Defining COI
There are numerous definitions of conflict of interest in the philosophical, business, and legal literatures. But for my purposes, I will use the following general and specific definitions of COI:
General
A COI can be defined as “a situation in which a person has a private or personal interest sufficient to appear to influence the objective exercise of his or her official duties as, say, a public official, an employee, or a professional” (MacDonald et al. 2002, p. 68).
Specific
In the case of university research, a COI can arise with “any factor that might tend to undermine a competent researcher’s ability to make scientifically reliable judgments concerning research strategy, evidence or conclusions” (Davis 1999, p. 52).
These factors are understood to include not only financial interests, but also the full range of personal or psychological factors that may affect one’s judgment (e.g., personal pride, prestige, competitiveness). Such conflicts may be characterized as real or potential (i.e., an actual conflict of interest or a situation that threatens to evolve into a conflict of interest), and/or apparent (i.e., perceived to be a conflict, whether real or potential). Even merely apparent COI can do significant damage to individual and institutional reputations, because even apparent COI may be corrosive of trust.