Understanding research ethics
Authorship
#EditorObservations 20 Authorship (YouTube, 2m 19s)
The number of unethical “authorship games” has increased dramatically during my tenure as the co-editor-in-chief of Annals of Tourism Research. No doubt this is another consequence of a metrics-driven university-based research sector.
There is general agreement on the criteria that warrant authorship. Elsevier’s ethics policy summarizes succinctly “Authorship should be limited to those who have made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution or interpretation of the reported study. Transparency about the contributions of authors is encouraged, for example, in the form of a CRediT author statement.”
Sadly, at Annals of Tourism Research, author lists became longer and longer during my eight-year tenure as co-editor-in-chief. By the end, we rarely saw sole-authored articles anymore. This is not a good development. Having contributed a tiny bit to a paper is nothing to be proud of and it is nothing that will be viewed in a positive light in the next job or promotion application. Often it is difficult not to suspect that some of the authors have contributed nothing. When the first author requests during the minor revision round of their paper, for example, that another author has to be added as first author now. This new surprise first author is, of course, a very senior person at the university. Not cool.
#editorobservation
Is it just me or does it seem like the number of authors on manuscripts is increasing?
Just reviewed a paper discussing tourism recovery post-COVID-19 at a destination.
6 authors
Not obvious how each one of them could have made a significant contribution.
#editorobservation
Hmm
Simple one-off cross-sectional survey study.
9 authors?
Authors must make “significant contribution to conception, design, execution or interpretation of reported study”.
TIPS
Disclose author contributions.
#editorobservation
Now that I noticed the issue of large author teams, I can’t unsee it anymore.
“Authorship limited to those who made significant contribution to conception, design, execution, or interpretation of study”.
Not always obvious what 5/6/7 people could have done🤔
#editorobservation
Absolutely not!
Authorship “limited to those who made significant contribution to conception, design, execution or interpretation”
Don’t send such emails.
Don’t agree to have your name included.
Don’t risk your reputation for a paper.
#editorobservation
The sender of this email had no bad intentions, I am sure.
But what I am being invited to contribute is not sufficient to warrant authorship
Important to be aware of research integrity matters always.
#editorobservation
Here’s an exceptionally poor attempt at making an indecent proposal by an inexperienced author.
Not addressing me by name.
Not spelling Annals of Tourism Research correctly.
Generally sloppy.
Even if perfectly presented, the answer, of course, would be “No, sorry”.
#editorobservation
Today I break my rule of never ever posting emails I receive verbatim.
Do we need any more evidence that the publishing system is seriously broken, possibly beyond repair?
On another note:
My “invaluable” contributions are not for sale.
They are only available for free.
They are only available to likeminded scholars who I enjoy working with.
#editorobservation
We see more and more “authorship games” being played.
Not cool.
No matter how massive the publication pressure is, it does not justify unethical behaviour. Putting your name on a manuscript you have not significantly contributed to is unethical. Allowing another person to put their name on a manuscript they have not significantly contributed to is unethical also.
#editorobservation
The insane and totally unreasonable pressure on academics to publish many papers (rather than create meaningful knowledge) has some fascinating consequences.
At Annals of Tourism Research we receive more and more requests for TWO authors to be first or corresponding authors.
#editorobservation
I feel like I am starting to see double … triple … quadruple 
More and more authors for less and less work. I rarely see any sole-authored papers anymore. This is concerning in terms of research integrity (Is every named author REALLY making a significant contribution?) and from a career development perspective: if you are the middle author on 100 articles on 25 different topics, what do you as a scholar actually stand for?
#editorobservation
CAUTHE 2021: Meet the Editors session
More useful tips.
32 mins in: Collaborations are wonderful, but you also need a few sole authored papers to demonstrate that you are a master of your trade
