor of history at Hampshire College--of The Whistleblowers (New York, Basic Books, 1989), a six-year study of 64 individuals. "The fact is that anyone who raises concerns about the work of colleagues is likely to run into very serious difficulty. It's a statement structured to lead to cynicism, because any sophisticated person who reads it is likely to say that it is not a sincere statement. It's pap." Veteran whistleblowers report that divorce is not uncommon among them, nor are afflictions such as post-traumatic stress disorder. At the very least, they say, scientists today who are tempted to bring matters of misconduct to light should think long and hard before taking that step. "In the present environment, given the consequences that are almost certain to follow, it's basically immoral to say that people have an obligation to go forward," asserts Walter Stewart, the National Institutes of Health scientist who, with partner Ned Feder, has unofficially counseled dozens of potential whistleblowers. As a result of their own self- initiated involvement in scientific misconduct activities, the two men were forcibly reassigned to new, separate jobs at NIH in April 1993. Stewart protested the personnel action with a 33-day hunger strike, to no avail (F. Hoke, The Scientist, June 28, 1993, page 4). "Where you have a relatively junior whistleblower accusing a relatively senior scientist, which is a very common situation, we never advise potential whistleblowers to go ahead," says Feder. "We invariably say Advice To Potential Whistleblowers: Seek Help, Keep Full Records to them that, if you go ahead, here's what's very likely to happen: The person against whom you are making allegations will get off scot-free, your allegations will not be investigated properly, you will lose your professional career--you'll be out of science--and, in all likelihood, your family will break up. The last point is not so sure, but the others are a virtual certainty." "I'm not sure it is a hard and fast obligation [to act]," comments Marcia P. Miceli, senior associate dean for academic programs and a professor of human resources at Ohio State University. With coauthor Janet P. Near, chairwoman and a professor of management at Indiana University, Miceli wrote Blowing the Whistle (New York, Lexington Books, 1992). "Is it a higher obligation than the obligation to do research? You're running a big risk, and you may be wasting valuable time, especially as a junior researcher, that you can't afford to waste." Despite the extreme personal difficulties almost every whistleblower reports having endured, many say that, if faced with the same choices today, they would again speak out. They add, however, that when a researcher feels morally compelled to come forward with an allegation--as when the transgression involves possible injury to patients--there are important steps he or she should take to ensure being forearmed against the consequences. BASIC VALUES: "Is science or is science not based on truth and honesty?", asks Margot O'Toole. "If you're going to be in the science, the answer has to be 'yes.'" As a postdoctoral fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1986, Margot O'Toole charged that immunologist Thereza Imanishi-Kari, now at Tufts University, faked data published in the journal Cell with Nobel Prize winner David Baltimore. In November 1994, the Office of Research Integrity in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) made public its finding that Imanishi-Kari had engaged in scientific misconduct. Imanishi-Kari denies her guilt and will contest the finding before an HHS appeals board, convening on June 12. Divisive congressional hearings and widespread criticism of O'Toole by other scientists followed her raising the charges initially, and she was unable to find work in science for several years. "I feel I'll always be paying the price, but I would have to do it again," says O'Toole, now a staff scientist at Genetics Institute Inc. in Cambridge, Mass. "Is science or is science not based on truth and honesty? Does accuracy of data and reporting of data matter? If you're going to be in science, the answer has to be 'yes.' "I've gotten stronger through this process, but it's very hard to find that strength in yourself. And before you go through it, you don't know whether you have it or not. The thing to decide in the beginning is that it's worth the stand, no matter what." Many scientists are under the impression that scientific misconduct is a vanishingly rare occurrence. But in a recent survey of faculty and graduate students conducted by science historian Judith P. Swazey, president of the Acadia Institute, Bar Harbor, Maine, and her colleagues, between 6 percent and 9 percent of faculty respondents reported knowledge of plagiarism and data falsification by other faculty (J.P. Swazey, M.S. Anderson, K.S. Lewis, American Scientist, 81:542-53, 1993). Between 13 percent and 33 percent reported observing those behaviors among graduate students. And between 15 percent and 43 percent of faculty reported that other faculty had engaged in one of four "questionable research practices," as defined by NAS. Also, although whistleblowers are often portrayed as troublemakers and malcontents, researchers report that they are, in fact, people who believe in fairness and playing by the rules. "The people we studied tended to be very strong-minded, committed people, and people who believed in the system, who believed that if they raised an issue, there would be a reasonable response," says Glazer. "They were not alienated or radical or critics of the system, but rather true believers in the system." Robert Sprague, a professor of psychology at the University of Illinois, concurs: "A person wouldn't blow the whistle unless they believed in the system. By and large, whistleblowers are idealistic. They really believe that it's just a matter of somebody not understanding the real facts-- but that's not a good assumption." Sprague was the whistleblower in a case in which a University of Pittsburgh psychologist, Stephen Breuning, pleaded guilty to fraud in United States District Court in Maryland in 1988. Breuning