Different schools have different rules or tradationals to follow, anyway, my openion is that we as supervisors have to support the students to take the responsibility in everything starting doing the research and writing and corresponding. Thus, the student who does most of the work should be the first author. Supervisors are "old for this", I mean it does not mean much for him to be the first or the second but should be included as coauthor. So it is used to be the last one in most publications. Usually the last one in the sequence of authors order meindicates that he is the head of the team or the supervisor. Simply, our duty to teach and support the new researchers to take the responisbility in everything to be independent.

Dear Najim, The person who does the research originally and developed the manuscript is to be the 1st author. He has rights to add his co-authors who might be his guide or colleagues who had given him supports in developing the research or written some parts of the article. Laboratory technicians/statisticians will not be given any authorship.

In some universities, if the supervisor is doing his/her PhD work currently, They wanted to be the 1st author by offering the different problems to their students and get solved and get published. In this case , officially the supervisor demands his authorship to be first from the students.

However research publishing is open to all and is your freedom to choose your right co-authors.

I understand that the first author should be the principle researcher (i.e. the one who has done the most work) and that if a supervisor demands to be first author when in fact the supervisee has done the majority of the work that would not be ethical.

As for coauthors, anyone who has contributed from the beginning to the end -to whatever extent- deserves to be included. Supervisors, of course, fall under this category as they will usually have been involved in the paper from research conception until the submission, to varying degrees.

It falls to the lead author to determine if someone who has not been involved in the entire work deserves mention as a coauthor or should be relegated to the acknowledgements...

If the student does most of the work, then (s)he should be the 1st author, and the supervisor should be the 2nd author even if (s)he financed the project (but the supervisor can be the corresponding author if (s)he wishes it). If other people contribute significantly - e.g. not only measure or calculate something but also write explanations what the results mean - they should be co-authors, too. Other people can be mentioned in the acknowledgements and people doing only language checks can get paid: they do not have to be mentioned in the paper.

Different schools have different rules or tradationals to follow, anyway, my openion is that we as supervisors have to support the students to take the responsibility in everything starting doing the research and writing and corresponding. Thus, the student who does most of the work should be the first author. Supervisors are "old for this", I mean it does not mean much for him to be the first or the second but should be included as coauthor. So it is used to be the last one in most publications. Usually the last one in the sequence of authors order meindicates that he is the head of the team or the supervisor. Simply, our duty to teach and support the new researchers to take the responisbility in everything to be independent.

All good answers in this thread. Even with very active guidance, I cant envisage many situations when the supervisor would have done more work than the student (researcher). Usually, first credit should always lie with the student. There are exceptions though i.e. a recent supervision of mine involved the student analysing the data that the supervisors had collected themselves.

There are slight variations from field to field in my fields the rules are generally; 1st author (the one who did the work), last author (your line manager or equivalent department head/supervisor). Authors between 1st and last author may be sorted by contribution or alphabetically but as I said these rules may vary.

The Original researcher or the idea generator should be the 1st author... Rest sequence should be as per contribution.

The Issue is controversial as stated by abdul because in many universities the head or Supervisor will remain as first author; the person who actually works wont get enough credits .

Hello all,

Good responses - well, with the PhD student/supervisor relationship - it should be always the student who should come first... as it is his/her research.

As for other collaborative work - I believe it should be an agreement at the first stage of authorship... however, in case any of the authors did not do what is required... or did not meet the deadlines - this author should be informed of the change in the agreement.!

Concerning who should be a co-author on a paper, there are a number of international guidelines for authorship on scientific papers, the most famous and widely cited is the so-called Vancouver Convention adopted by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors.

This states that in order to be a co-author on a paper, you need to fulfill the following four criteria:

- Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND

- Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND

- Final approval of the version to be published; AND

- Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

http://www.icmje.org/roles_a.html

An interesting case of denied authorship, based on the Vancouver convention is related in this article in the on-line Lab Times magazine http://www.labtimes.org/labtimes/issues/lt2007/lt01/lt_2007_01_6_12.pdf

A list of criteria suggested more recently by Paul J. Friedman from the UCSC and the Council of Science Editors lists several criteria, and suggests that a person should fulfill at least 2-3 of these to be a coauthor on a paper:

CONCEPT: the idea for the research or article, framing the hypothesis

DESIGN: planning the methods to generate results

SUPERVISION: oversight and responsibility for the organization and course of the project and the manuscript

RESOURCES: dollars, equipment, space, personnel vital to the project

MATERIAL: biological materials, reagents, referred patients

DATA COLLECTION/PROCESSING: responsibility for doing experiments, managing patients, organizing and reporting data

ANALYSIS/INTERPRETATION. responsibility for making sense of and presenting the results

LITERATURE SEARCH. responsibility for this necessary function

WRITING. responsibility for creating all or a substantive part of the manuscript

CRITICAL REVIEW. reworking the manuscript for intellectual content before submission, not just spelling and grammar checking

OTHER. for novel contributions

http://openwetware.org/wiki/Authorship

Concerning the question of the order of authors, there are enormously varied traditions between different disciplines, so there's no generally correct answer. In my world (animal physiology), the first author is usually the one doing most of the work, often a PhD student or a postdoc, and the last author is a senior research leader.

Dear All,

Thank you very much for the discussion we had on the issue so far.

