Authorship and CRediT

Authorship disputes are among the most common problems in research. The best fix is to agree early, and use clear rules.

ICMJE's four criteria

The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) says an author should meet all four:

1. Substantial contributions to the idea or design, or to getting, analysing or interpreting the data.
2. Drafting the work or revising it critically for important content.
3. Final approval of the version to be published.
4. Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work.

Many fields outside medicine use these or similar rules. People who helped but don't meet all four go in the acknowledgements.

What isn't authorship

• Gift authorship: adding someone senior who didn't contribute.
• Ghost authorship: leaving out someone who did substantial work, like a writer paid by a company.
• Supervising, providing funding or equipment alone usually isn't enough.

CRediT: say who did what

CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) lists 14 roles, such as Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Methodology, Software, Writing (original draft) and Writing (review and editing). Many journals ask you to list each author's roles. It makes contributions visible, especially for students whose work might otherwise be hidden.

Author order

Conventions differ by field: in many sciences, first author did the most work and last author led the lab; in mathematics and some economics, authors are listed alphabetically. Discuss order at the start, and revisit it if roles change.

RememberAgree authorship early, use ICMJE's four criteria, and describe every contribution with CRediT roles.