“Numerous plagiarism and nonsense”, Weber said he found in the diploma thesis of the Minister for Women, Susanne Raab (ÖVP), as he wrote on his blog on Friday. You have not mastered the basic scientific rules of your subject. According to Weber, it no longer seems important to him whether she “deceived” or not. In the minister’s office, there was talk of whimpering allegations that were not commented on.
Raab completed a diploma course in psychology as well as a diploma and doctoral degree in law at the University of Innsbruck. For her psychological diploma thesis submitted in 2009 on the subject of “Attitude structures and life meanings of voluntary workers”, Weber was now criticized: “She did not master the basic scientific rules of her subject,” wrote the well-known plagiarism expert. Reason for this assessment: “17 plagiarism fragments” he had “saved on 84 pages of continuous text, often up to half a page in length.” This also affects a paragraph of one’s own conclusion and hypotheses.
Weber claims to have found not only plagiarism and the lack of source information when reproducing other people’s thoughts, but also other “annoying errors”. The Austrian psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl became “Frank” in Raab’s thesis. In addition, literature cited in the running text was repeatedly not cited in the bibliography. And also the empirical part of the work is “nonsense”, the sample is probably too small for statistical calculations.
“Allegations pulled by the hair”
One commented on “absurd constructions by self-proclaimed plagiarism hunters”, it was said in the meantime from the office of the minister. “Anyone seriously involved in science will conclude that the claims are fake.”
Weber had already confronted several politicians with similar allegations in the past, not least the former Labor Minister Christine Aschbacher (ÖVP). She resigned after the plagiarism affair, but was ultimately allowed to keep her master’s degree.
Source: Nachrichten