Is it ethical of a supervisor of a M.Sc. or Ph.D. student to put his/her name as the first author of the paper done by his/her student? In such a situation, the student is helpless as he/she has to satisfy his/her supervisor to get his degree through.

No it is UNETHICAL for the supervisor to put his/her name as the first author - no matter how hard this supervisor worked - as the original research idea is the student's... Academy of Management has some ethical guidelines even in videos about such issues.

Regards

Dear Madam Theodora Issa

Could you please let us know the links to the ethical guidelines you are referring to so that many could be benefited.

In my personal experience the authors can be listed:

- by the work done in the paper

- by the alphabetical order

- by the academic rank

in my cv I have papers with each of these situations. It depends on the people you work with.

The answers so far have not addressed two points. One is who did the actual writing? The other is who is the corresponding author? In my career as a research supervisor, I made sure the one who did the bulk of the work also did the writing and was thus the first author. In the case of multiple inputs of data or ideas, the writer was still the first author. It always made sense to me for the PI in the lab doing the work should be the corresponding author for the sake of continuity. I believe all authors should have had creative input into the work. If someone did some task that was routine, they should be acknowledged. This last point is probably the most frequently infringed. Managers of service labs are often included as authors. Sometimes also are associates that have just been involved in the broader aspects of the project. I do not get too upset about over-crediting. It all sorts out over time.

I think this discussion attracts answers because the ethical principles are blurred nowadays. In my environment, there is an obvious contradiction between the rule that a student is the owner of his work, as Theodora said; and the fact that the ideas no longer come from them, because selection of thesis subjects is decided by the lab or the funding authority, ahead of students' selection, so the supervisor is responsible for the thesis on an intellectual basis, as Najim said. The supervisor is equally responsible for the thesis short duration, and the number of high-level publications. Unrealistic demands result in unclear practices.

The collecting of data and writing of papers is usually the student's responsability, but she/he gets (huge) help of course, no beginner can publish at the required level. Thus, sometimes, the entire paper is written by the supervisor or experienced team members. However, the student still appears as the first author.

I guess there were uncorrect behaviours at all times, but I saw devious practices develop over the past years, from "forgetting" major contributors to over-crediting some others; or refusing to dissociate first author and corresponding author. Students and supervisors alike are involved.

Many colleagues consider it is unavoidable and not that important, but I feel ethics should be overtly discussed like here and taught. I hope reasonable social rules will emerge, as in medicine, and be honestly applied.

See my recent article on the topic of author order: Henry, Stuart. 2013. "On the Ethics of Collaborative Authorship: The Challenge of Authorship Order and the Risk of Textploitation.” Western Criminology Review 14(1): 84-87 (http://wcr.sonoma.edu/v14n1/Henry.pdf).

Thanks Stuart for the interesting paper.

Hello Najem,

Here is the link http://aom.org/About-AOM/Ethics-of-Research---Publishing-Video-Series.aspx

Hope it works !

I just wanted to contribute my own experiences Nadine. When I was a PhD student, (graduated 2010) I wrote the papers largely by myself. My supervisors commented and gave me guidance, but the writing was mine. I was the first author and also the corresponding author, i.e. the responsibility for the paper was all mine. The ideas for 3 out of 4 papers came from my supervisor, but I developed them, analysed the data and wrote the papers. I don't understand why there should be a problem with the student also being the corresponding author. If he/she wrote the paper, why can't they be responsible for submission processes, including any necessary revisions and finally publication?

Students can be corresponding authors if their English is good and if they know how to respond to the reviewers' suggestions. Otherwise, it is better if somebody else is the corresponding author or at least if somebody checks how the student has responded.

OK. My written English is excellent, and of course, my supervisors read all of the correspondence before I submitted it.

There is no problem when there is trust, when supervisor and student agree about the responsibilities, or generally when co-authors agree among them. Problems arise when parts of the implicit contract are not respected, for instance when a student who did not write the paper by himself and is about to leave sends the paper as corresponding author, or when a supervisor insists on being the first author because he is the corresponding author for the sake of continuity.

Indeed, it depends on the RESPECT and TRUST between the student and the supervisor... if there is a MUTUAL respect and trust - none of these problems will occur.

I agree with the comments that the person who writes the paper should be the first author. Supervisors/PI are most often the last author, indicating senior leadership. In my experience, the decision is usually made at the time the idea for the paper is conceived to have the person doing the bulk of the work also do the bulk of the writing. In fact, discussing authorship at the earliest stage of writing, such as at the time a paper outline is created, is a good idea to avoid conflict over author order when it's time to submit. If a supervisor wants to be the first author, they should then shoulder most of the writing responsibility. Personally, I think it is to everyone's advantage to let students write a first draft, and therefore be first author, even if their writing skills are not yet adequate to get the paper all the way to the point that it's ready for submission. The point of being a student is to learn new skills, and publishing is a vitally important skill for a scientist. Any PI who is supervising students should take education of their students as a crucial part of their job, and that includes educating them about the publication process. It is also to the PI's advantage to produce graduates who go on to have successful careers of their own, and getting a few first-author publications under their belt as a student is an important step towards that goal.

