A systematic review of research on the meaning, ethics and practices of authorship across scholarly disciplines

A systematic review of research on the meaning, ethics and practices of authorship across scholarly disciplines

Bošnjak, Lana
Jerončić, Ana
Marušić, Ana

2011/00/00

English

20110000

Background:The purpose of this systematic review was to evaluate evidence about authorship issues and provide synthesis of research on authorship across all research fields. Methods:We searched bibliographical databases to identify articles describing empirical quantitive or qualitative research from all scholarly fields on different aspects of authorship. Search was limited to original articles and reviews. Results: The final sample consisted of 123 articles reporting results from 118 studies. Most studies came for biomedical and health research fields and social sciences. Study design was usually a survey (53%) or descriptive study (27%)

only 2 studies used randomized design. We identified four 4 general themes common to all research disciplines: authorship perceptions, definitions and practices, defining order of authors on the byline, ethical and unethical authorship practices, and authorship issues related to student/non-research personnel-supervisor collaboration. For 14 survey studies, a meta-analysis showed a pooled weighted average of 29% (95% CI 24% to 35%) researchers reporting their own or others' experience with misuse of authorship. Authorship misuse was reported more often by researcher outside of the USA and UK: 55% (95% CI 45% to 64%) for 4 studies in France, South Africa, India and Bangladesh vs. 23% (95% CI 18% to 28%) in USA/UK or international journal settings. Interpretation High prevalence of authorship problems may have severe impact on the integrity of the research process, just as more serious forms of research misconduct. There is a need for more methodologically rigorous studies to understand the allocation of publication credit across research disciplines.

1.3.7

1.3.7;1.3.9

authorship--[pri];biomedical research--[pri];research ethics--[pri];science--[pri];social sciences--[pri]

conflict of interest;editorial policies;empirical research;industry;international aspects;interprofessional relations;misconduct;nursing research;publishing;research support;researchers;survey;trends

PLoS One2011; 6(9):e23477 [Online]. Accessed: 2012 April 18

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