Department of Food and Resource Economics, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Department of Science Education, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
PLoS One. 2023 Jan 12;18(1):e0280018. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0280018. eCollection 2023.
Questionable authorship practices in scientific publishing are detrimental to research quality and management. The existing literature dealing with the prevalence, and perceptions, of such practices has focused on the medical sciences, and on experienced researchers. In contrast, this study investigated how younger researchers (PhD students) from across the faculties view fair authorship attribution, their experience with granting guest authorships to more powerful researchers and their reasons for doing so. Data for the study were collected in a survey of European PhD students. The final dataset included 1,336 participants from five European countries (Denmark, Hungary, Ireland, Portugal, and Switzerland) representing all major disciplines. Approximately three in ten reported that they had granted at least one guest authorship to "a person in power". Half of these indicated that they had done so because they had been told to do so by the person in power. Participants from the medical, natural and technical sciences were much more likely to state that they had granted a guest authorship than those from other faculties. We identified four general views about what is sufficient for co-authorship. There were two dominant views. The first (inclusive view) considered a broad range of contributions to merit co-authorship. The second (strongly writing-oriented) emphasised that co-authors must have written a piece of the manuscript text. The inclusive view dominated in the natural, technical, and medical sciences. Participants from other faculties were more evenly distributed between the inclusive and writing oriented view. Those with an inclusive view were most likely to indicate that they have granted a guest authorship. According to the experiences of our participants, questionable authorship practices are prevalent among early-career researchers, and they appear to be reinforced through a combination of coercive power relations and dominant norms in some research cultures, particularly in the natural, technical, and medical sciences.
科学出版界存在有问题的作者署名做法，这对研究质量和管理都有不利影响。现有的关于此类做法的普遍性和认知的文献主要集中在医学科学和经验丰富的研究人员上。相比之下，这项研究调查了来自不同学院的年轻研究人员（博士生）如何看待公平的作者署名，他们对向更有权势的研究人员授予客座作者身份的经验，以及这样做的原因。这项研究的数据是通过对欧洲博士生的调查收集的。最终数据集包括来自五个欧洲国家（丹麦、匈牙利、爱尔兰、葡萄牙和瑞士）的 1336 名参与者，代表了所有主要学科。大约三分之一的人报告说，他们至少向“有权势的人”授予了一个客座作者身份。其中一半人表示，他们这样做是因为有权势的人要求他们这样做。来自医学、自然科学和技术科学的参与者比来自其他学院的参与者更有可能表示他们授予了客座作者身份。我们确定了关于共同作者身份的四个普遍观点。有两种占主导地位的观点。第一种（包容性观点）认为广泛的贡献值得共同作者身份。第二种（强烈以写作为导向）强调共同作者必须写了手稿文本的一部分。包容性观点在自然科学、技术科学和医学科学中占主导地位。来自其他学院的参与者在包容性和以写作为导向的观点之间分布更为平均。持包容性观点的人最有可能表示他们已经授予了客座作者身份。根据我们参与者的经验，有问题的作者署名做法在早期职业研究人员中很普遍，而且似乎通过一些研究文化中的强制权力关系和主导规范得到了加强，尤其是在自然科学、技术科学和医学科学中。