As far as determining who else is listed as a co-author, most journals have guidelines for determining whether someone should be listed as a co-author rather than listed in acknowledgements. Many actually require all co-authors to attest to having met each of these criteria. These criteria vary by field, but the criteria I see most often in medicine are (1) major contributions to conception and design, data acquisition/collection OR analysis; AND (2) writing or substantive revision of the manuscript; AND (3) review and approval of final manuscript. This still leaves much room for interpretation, but at least gives some guideline.

At our University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, we have rules who is the first, who the corresponding and who the lead (last) coauthor. For this leading coauthor a written agreement must be signed making it clear that he/she is the leading coauthor and not simply the last person mentioned.

Of course, being the chief of the department does not entitle him/her to be the last coauthor. Leading the research and/or work on manuscript is the ticket that buys the (co)authorship.

The World Association of Medical Editors http://www.wame.org/resources/publication-ethics-policies-for-medical-journals#authorship has details for determining authorship. As a policy, I establish authorship agreements as early as the first meeting of research collaborations. It is good to have a written agreement.

There are so many ways of doing this. I know people who put the authors in alphabetical order; others who do it randomly; others who put them in the order of their contributions (think of articles in 'big' physics that can have as many as 50 or more authors). I don't believe there is any right, or correct, way, but it's really important not to have disgruntled co-authors, so I suppose that sometimes this can be a 'touchy' business.

I participated in a large EU project which included many research groups across Europe. The policy for the multi-author papers that were published was that the people who actually wrote the paper were listed first, according to the importance of their contribution, and the rest of the people (who contributed data etc.) were listed afterwards in alphabetical order.

Carly - a unique way of doing it. Sounds like a good idea for any study where there are say - more than 10 authors. Readers would be able to work out who were the more 'minor' players - when it becomes alphabetical order - and that might save a bit of tension in the 'I supplied a bit more data than they did' department. Of course, with APA conventions of citing - it doesn'treally matter. It's the first 6 authors that are mentioned - then the last author (sometimes it's worth been the last named author!!) only - the rest disappear

I agree with the comment of Ellen Schultz, which is similar to the ICMJE guidelines available at www.icmje.org/‎ -- a useful reference for determining authorship eligibility.

There are examples given here, when the article is an output of a large research project. To my (perhaps narrow) way of thinking though, an 'author' is someone who has actually contributed to the published paper (not the overall project). Of course, this contribution may be in writing, data compilation etc, but perhaps those who have encouraged or lent support (academic, technical, moral etc) are to be more correctly identified in the papers 'acknowledgements' citing their specific role, and not as an author or co-author.

Like it as not, authorship is often about kudos, citation etc (as shown in some of these posts), and we often see long CVs that people submit for annual review or post on their faculty pages listing all of the work they have 'supervised' (sic. lead/co-author number 26) as if they had played an active role in planning, writing & submitting the paper. Perhaps the tradition of including 'important' people should move to acknowledgement rather than co-authorship & this differentiation should be made clear? Whenever I see a listing of lots of 'authors', I am always impressed how they have managed to co-ordinate their specific inputs to form the single paper that is in front of me .... team workers obviously ;-)

Nicholas - I agree with all your points in your last post. It is a bit of game at times. In my field, i often see medical clinical studies that have 10-15+ authors - and it's obvious that some are there in name only. In some cases, it may be purely that they are 'mates' in what can be a bit of 'boys club'.

Dear Nicholas!

I cannot agree with your position(s)! While it may be true that some authors are listed just for reason they are "bosses" in one or other way, nowadays research is often done in big multidisciplinary groups - and from this reason also a lot of coauthors emerge.

… and yes, being in the position of the principal researcher or supervisor I may advise, direct, lead … the research of my colleagues, and finally encourage them to write the scientific paper by themselves. If the paper is written so well, that I do not need to change a single word, I still believe I must be put as the coauthor - better to say: as the lead author, as I believe I was the one who helped a lot that the research was made properly and brought to the successful end.

@Boris: "... I believe I must ..." Dicto ergo est?

Unfortunately, my take is still that authors are authors, & helpers/mentors etc are to be acknowledged separately. You only have to look at the author instructions for any major journal, in any field, to see that authorship criteria is clearly defined by the active contribution of those listed and not by position.

If of course somebody insists on being put as co-author or lead author because they fulfilled their (employed) role in supporting, supervising or otherwise helping those who they have a position over, then it is often the case that these individuals will be listed amongst the authors. Fortunately, whilst we can disagree in forums such as this, the criteria for authorship is often clearly stated for each journal, so it remains a matter for the authors to decide. I acknowledge that there is tradition & politics involved (the Game that DW mentions), but thankfully we don't all have to play it. It also points to how our institutions note the performance and 'success' of supervisors - I would like to see the output of a team or faculty acknowledged without having to claim authorship. Unfortunately, being a listed author still is the most conspicuous marker, but it can be perhaps a bit superficial when everybody demands a place on the billboard ;-)

Dear Nicholas!

It seems we have a bit different positions … OK, the World would have been dull if everything was identical. Just one word to make my point more clear: Science is not a sport, where the sportsman only gets the medal while the coach just the acknowledgement. I would rather see research work and finally paper writing like conducting a symphonic orchestra - the whole orchestra without the conductor is worth almost nothing …

Good point Nicholas. I do like your eloquent use of the orchestra conductor analogy Boris but, I too, would beg to differ. For instance, some of my publications are as a result of Masters and PhD supervisions. Without me 'conducting' their academic and publication journey - i doubt that their studies would 'see the light of day'. However, morally and ethically, I feel that I can only always take second credit - no matter how much of a part I have played. It's their research at the end of the day - and I wouldn't want to 'steal their thunder' anyway.

