Distrust Among Members of a Lab
Author(s):
Terry Ann Krulwich
This much is known to all the people in the scenario:
An active research laboratory, under the direction of Professor Big, is investigating the cell and molecular biology of a new cytoskeletal protein that is specific to cardiac cells. The lab has two students, Who Me and Wiz, as well as two technicians, three postdocs, Huey, Dewey, and Lewie, and a clinical fellow, Heart. Heart is doing two years of research in preparation for a career in cardiology and related cell biological research.
The two students, Who Me and Wiz, are quite friendly with each other, and their work is going well, especially Wiz' work,although recently even Wiz had a few disasters. Who Me's work is also going well; she is working on the expression of the gene encoding the new protein, and provides useful clones to Dewey. Who-Me and Wiz get along well with most of the other people in the lab, but Huey has a terrible temper, and doesn't do a fair share of the common work (like radioactive disposal, cleaning up after himself, preps); also, there is a problem with Dewey's progress and a sense of uneasiness by some of the other members of the lab with Dewey. They have not, however, talked about it among themselves.
Professor Big is beginning to write a new paper on Dewey's work, and indicates that Who Me should be an author. Who Me indicates quietly that she doesn't really feel right about being an author on the paper, and Professor Big lets it go.
This is what some of the characters know:
The real reason that Who Me doesn't want authorship is that she thinks that Dewey is such a careless worker that she is afraid that her name will be on a paper that contains many errors.
Dewey is well aware of his inadequacies in the lab, and is very jealous of how well other people's work is going. A few times recently, he messed up Wiz's experiments; finally, one night, Lewie happened to be there and saw the sabotage in progress. He asked Dewey what was going on, and got a sorrowful confession and promise from Dewey that he would never be dishonest or destructive in the lab again; Dewey begged Lewie not to tell anyone. Lewie did not tell anyone.
Questions to work with:
- If Who Me doesn't think Dewey's results are sufficiently error`free to publish, is she correct in keeping this view to herself?
- What might she do, depending on all the personalities involved?
- What would you do?
- Do you find it credible that a sloppy worker could go more or less unreported? undetected?
- Should Professor Big be expected to sit down with Who`Me and find out what Who`Me's reason is for refusing authorship, lest it be known fraud or unexpressed rancor?
- What, if anything, should Lewie have done after he caught Dewey in the act of sabotage?
- What if he had not caught Dewey but only suspected - should he tell Wiz? the Professor?
- What should happen to Dewey? How is such an issue handled in your department?
- What if the culprit were Heart, who is about to assume a faculty position in which he both sees patients and does research? Would the obligation (or moral burden) to report increase?
- What are the risks to Lewie (the potential whistle blower)? Do those risks prevent whistle blowing in a case such as this?
- How much should Lewie worry about what Dewey might do next time, if not challenged more officially now?
On a less serious front what obligation does the Professor have to address Huey's temper tantrums and lack of participation in a fair share of lab duties? What would you suggest for lab situations in which one trainee seems to getaway with doing less of the "scut", sometimes just because they are a little hard to deal with?
What if Huey is very respectful with Professor Big, but is rude to one of the technicians and expects the technician to put up with lots of personal mess? Should someone else bring it to the Professor's attention? Should peer pressure prevail? What if Huey's pattern seems to have a sexist tone?
by Terry Ann Krulwich, Dean of Graduate School
Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY