Scientific collaboration is crucial for a productive research environment, with co-authoring being a prominent form of such collaboration. Over the past 20 years, team-authored papers have become more common than solo-authored ones due to factors like cross-disciplinary research and the pressure on faculty to publish. The assumption is that more authors lead to better results, especially for complex research.
However, studies have also highlighted significant challenges in collaborations, such as ethical issues and power dynamics, which become more pronounced with more authors. These problems undermine the traditional authorship system. Addressing these issues requires understanding the motivations and dynamics of co-authorship, which can be analyzed using game theory to balance the investments and benefits for each author.
Determining which authors to list and the order of names, fueled by competition for jobs, promotions, and grants; become a too common of a phenomenon, usually escalating to full conflicts between the co-authors. These conflicts over authorship credit distribution escalate with the number of collaborators, potentially leading to negative consequences such as unjust credit distribution, hindering professional recognition, and discouraging future collaborations.
To address these issues, journals have adopted criteria like ICMJE-2009, EASE-2011, CSE-2012, and COPE-2008, which aim to limit authorship to those who have made substantial intellectual contributions. However, these guidelines often remain ambiguous and vary across disciplines, leaving room for interpretation and conflicts influenced by power dynamics within research teams. Alternative solutions like the CRediT (Contributor Role Taxonomy) system, which specifies fourteen types of contributions for each author, and designations like co-first and co-corresponding authors, aim to clarify contributions. While these approaches are steps in the right direction, they do not completely resolve authorship conflicts due to subjective role interpretation, disciplinary norms, and persistent power imbalances.
Members of ISAC investigating the properties as well as the socio-economic mechanisms playing a role in these conflicts. In recent two papers published in Scientometrics, the authors invistiagted the phenomenon from a game-theory and sociological perspectives.
Lazebnik et al. (2023) [1] introduces a game-theory-based model for co-authorship where authors can issue an ultimatum to block publication if they do not receive adequate credit. The model analyzes how contributions and the utility of publication influence the likelihood of authors issuing ultimatums. It also considers the impact of project duration, current state, and number of authors, focusing on student-advisor and colleague-colleague co-authorship scenarios. The findings reveal that current academic practices inadvertently encourage authors to issue ultimatums, relying on their integrity to prevent such conflicts rather than on systematic design.
Savchenko and Rosenfeld (2024) [2] conducted an international and cross-disciplinary survey with 752 academics from 41 research fields and 93 countries, representing the global academic workforce. The authors show concerning findings which reveal that authorship conflicts begin early in academic careers, even at the Master’s and Ph.D. levels, and become more frequent over time.
Active directions for future research include further analysis of the socio-demographic factors influencing authorship conflicts and developing more robust and transparent authorship guidelines. New members interested in joining ISAC’s efforts can participate by attending our upcoming workshops, collaborating on ongoing research projects with the ISAC members. For more information, we suggest you directly email the relevant ISAC members involved in these research projects.
1. Lazebnik, T., Beck, S., Shami, L. (2023). Academic co-authorship is a risky game. Scientometrics. Ream more
2. Savchenko, E., Rosenfeld, A. (2024). Authorship conflicts in academia: an international cross-discipline survey. Scientometrics. Ream more