To follow up on the orchestra analogy, the conductor is not a playing orchestra member but its conductor (& is billed as such). Likewise, a coach does not get 'an assist' when their player scores a goal & the make-up artist does not get headline billing even though without her efforts, the main actress would look decidedly less glamorous.

I understand the tradition of listing supervisors but still say that this often goes against the published requirements for authorship. Supervisors are employed to support / help etc. & whilst I agree they should be properly acknowledged for their role, unless they specifically meet the criteria for authorship, I would say that they are claiming a degree of credit that may not be theirs. If people want credit (kudos) as 'author', then they should meet its definition .... themselves. If supervising /helping does not bring enough acknowledgement, then writing is always a good alternative. I help get people's work published on a regular basis (that would otherwise not see the light of day), but it is never my work .... always the authors. I just have to get on and write my own & settle for the odd acknowledgement from time to time ;-)

http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-301854.html

3.2 Who did the work?

The list of authors should accurately reflect who did the work. All published work should be attributed to one or more authors.

•Journal instructions for authors should explain the concepts of academic authorship, setting out which contributions do and do not qualify for authorship.

•Journals should remind contributors about authorship guidelines (for example, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors [ICMJE] criteria) and should encourage their adherence by appropriately designed authorship declarations.

•Listing individuals' contributions to the research and publication process provides greater transparency than the traditional listing of authors and may discourage inappropriate authorship practices such as 'ghost' authors (individuals who qualify for authorship but are not listed) and 'guest' (or honorary) authors (individuals who are listed despite not qualifying for authorship, such as heads of department not directly involved with research).

•Editors should ask for a declaration that all authors meet the journal's criteria for authorship and that nobody who meets these criteria has been omitted from the list.

•Editors should ask for a declaration that the authors have acknowledged all significant contributions made to their publication by individuals who did not meet the journal's criteria for authorship. These might include, for example and depending on their contribution, author's editors, statisticians, medical writers, or translators.

http://www.sagepub.com/journalgateway/ethics.htm#

Authors Journal Author Gateway

Authors should ensure that:

##their work is original and written by them

>

>

##authorship of the paper is accurately represented, including ensuring that all individuals credited as authors participated in the actual authorship of the work and that all who participated are credited and have given consent for publication

Final post (promise ;-) ): Here is the COPE guideline that recommends that 'honorary' or 'ghost' authors should be moved to an acknowledgement section & not listed as authors. It also says that authors are more likely to acknowledge their actual role in developing the actual paper, if they describe their contribution in open statements (makes it less easy than ticking a box).

I have found this question very interesting indeed.

At least I have never put my name as the first author of any article prepared by my research students. I feel, it is a sin to put my name as the first author when the work was actually done by my students. In fact, I believe in writing articles as the sole author as far as possible.

Good stuff Nicholas. I agree fully, and I now realise that I did not articulate my last post very well. If I was 'merely' supervising' alone - I would not take any authorship credit for my students work. I should have said that, for the vast majority of my supervisions, I 'extensively' edit and re-work their theses so that they are 'ready' for publication - as well as 'chase them up' for deadlines etc. In these cases, I do think that i deserve some authorship credit.

@Dean: The guidelines clearly state what contributions constitute authorship, so it helps remove some of the doubt. For example though, when I edit someone elses article, although I do the usual language proofing, I also re-structure or re-phrase to convey information appropriately, advise on academic issues like supporting statements they have made, check the work against the journal's author guidelines for style, word count etc. It is often these issues that would stop an authors submission, but although I have this level of involvement I never add significant new material. For this reason, I do not feel any entitlement to authorship. Had I instigated the work, played an active role in its conception/construction & monitored its development through to submission (as supervisors IMO are meant to do), then this does merit authorship. Judging from the state of some of the work I see however, the supervisor who is prominently cited has evidently not been .... so diligent in processing the work ;-)

Nicholas - I see, recognise and acknowledge your stance - and highly commendable it is. However, if I have invested time above and beyond my supervision contract (and that includes 'you can 'lead a horse to water - but you can't make it drink') - then I think that credit is due. It's a lot of work to do these things and, at the end of the day, the lead author claims the 'lion's share' anyway. A supervisor may not add much 'significant new material' towards the end processes - but they may well have done previously; and I think that you acknowledge that in your previous post. My experience also is that thesis students want their supervisors 'along for the ride' - and that includes the reassurance that they are willing enough to put their name to the 'end product', otherwise they may not have the confidence to submit on their own.

Fair point Dean ... as long as it's not a free ride ;-)

Good to hear Nicholas - and, as far as I can recollect, I've never had a free ride. They've often, to me, seemed relatively expensive; until your co-author gushes praise on you for 'walking them through the process'.

Consider this hypothetical scenario where the supervisor is in fact is the main contributor while the researcher (for some reason) is not. Then what ?

My experience is that it is useful to talk about authorship BEFORE a manuscript is being written to prevent arguments and disappointment later. First author should be the person writing the paper. Co-authorship is awarded to people who have contributed significantly to the research being reported - whether or not a contribution was significant is subjective and must be decided by someone, e.g. the senior author. It is important to keep negotiations about authorship and order of mention OPEN and let everyone have his/her say. In my experience, this works best. I have the tendency to include students/RA's as authors if they have contributed to a publication - others acknowledge their work in the acknowledgements. This is a decision that can be difficult to make sometimes.

