Describes the procedures to be followed while allocating the credits.

1. DESIGN OF RESEARCH
AUTHORSHIP AND THE ALLOCATION
OF CREDIT
Kiran Hanjar S
I sem, IE
Dept. of IE&M
MSRIT

2. Definition
“Authorship is reserved for persons who make a
primary contribution to and hold primary
responsibility for the data, concepts, and
interpretation of results for a published work”
(Huth, 1987).
“ Authorship encompasses not only those who do
the actual writing but also those who have made
substantial scientific contributions to a study.”
(American Psychological Association, 2001, pg. 6)

3. • “The statement of authorship responsibility is
certification that each author has made
substantial contributions to
• (a) the conception and design, acquisition of
data, or analysis and interpretation of data
• (b) drafting and revising the article
• (c) approval of the final version. Further, each
author takes public responsibility for the work.”
( American Journal of Occupational Therapy, n.d.)

4. Authorship
• Authors are listed to provide a public record of
responsibility and credit for the work
• Only those who can take both responsibility
and credit for a work should be authors

5. • To be eligible for authorship, most policies
require that a person:
– Make a major contribution to
concept, design, analysis and/or interpretation of
the work
– Participate in drafting the article or revising it
critically for important content
– Have a voice in the final version submitted for
publication
– Accept responsibility as well as credit for the work
– Be able to present, discuss, interpret, and defend
the work, analysis, and conclusions

6. Allocation of credits
• When a paper is published, the list of authors
indicates who has contributed to the work
• Peer recognition generated by authorship is
important in a scientific career and needs to be
allocated appropriately
• Authorship conventions may differ greatly among
disciplines and among research groups
• Many journals and professional societies have
published guidelines that lay out the conventions
for authorship in particular disciplines

7. • Decisions about authorship can be especially
difficult in interdisciplinary collaborations or
multi-group projects
• Several considerations must be weighed in
determining the proper division of credit
between investigators working on a project
• Established researchers are well aware of the
importance of credit in science where
traditions expect them to be generous in their
allocation of credit to beginning researchers

8. • Sometimes a name is included in a list of
authors even though that person had little or
nothing to do with the content of a paper
• Ghost authorship, where a person who writes
a paper is not listed among the authors,
misleads readers and also should be
condemned
• Policies at most scientific journals state that a
person should be listed as the author of a
paper only if that person made a direct and
substantial intellectual contribution to the
design of the research

9. • The list of authors establishes accountability as
well as credit
• When a paper is found to contain errors,
whether caused by mistakes or deceit, authors
might wish to disavow responsibility

10. Authorship Issues in Faculty/Student
Collaborations
• Faculty-student collaborations are unequal
• Two common ethical problems:
– Faculty taking unearned authorship or
inappropriate author order
– Faculty granting students unearned authorship or
inappropriate author order
(Fine and Kurdek , 1993)

11. Preventing Authorship Problems
• Identify and assign study tasks that are key for
authorship, and those warranting only
acknowledgement.
• Link authorship to quality and completion of
work not to an individual’s role or title.
• Renegotiate authorship and author order
when new tasks emerge, responsibilities alter,
or people enter or leave the collaborative
group

12. Acknowledgement
• Acknowledge
– People or institutions with minor but respected role
in project
– People who cannot or do not want to be author
• Acknowledgements should specify
contribution, not offer vague thanks for help
• Many journals now require permission if
specific person or institution is named as this
could imply endorsement of study

13. Examples of Contributions Appropriate for
Acknowledgement
• Advice on study design
• Editing grant proposal, manuscript
• Data collection, subject recruitment, providing
animals, contributing samples
• Statistical or technical advice
• Assistance with data entry or analysis
• Photography
• Financial support or donation of materials
• Participants
• Fabrication of a device
• Recruitment or referral of participants

14. Thank you