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And the credit goes to … – Ghost and honorary authorship among social scientists (Papers: Gernot Pruschak & Christian Hopp | May 2022)

Posted by Dr Gary Allen in Human Research Ethics on June 1, 2022
Keywords: Authorship, Breaches, Journal, Research Misconduct, Research results

The Linked Original Item was Posted On May, 5 2022

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Abstract

This open access and peer PLOS paper, that was published in May 2022, and the research it reports, looks at authorship misconduct (ghost authorship and honorary authorship) amongst a sample of social science researchers.  It points to the need for greater professional development for social science researchers and more guidance material from publishers on authorship matters for social science researchers.  This is a good reference for publishes and editors, as well as researchers, RIAs and research office staff.  We have included links to six related items.

The proliferation of team-authored academic work has led to the proliferation of two kinds of authorship misconduct: ghost authorship, in which contributors are not listed as authors and honorary authorship, in which non-contributors are listed as authors. Drawing on data from a survey of 2,222 social scientists from around the globe, we study the prevalence of authorship misconduct in the social sciences. Our results show that ghost and honorary authorship occur frequently here and may be driven by social scientists’ misconceptions about authorship criteria. Our results show that they frequently deviate from a common point of authorship reference (the ICMJE authorship criteria). On the one hand, they tend to award authorship more broadly to more junior scholars, while on the other hand, they may withhold authorship from senior scholars if those are engaged in collaborations with junior scholars. Authorship misattribution, even if it is based on a misunderstanding of authorship criteria rather than egregious misconduct, alters academic rankings and may constitute a threat to the integrity of science. Based on our findings, we call for journals to implement contribution disclosures and to define authorship criteria more explicitly to guide and inform researchers as to what constitutes authorship in the social sciences. Our results also hold implications for research institutions, universities, and publishers to move beyond authorship-based citation and publication rankings in hiring and tenure processes and instead to focus explicitly on contributions in team-authored publications.

Pruschak, G. & Hopp, C. (2022) And the credit goes to . . . – Ghost and honorary authorship among social scientists. PLoS ONE 17(5).  e0267312. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0267312
Publisher (Open Access): https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0267312

A screenshot of the 'And the credit goes to … - Ghost and honorary authorship among social scientists' article.
And the credit goes to … - Ghost and honorary authorship among social scientists
The proliferation of team-authored academic work has led to the proliferation of two kinds of authorship misconduct: ghost authorship, in which contributors are not listed as authors and honorary authorship, in which non-contributors are listed as authors. Drawing on data from a survey of 2,222 soci…

Related Reading

And the credit goes to … – Ghost and honorary authorship among social scientists (Papers: Gernot Pruschak & Christian Hopp | May 2022)

Time to recognize authorship of open data – Nature (Editorial | April 2022)

Who’s on first? Duking out scientific paper authorship order – Scope (Krista Conger | December 2021)

Conflict resolution – Nature (Opinion | November 2021)

Don’t make early career researchers ‘ghost authors.’ Give us the credit we deserve – Science (Karishma Bisht | September 2021)

How to navigate authorship of scientific manuscripts – Science (Elisabeth Pain | May 2021)

Defining authorship in your research paper (Taylor & Francis)

Co-authorship in the Humanities and Social Sciences – Author Services (Resource: Taylor & Francis | September 2017)

The authorship rows that sour scientific collaborations – Nature (Nic Fleming | June 2021)

A simple guide to ethical co-authorship – London School of Economics Impact Blog (Dr Helen Kara | March 2021)

The ethics of authorship and preparation of research publications – World Aquaculture Society (Carole R. Engle | April 2020)

Taiwanese Researchers’ Perceptions of Questionable Authorship Practices: An Exploratory Study (Papers: Sophia Jui-An Pan & Chien Chou | January 2020)

CRediT Check – Should we welcome tools to differentiate the contributions made to academic papers? – LSE Blog (Elizabeth Gadd | January 2020)

Honesty in authorship. Who’s on first? – Hindawi (Eva Amsen | January 2020)

Authorship (NHMRC An Australian Code (2018) good practice guide | June 2019)

We Need to Talk About Authorship Abuse – Inside Higher Ed (A. Susan Jurow and Jordan Jurow | September 2019)

Transparent Attribution of Contributions to Research: Aligning Guidelines to Real-Life Practices (Papers: Valerie Matarese and Karen Shashok | April 2019)

Farewell authors, hello contributors – Nature (Alex Holcombe | July 2019)

Supervision and HDR candidate research outputs (Resource material: Griffith University | June 2018) UPDATED 14/02/19

Resolving authorship disputes by mediation and arbitration (Papers: Zen Faulkes | 2018)

How to counter undeserving authorship (Papers: Stefan Eriksson, et al)

Authorship wars: academics outline the rules for recognition – THE (Holly Else | November 2017)

False investigators and coercive citation are widespread in academic research – LSE Blog (Al Wilhite | March 2018)

Designing integrated research integrity training: authorship, publication, and peer review (Papers: Mark Hooper, et al)

Authorship, Publication, and Peer Review (Guidance: QUT | 2017)

Authorship and citation manipulation in academic research (Papers: Eric A. Fong and Allen W. Wilhite | 2017)

Authorship and Team Science – JAMA Network (Editorial | Phil Fontanarosa, et al | December 2017)

Percentage-based Author Contribution Index: a universal measure of author contribution to scientific articles (Papers: Stéphane Boyer, et al | 2017)

All for one or one for all? Authorship and the cross-sectoral valuation of credit in nutrition science (Papers: Bart Penders | 2017)

Authorship for sale: Some journals willing to add authors to papers they didn’t write – Retraction Watch (Alison McCook | September 2017)

Where Are the Missing Coauthors? Authorship Practices in Participatory Research (Papers: Daniel Sarna-Wojcicki, et al | 2017)

The relationship between the author byline and contribution lists: a comparison of three general medical journals (Papers: Siluo Yang, et al 2017)

Ghost and Honorary Authorship in Cancer Research – Cancer Therapy Advisor (Jim Daley: September 2016)

Ethical considerations in naming authors of scientific papers (Papers: Sepideh Mohammadi and Tajmohammad Arazi 2015)

When it takes a village to write a paper, what does it mean to be an author? – Retraction Watch commentary (Alison McCook 2016)

Authorship abuse is the dark side of collaboration – Times Higher Education (Bruce Macfarlane 2015)

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