Subrata,

The scenario that you have mentioned is not necessarily hypothetical. Perhaps your personal experiences are of that type! You may have come across someone who told you to search for a research problem on your own! In fact, he might have told you further that if he has a research problem at hand, why would he give it to you? Perhaps such a person would like to put his name as the first author just because he has offered you a research problem!

Even if the research supervisor has to work out certain things initially, the student would anyway start doing his researches on his own later. In that situation, would you allow your student to write only his name as the sole author, or not?

Hi, all!

Consider this: Albert Einstein got his Nobel prize for the work of his wife Mileva Maric who made all mathematics, his was only the idea.

Similar is also the case with Pier and Marie Curie - Marie was awarded the prize after long battle whether women deserve such a noble prize!

Sic!

Yes Boris - their claims to fame may well be based on others efforts - but their ideas were 'game-changers' - and neither Einstein nor Curie were 'slouchers'. Whatever recognition they have enjoyed, both past and present, is well justified.

@Boris: The two examples you give are (fortunately) from a different era. Principles of ethics (worldwide) have moved on & been agreed internationally to correct the flaws you point out. In the present era I would hope things like this would be unwanted anomalies as opposed to the norm.

PS: The gender issue has also been picked up on ;-)

When research students engage in research, it is for academic purposes. This is done under the supervision of one or more supervisors whose role is to supervise and mentor the student. In such a case the student does most of the work naturally. Authorship should be based on the contribution of individual members of the team with the Student as the first author. Subsequent authors should be listed based on the level of their contribution. Other project team members can be acknowledged because they play very specific roles. If a supervisor does not contribute much to the study, then it is unethical to include in co-authorship.

It depends upon the question and the context. If the researcher is being guided through the research process then they should get awarded joint authorship with supervisor depending upon guidance, data collection and discussion. The statistician should also be added onto the authorship of the paper. I know this rarely happens as I have been a 'victim' of this process as without the statistics there would be little or no meaningful results!

@ Alan: see my view & the published links that differentiate (albeit important) key help, from the definition of authorship. Quite often, we lend technical, supervisory or other expertise which is highly important to the study, but does not necessarily meet the criteria of 'authorship'. In such cases, we may have to settle for a deserved acknowledgement in the paper instead ;-)

Unfortunately, authorship is often the only marker which institutions (& CVs) value, so an 'acknowledgement' does not always serve to indicate the key role that those who have not specifically developed the written paper have played. It would be good to see institutions produce some sort of statement on how they define authorship & the criteria they base it on. They should also state how they recognise the contribution of other key players & how they value their input in terms of institutional policy & recognition. Not everyone can have a long list of 'publications', even though their underlying work is crucial to the publications of others. Being an 'unsung hero' however should not detract from the value & recognition of providing such help :-)

Nicholas, I agree entirely but the resentment and ill feeling that exclusion causes does impact on future joint initiatives1 alan

@Prof. Hemanta Baruah

Sir, what you said is perfect. But my hypothetical situation is "suppose some one has a Ph. D. research scholar who is doing or contribution very little, whom the supervisor for some reason can not ask to leave and hence in order to complete his/her thesis most of the work is done by the supervisor himself". Then what?.

@Journalists/Editors/

A suggestion!

Can we define a category below the main author/s?

In other hand we can move the acknowledgment in a formal format, which will be a part of the article info for submitted/published papers, like Keywords/Submitted date/Accepted date. For example:

Title: "………"

Author/Authors: "1,2,3,….."

Main contributors/key players/….:"NONE, or 1,2,3,….."

And then we can assign a equal score (e.g half of quarter score) to the contributor/s to improve their CVs.

I think it is better to write the names of contributors in ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS section.

What is your idea?

At the end of the day honestly it is between the supervisor and scholars to decide the order of the authorship. After all only they know who has the major contribution and who comes second so on. In any case even if a papers is written out of ones' Ph. D. thesis, it will always be looked upon as some thing which is supervised not his /her independent contribution.

Raoof - I like your idea of applying a 'formulae' to the author order - but I'm not sure that it is really that necessary. Research and publishing is a complex enough situation - without adding more complexity. I say that the order should be a 'natural' thing. All should know the rules and apply them. Their should be no power-play or egos involved. As Subrata implies, it should purely boil down to 'credit is due where credit is due' - not sure who first coined that expression though.

Dear Subrata,

If a research student does not work, it certainly can not, and ethically it should not, be the duty of the supervisor to do the research work on behalf of the student. Offering social services is one thing, and doing something unethical such as preparing the thesis in the name of supervising researches is quite another!

In my institution, it is common use that the first author is the researcher who has done most of the work. Usually, the senior researcher or the supervisor of the researchproject is the last author.

Concerning the co-authors, most journals have clear author guidelines in which - most of the time - they clarify in which case any other contributors can be designated as a co-author.

At our University, we have a form to be signed prior to starting working - this is part of the 'ethics approval' for research.

Theodora - what does the form entail - is it based on any guidelines ?

