Courtesy Authorship Practices Among First and Senior Authors: Evaluation of Motivations, Gender Bias, and Inequities

Honorary authorship is highly prevalent in health sciences: systematic review and meta-analysis of surveys

A systematic review and meta-analysis of survey research was conducted to estimate honorary authorship prevalence in health sciences. We searched PubMed, Lens.org, and Dimensions.ai. until January 5 2023. Methodological quality was assessed and quantitative syntheses were conducted. Nineteen surveys were included and rated as having low methodological quality. We found a pooled prevalence of 26% [95% CI 21-31] (6 surveys, 2758 respondents) of researchers that perceived co-author(s) as honorary on the publication at issue (when they were not referred to any authorship criteria). That prevalence was 18% [95% CI 15-21] (11 surveys, 4272 respondents) when researchers were referred to Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) authorship criteria, and 51% [95% CI 47-56] (15 surveys, 5111 respondents) when researchers were asked to declare their co-author(s) contributions on the publication at issue (and these were then compared to ICMJE criteria). 10% of researchers [95% CI 9-12] (11 surveys, 3,663 respondents) reported being approached by others to include honorary author(s) on the publication at issue and 16% [95% CI 13-18] (2 surveys, 823 respondents) admitted adding (an) honorary author(s). Survey research consistently indicates that honorary authorship in the health sciences is highly prevalent, however the quality of the surveys' methods and reporting needs improvement.

The Author Truncation "et al." in Article References: An Anachronism That Needs to Change

Background: Valuable research requires contribution from many experts; however, the "et al." truncation often keeps all individuals from being acknowledged. The adoption of a new citation rule (list all authors up to 30, followed by et al.) would allow more authors to be acknowledged. The purpose of this study was to (1) explore the citation styles of the top 10 Plastic Surgery, Surgery, and Medical journals and (2) compare the number of extra pages required, and the number of additional authors acknowledged when the "new rule" is implemented. Methods: The top 10 journals in Plastic Surgery, Surgery, and Medicine were identified. The citation styles used in each of the journals were reviewed and the reference list from a recently published article was extracted. The original reference list was used to create an Extended Reference List using the new rule. Results: Most journals implemented "et al." when seven or more authors were listed. Ten articles required additional pages to accommodate the Extended Reference List. When the "et al." truncation was introduced after 30 authors, there was an almost 100% chance of all authors being included. The adoption of this rule rarely resulted in the need for additional pages, especially within Plastic Surgery. Conclusions: In a time of electronic publishing, where constraints such as article and journal page length should not be important factors, all authors should be recognized. The use of the "et al." truncation should be discouraged by all individuals involved in the production and publication of research. Scenario You are asked by the Editor-in-Chief of your specialty's journal to review an article in your area of expertise. You gladly accept the task. One of the questions you are required to answer in your review is whether the authors of the submitted manuscript have missed any important articles in their references. As you are the recognized expert in this field, you glance at the references to see if a key article you published 3 years earlier has been included. The first author of that article was a junior resident in your service and the research was done under your supervision. To their credit, the authors included the said article, but you are dismayed that the reference does not include your name. It includes only the names of the first three authors, all junior residents in your service. Your name, and the names of many others, are lost in the et al. truncation.

Undeserved authorship in surgical research: an underestimated bias with potential side effects on academic careers

The incidence of courtesy authorship in research over time has probably increased due to the enormous pressure to publish to increase the bibliometric indexes necessary to achieve an academic role. The aim of this survey was to quantify and characterize this research malpractice among a very selected group of surgeons from different surgical specialties belonging to the European Association of Surgery (ESA). E-mail addresses for the invitation to take part to the survey were collected by the Twenty-eighth Annual Meeting final program. Five-item were designed and developed by the authors using an online platform. Eighty-six members from 21 countries completed the survey (female/male ratio: 0.09). In the last 10 years, almost half of the responders (41, 47.7%, 37 academics) have included colleagues for courtesy authorship. The most common reason of courtesy authorships was to support the academic career of another researcher (62.5%). Other reasons were fear of retaliation (12.5%), reciprocal authorship (12.5%) or support for a partner (10%). This survey showed that undeserved authorship is sadly confirmed to be a common research misconduct across any countries and medical specialties, even among a very selected group of surgeons with international reputation irrespective of the academic position.

Gender Discrepancies in Middle Author Publications in US Academic General Surgery

INTRODUCTION

To explore gender discrepancies in publications at general surgery departments, we performed a cross-sectional comparing the number of women and men at each academic rank and their number of first author (FA), middle author (MA), last author (LA), and total publications.

METHODS

Thirty academic general surgery departments were randomly selected. For each faculty, we tabulated: first, middle, last names, gender, academic rank, educational leadership, year of medical school graduation, and additional graduate degrees. Bibliography, H-index, and citations were downloaded from the Scopus database.

RESULTS

One thousand three hundred twenty-six faculty sampled, 881 (66.4%) men and 445 (33.5%) women. Men outnumbered women at all ranks, with increasing disparity at higher ranks. Men outnumbered women in all subspecialties-largest difference in transplant surgery (84.4% versus 15.6%, P < 0.001). Men at all ranks had more MA publications: assistant professor (rate ratio 1.20; 95% confidence interval, 1.01-1.43, P = 0.024), associate professor (1.65; 1.31-2.06, P < 0.001), and professor (1.50; 1.20-1.91, P = 0.008). Men associate professors had more LA publications (1.74; 1.34-2.37, P < 0.001). No differences found in FA publications at any rank, nor LA publications at assistant professor and professor ranks. At subspecialty level, men in surgical oncology (1.95; 1.55-2.45, P < 0.001) and transplant surgery (1.70; 1.09-2.66, P = 0.02) had more MA publications.

CONCLUSIONS

While FA and LA publications did not differ significantly across genders, the largest difference lies in MA publications, beginning at junior ranks and persisting with seniority. Discrepancies in MA publications may reflect gender discrepancies in collaborative opportunities, hence total publications should be used cautiously when determining academic productivity.