From the Editor's Notebook Authorship: Did I Really Contribute?

摘要

In the September Editor's Notebook we discussed issues regarding "authorship creep" [1]. What should be the correct number of authors for a given manuscript? Do all listed authors really provide substantive contributions to the manuscript? We asked for you, our readers, to provide us with input about how we might deal with this issue going forward. We still await your responses. However, in the mean time, additional information has come to light that leads to further discussion on the responsibility and meaning of authorship in scientific or biomedical journals. Continuing events at the American Journal of Roentgenology clearly demonstrate the magnitude of the problem for our (your) journal. For example, in recent months we have had the corresponding author sign for all coauthors, have had secretaries sign for all authors, and have had authors included who did not want to be associated with the manuscript. We also have received requests for authors to be added and/or deleted following submission of the manuscript for peer review and even after acceptance of the paper and well into the production cycle.