admitted faking psychopharmacological studies involving a movement disorder common in severely retarded children receiving tranquilizer therapy. (See also R.L. Sprague, The Scientist, Dec. 14, 1987, page 11.) Preferably, prior to making any allegations, would-be "ethical resisters"--the term preferred by some whistleblowers, according to Glazer--should contact scientists who have gone before them on this road, experienced whistleblowers suggest. Many feel there are common patterns in the responses of institutions to the perceived threat of a whistleblower and say that being prepared for them can blunt their impact. Among these are moves to shift the focus from the whistleblower's charges to the whistleblower's character; counter-charges of misconduct against the whistleblower; and job restructuring, transfer, or termination. "It's almost like the establishment goes to school and has a course in this," observes Roger Boisjoly, president of his own "forensic engineering" firm, Boisjoly Engineering Ltd. in Roosevelt, Utah. In January 1986, as an engineer with Morton Thiokol Inc. in Willard, Utah (the company has since separated into two entities), Boisjoly raised technical concerns that he felt should delay a launch of the space shuttle Challenger. The shuttle subsequently exploded with the loss of the entire crew of seven. A presidential commission investigating the accident found not only that Boisjoly's technical assessment was correct, but also that flawed management practices at the company had contributed to the tragedy. Sharing information with others can be useful in direct ways, and it can also help counteract the damaging isolation that whistleblowers say is typical. "You're just one person trying to learn the rules from scratch," counsels research psychologist Carolyn Phinney. "So, if you can get in touch immediately with people like Walter Stewart and Robert Sprague, who know the system, you're going to be way ahead of the game. That's part of the reason I survived." Phinney alleged that Marion Perlmutter, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, committed fraud by lying to her to obtain access to and usurp her research and grant proposals. She also claimed that Richard Adelman, director of the university's Institute of Gerontology, where Perlmutter worked at the time, retaliated against her when she refused to drop the accusation against Perlmutter. In May 1993, a jury unanimously agreed with Phinney, and Judge Patrick Conlin awarded her $1.246 million in Washtenaw County Circuit Court, Ann Arbor, in September 1993. Phinney, unemployed since July 1992, says she developed post-traumatic stress disorder during her case. "That's Vietnam vets' disease," Phinney says. "It's what rape victims get. I was nearly hospitalized, because I couldn't stop throwing up. I didn't know what was wrong with me." When a psychiatrist diagnosed her problem, she asked him why she had developed the disorder. He told her the trauma she had suffered was major: "The fundamental premises upon which you based your life and your career were decimated." Boisjoly, too, notes that being right was no protection from the dangers of whistleblowing. His relationship with his employer deteriorated, and he found himself increasingly isolated. He began to experience dramatic mood swings, inexplicable outbursts of anger, symptoms of heart disease and stroke, and episodes of double vision, he says. Eventually, his problems also were diagnosed as post- traumatic stress disorder, for which he received treatment. Boisjoly began giving talks to students about his experiences, too, which he found therapeutic. "I healed a lot quicker, because I was able to talk about it," he says. Boisjoly suggests potential whistleblowers contact the Government Accountability Project (GAP) in Washington, D.C., for help. GAP can be reached at: (202) 408-0034; fax: (202) 408-9855; E-mail: gap@cap.gwu.edu. GAP provides legal and other counsel to whistleblowers and publishes "Courage Without Martyrdom: A Survival Guide For Whistleblowers," a booklet detailing the tactics organizations have used to neutralize dissenters (see Opinion, page 11). In addition, Boisjoly advises, "don't be so hardheaded as to not go to colleagues to get it verified that you are indeed on good ground." "It's also very important to discuss this with your family and to get their support," Glazer says. "Make sure that people close to you have as much information as possible, because you are going to be obsessed by this situation for many months to come." For those who decide to act--after consultation with experienced whistleblowers, colleagues, and family members-- there are several practical considerations. "The most important thing is to get a job," Stewart stresses. He can be reached at: (301) 983-1441; E-mail: wstewart@nyx.cs.du.edu; WWW: http://nyx10.cs.du.edu: 8001/_wstewart. "If you've lost your job, get another job. If you've lost your career, get another career. It's virtually impossible to fight the thing in an unemployed position. Making your career fighting your case has a very bad prognosis." "We also advise them to keep accurate records, make photocopies of lab notes, all that sort of thing," adds Feder. "An awful lot of whistleblowers embark on this thing without good records. And if you don't have good records, it's absolutely hopeless." "I was the only one who had real-time notes on the [pivotal] meeting that took place," Boisjoly recalls. "And, quite frankly, [company management] was doing quite well in front of the presidential commission until I turned in my [contemporaneous] memos. When I turned in my memos, the whole complexion of the investigation changed. They could no longer just look at the technical causes. They had to go and address now what kind of management tomfoolery had been going on." "One of the characteristics of the successful whistleblower is that they're compulsive record-keepers," agrees Robert Sprague. "And that often turns the tide."

Veteran Whistleblowers Advise Other Would-Be 'Ethical Resisters' To Carefully Weigh Personal Consequences Before Taking Action

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