Indeed, it is directly linked with the approvals on the research itself - so, we have forms that cover HIGH risk (form A and needs the University approval) - then, we have the Form C that can be approved at the school level - but you need to have this form signed... too

I can see this is a potentially vexing question. Some journals such as the Journal of Physiology used to have a system whereby authorship was strictly alphabetical, others ask for the specification of what each authors contributed to the work, which helps. The lead author may also be the person who steers the manuscript through to publication and coordinates the other authors. Acknowledgements are also helpful and important. There should also be a mechanism to resolve any disputes about authorship to the mutual satisfaction of all.

Some institutions such as @Theodora Issa above or the Washington University, St Louis have formal rules:

http://wustl.edu/policies/authorship.html (text below)

My own view is that one should adhere to a code of ethics and mutual trust. Of course, the other option is to only publish articles as a solitary author, but that is becoming increasingly rare !

Policy for Authorship on Scientific and Scholarly Publications

Revised and Effective Date: December 15, 2009

Original Effective Date: February 2002, Revised June 15, 2009

Reviewed by: Faculty Senate Council, November 2009, and Faculty Senate, December 2009

Approved by: The Executive Committee on Research, December 2009

Applicability: Faculty, Staff, Postdoctoral Scholars and Associates, Fellows, Trainees, and Students affiliated with Washington University

Purpose:

Scholarly integrity and the responsible conduct and reporting of research are essential for maintaining public trust in the research enterprise, and for community benefit from research discovery.

Scientific and scholarly publications, defined as articles, abstracts, presentations at professional meetings and grant applications, provide the main vehicle to disseminate findings, thoughts, and analysis to the scientific, academic, and lay communities. For academic activities to contribute to the advancement of knowledge, they must be published in sufficient detail and accuracy to enable others to understand and elaborate the results. For the authors of such work, successful publication improves opportunities for academic funding and promotion while enhancing scientific and scholarly achievement and repute. At the same time, the benefits of authorship are accompanied by a number of responsibilities for the proper planning, conducting, analysis, and reporting of research, and the content and conclusions of other scholarly work. As a respected member of the academic community, it is the responsibility of Washington University and its faculty, staff and students to help protect these fundamental elements of the scientific and scholarly process. This policy provides an educational resource describing the essential considerations and requirements in responsible authorship and publication at Washington University.

Policy:

The following principles define Washington University's policy on authorship of scientific and scholarly publications.

1.Defining Authorship

An author is generally considered to be an individual who has made substantial intellectual contributions to a scientific investigation. All authors should meet the following three criteria, and all those who meet the criteria should be authors:

a.Scholarship: Contribute significantly to the conception, design, execution, and/or analysis and interpretation of data.

b.Authorship: Participate in drafting, reviewing, and/or revising the manuscript for intellectual content.

c.Approval: Approve the manuscript to be published.

An administrative relationship, acquisition of funding, collection of data, or general supervision of a research group alone does not constitute authorship.

It is recognized that definitions of authorship differ among the various scientific disciplines and professional journals, as may standards for “substantial” and “scholarly effort”, and the extent to which authors must participate in scholarship and authorship. For example, design/development of research equipment, or collection of a specific data set, may be substantial scholarly effort in certain disciplines. The expectation of this policy is that standards and criteria for authorship in an academic discipline will be widely recognized and consistent across that discipline (including within Washington University), and consistent with the appropriate professional association, and/or journal (publication) in which the work appears.

2.Lead Author

As a practical matter in the case of publications with multiple authors, one author should be designated as the lead author. The lead author assumes overall responsibility for the manuscript, and also often serves as the managerial and corresponding author, as well as providing a significant contribution to the research effort. A lead author is not necessarily the principal investigator or project leader. The lead author is responsible for:

a.Authorship: Including as co-authors all and only those individuals who meet the authorship criteria set forth in this policy.

b.Approval: Providing the draft of the manuscript to each individual contributing author for review and consent for authorship. The lead author should obtain from all coauthors their agreement to be designated as such and their approval of the manuscript. A journal may have specific requirements governing author review and consent, which must be followed.

c.Integrity: The lead author is responsible for the integrity of the work as a whole, and ensuring that reasonable care and effort has been taken to determine that all the data are complete, accurate, and reasonably interpreted.

3.Co-authors

All co-authors of a publication are responsible for:

a.Authorship: By providing consent to authorship to the lead author, co-authors acknowledge that they meet the authorship criteria set forth in section 1 of this policy. A coauthor should have participated sufficiently in the work to take responsibility for appropriate portions of the content.

b.Approval: By providing consent to authorship to the lead author, co-authors are acknowledging that they have reviewed and approved the manuscript.

c.Integrity: Each co-author is responsible for the content of all appropriate portions of the manuscript, including the integrity of any applicable research.

An individual retains the right to refuse co-authorship of a manuscript if s/he does not satisfy the criteria for authorship.

4.Acknowledgments

Individuals who may have made some contribution to a publication, but who do not meet the criteria for authorship, such as staff, editorial assistants, medical writers, or other individuals, can provide a valuable contribution to the writing and editing of publications. Since those contributions do not meet the criteria for authorship under this policy, those individuals should be listed in an acknowledgement and/or contributorship section of the work.

5.Unacceptable Authorship

Guest, gift, and ghost authorship are all inconsistent with the definition of authorship, and are unacceptable and a violation of this policy.

Guest (honorary, courtesy, or prestige) authorship is defined as granting authorship out of appreciation or respect for an individual, or in the belief that expert standing of the guest will increase the likelihood of publication, credibility, or status of the work.

Gift authorship is credit, offered from a sense of obligation, tribute, or dependence, within the context of an anticipated benefit, to an individual who has not contributed to the work.

Ghost authorship is the failure to identify as an author, someone who made substantial contributions to the research or writing of a manuscript that merited authorship, or an unnamed individual who participated in writing the manuscript. Ghost authorship may range from authors for hire with the understanding that they will not be credited, to major contributors not named as an author.

6.Authorship Order

The order of authors is a collective decision of the authors or study group. This policy does not address questions or disputes regarding the order of authorship on publications. It is not possible for the University to define the order of authorship. In conjunction with the lead author, co-authors should discuss authorship order at the onset of the project and revise their decision as needed. All authors must work together to make these informed judgments.

Should authors fail to resolve disputes about the order of authors, the chair or head of the involved department(s) should mediate an effort to resolve the dispute. If not successful, such mediation may be addressed by the school Dean. In cases that cannot be resolved, the lead author, in consultation with the department chair and/or Dean, will have the final authority to determine the order of authorship.

7.Dispute Resolutions

Guidelines have been developed for Avoiding and Resolving Authorship Disputes to assist with addressing disputes that do not represent a violation of this policy

8.Research Funding

All authors, in manuscripts submitted for review and publication, must acknowledge/disclose the source(s) of support for the work. Support includes research and educational grants, salary or other support, contracts, gifts, and departmental, institutional and hospital support.

9.Financial Conflicts of Interest

Authors shall fully disclose, in all manuscripts to journals, grant applications, and at professional meetings, all relevant financial interests that could be viewed as a potential conflict of interest or as required by the University and/or journal. All such financial interests must also be reported internally as required by the University’s conflict of interest policies.

Violations of the Policy:

Knowing, intentional, or reckless violations of this policy are considered research misconduct as defined by the Washington University Research Integrity Policy and as such, will be referred to the Research Integrity Officer. Violations of the policy that do not rise to the level of research misconduct may subject the individual to corrective action or other sanctions as deemed appropriate by the Vice Chancellor for Research. Disagreements regarding the order of authorship do not, in and of themselves, constitute a violation of this policy or research misconduct.

What i followed for 4.5 decades - The experimenter is the first author - the one conceived the idea is the corresponding author - Really some one has contributed n discussion place him in the middle -if tou

If you received some experimental help acknowledge them as you have paid them - do not give authorship

dear Theodora Issa , what is the ethics? sincere to science or not?

Just because we have had the same practice for 4.5 decades, it does not necessarily mean it is correct ... it simply means that we have not changed for 4.5 decades ....

Habit never dies dear Nicholas

If that were so, then we are destined to merely repeat the past ... ;-)

APA code of ethicsi is clear on this issue, if you are in a discipline that adheres to APA, if other, then the APA guidelines are at least informative http://www.apa.org/research/responsible/publication/index.aspx

dear Nicholas Rowe , most of the discoveries were only in second world battery systems now we use are 200 years old In 2001-2010 no new discoveries made

Sorry it should be in second world war

After 2000 , there are no scientists whose name has a SI ( standard international)units --To quote like Ohm, Volta, Debye , Ampere

I strongly believe in adhering to ethical principles. The student who spends sleepless nights, money and time working on his paper deserves the right to be the first author when the manuscript is ripe for publication. The supervisor can be the second or third author based on his contribution. Sometimes the publication does not add to his promotion but it only add to his already published articles which may not add or subtract from what he is already. The students should be encouraged to publish and have the sense of satisfaction derived from such act. Collection of data or when a statistician is paid to analyse data are not necessary criteria for authorship. Administrative or technical staff should be acknowledge but not included as authors.

'After 2000 , there are no scientists whose name has a SI ( standard international)units --To quote like Ohm, Volta, Debye , Ampere'

... but we have reached the Moon, undertaken the genome mapping project, invented the computer & internet ... We don't dismiss the past, but hopefully we learn and build upon it. Change is not threatening & helps us move forward. We often do so however by standing on the shoulders ofgiants

;-)

Hi:

If you have not seen it check out my article on this t:opic (I thought I'd posted it to this site but can't see it): Henry, Stuart. 2013. "On the Ethics of Collaborative Authorship: The Challenge of Authorship Order and the Risk of Textploitation.” Western Criminology Review 14(1): 84-87 (http://wcr.sonoma.edu/v14n1/Henry.pdf).

Nice paper, Stuart. Thanks.

@Stuart,

no problem, your paper is on this topic. Try to show" full discussion", your thread is the second one.

Hanno:

Thanks. Where is the button to show full description?

Cheers

Stuart

Dear Stuart, go to the top, right below the popular answers: "Show full discussion".

Try it, it will work. Regards

The supervisor should have the sensibility (and the intelligence) to promote the independent activity of young researchers. This does not mean to leave them to their own device; on the contrary, young people should be encouraged to find solutions to problems raised by the supervisor as well as to propose items to be investigated.

Only through this sort of brainstorming activity the supervisor will also be able to detect who takes the lead and who follows so as to get a clearer idea of which should be the order of the authorship for the final publication.

An enlighten supervisor of the kind briefly described above will clearly be satisfied with the last position in the list of authors if the team is working well under his/her supervision. Alternatively an alphabetical order of the authors could solve the problem.

a person who are doing research work should come first than supervisor

The first author: the student or the supervisor? It depends upon a number of factors. Did the researcher or the supervisor promote the research in which case then they should be accredited despite the data gathering and writing up. If the researcher did the write up fully and is adding the supervisor out of courtesy then that should be the order. Any other person involved in the research should be accredited to the paper either as a statistician or as a consultant providing feedback or direction.

Right, but the more complex question is which author comes first when they are each doing equal amounts of work, or complementary parts of a paper. In that case it is still justifiable to  promote the junior faculty or graduate student by making them first author, or to default to the alphabetical aorder. The challenge is who determines equity of work load. As I said in an earlier post and as indicated inmy article cited there, these are matters that should be agreed in advance, before any work is completed on the project/paper. The criteria for authorship order should be spelled out and signed by all parties to a project; this is a requirement at San Diego State University for Masters theses and above.

As a rule of thumb, I tried to respect who has worked the most! With a colleague, usually, it has not created problems and we agreed easily, With a student, the best thing to do is to discuss the matter before publishing. If the student has written a good piece of research and which I reviewed and corrected, as his/her supervisor, his/her name comes first, then mine. When I rewrote the text with his data, mine comes first, then his/her. If I used the data only and write the article mostly by myself, then, the name of the student can be associated by the mention «with the participation of». It is a delicate matter, I must admit,  because the supervisor is in position of authority; moreover, there is a matter of author's right. I have seen situation where the supervisor has been association to articles when his contribution had been very little. We have to balance justice and academic contribution.

Jean-Pierre:  many journals (& the COPE Guidelines) do not view supervision or merely reviewing/correcting as meriting authorship.  Acknowledgement yes, but the ICMJE (2001) state that “Authorship credit should be based only on:

Conditions (1), (2), and (3) must all be met."

Hi, this is a complex question because I noticed that in various parts of the world, various rules seem to apply. In my country, the Netherlands it is the first author that did the most work, the second author also contributed more than the third or fourth and the final author is always the supervisor or professor. In the States I learned that the place of the second author has a different meaning, I believe more weight is placed on the second than on the last author. But please correct me if I am wrong! 

It is definitely the case that 'in various parts of the world, various rules seem to apply' ... but where do these 'rules' come from, where are they written/agreed, and how are they regulated?  From an international journal perspective (& hence any work that is published in such journals), there is a commonly adopted set of ethics which all authors are obliged to follow.  They are also fully reasoned, so from a professional perspective, it is difficult to see why someone who practices with integrity would not wish to follow them. However, many of the views expressed in this thread reflect either personal, local or national views.  RG is an international forum, so it would be interesting to hear how 'rules' which differ from mainstream international 'norms' are justified or explained. This is especially so when the mainstream issues are widely adopted and reasoned in published form.  The idea of 'contributory weight' is clear in determining order, but I am not convinced by those who wish to claim authorship for tasks that are specifically excluded from international authorship criteria. These are defined in the COPE guidelines (see above post) as:

• Gift authors: People who are listed as authors but who did not make a significant contribution to the research and therefore do not fulfil the ICMJE criteria. These are often senior figures (e.g. heads of department) whose names are added to curry favour (or because it is expected).

A 2011 version of the published international standards are attached, so I guess it would be interesting to know why even though we contribute to publications that adhere to these standards, we can also 'bend the rules' to suit our own preferences.

This is an important issue and one that deserves discussion since the practice varies widely. When one person does considerably more work than the others, perhaps we can agree that that person should be the first author. I consider an important, sometimes even the most important part of the work to be preparing the first draft, putting the paper into the proper format for the journal, preparing figures, formatting references, checking calculations, proofreading, submitting the paper, and responding to the editors and reviewers.

More problematic is the case where two or more authors contribute equally. There are a number of possible approaches. One is to list them alphabetically, but that gives an obvious bias unless it is applied so consistently that everyone knows that is the practice. Another is to alternate or cycle the order in cases where there are multiple publications by the same authors. Another is to give priority to the one who would benefit most by being first author, and that would normally be the student or junior scientist rather than the advisor who presumably already has a significant publication record. Occasionally a fictitious first author is added, but that might not be ethical. One highly cited paper from my institution has our mascot Bucky Badger as it first author.

Also problematic is the case where authors are added for honorary reasons or where someone contributed minimally. Where there is a clearly identifiable contribution, I would lean in the direction of inclusivity, although I would expect such authors to at least read, comment on, approve, and most importantly, be willing to defend those portions of the paper to which they contributed or have knowledge. Coauthoring a paper implies a degree of responsibility over its contents, and anyone added for honorary reasons should take that responsibility seriously, else they should not be a coauthor.

As others have said, the practice varies widely. I know of a math ed research group in the USA which orders the authors randomly (perhaps because they have trouble saying who contributed the most). Because they do research and publish together, the group has a number of published papers and each time the order of the authors is different.

Lets keep it simple. The first author should be the person with the original idea for the article or research and who has done the most work. In the case of s student or supervisor, the same rule should apply in my opinion. The first authorship should be decided from the beginning.

Tendency in my world is whomever did most work and the write up is first, others in order of contribution and the last is the one who put together the project (got the funding, and contributed in some manner)