In defense of the ICMJE authorship guideline, a rejoinder to Curzer

ABSTRACT

Curzer (Curzer 2021. Authorship and justice: Credit and responsibility, Accountability in Research 28:1–22) has constructed cogent and important arguments against the ICMJE authorship criteria from various philosophical perspectives. Here, we provide differing opinions to Curzer’s points, primarily from the perspective of biomedical sciences (for which the ICMJE authorship criteria are originally meant for). We could neither identify nor concur with Curzer’s opinion of a “disconnect” between writer and researcher in contemporary biomedical science publications, or see definitive value in the notion that intellectual and non-intellectual contributors should be equally credited. Furthermore, we note that consequentialist argument for utility, Rawlsian justice, as well as Kantian deontology are all not in disagreement with the ICMJE criteria. In brief, while we find Curzer’s arguments to be participant or people-centric, these are not particularly in line with either the philosophy or the practice of science. We posit that the key concept underlying the ICMJE authorship criteria, in which authorship entails a coupling of intellectual credit to accountability, should remain a cornerstone in the practice of scientific research.

KEYWORDS:

• Accountability
• Authorship
• Contributorship
• ICMJE guidelines
• Intellectual credit

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. https://www.icmje.org. The ICMJE criteria for authorship are the following.

Substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; AND

Drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; AND

Final approval of the version to be published; AND

Agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

2. The world’s largest organization for engineers and technologists, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), for example, have a 3-criteria authorship definition that is similar to the first 3 criteria of the ICMJE guideline (https://journals.ieeeauthorcenter.ieee.org/become-an-ieee-journal-author/publishing-ethics/ethical-requirements).

3. Such an exclusion would be a form of research misconduct.

4. One should bear in mind that unlike the academia, the major form of research output record in the industry are not manuscript and papers, but rather unpublished records and reports that would informed the application of patents or applications for drug/technology approval. Only in rare occasions, and usually a lengthy period of time after the research has been performed, would portions of such records and reports feed into manuscripts and papers. Papers are therefore not the expected primary returns or rewards for a career in research in the industry setting. More tangible returns would likely be an enhance job security (without the stress of the tenure clock and the need to secure tenure in the academia) and better monetary rewards.

5. A reviewer pointed out that such a disconnect may be more prevalent in papers that report clinical trials when there is a large number of collaborating authors from the industry and the academia.

6. It would be mainly biology and chemistry, although knowledge in physics and engineering would be important for fields such as medical imaging, and expertise in computing and data science would be required across many biomedical subfields.

7. Not fulfilling ICMJE criteria 2 would effectively mean that criteria 4, on being accountable for the content of the paper, does not apply.

8. Although there are considerable plurality in authorship practice across different fields of research, the intellectual contributor’s wish for his/her name to stand out in association with a publication would be the same. One might ask how a philosopher or a historian might feel if they are listed on the same acknowledgment platform as the department administrators.

9. That postdocs and student are poorly rewarded financially is a worldwide phenomenon. We provide two examples from the United Kingdom and the United States – a recent editorial in Nature entitled “The scandal of researchers paid less than a living wage” (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03472-3) and a news report on the recent strike in University of California campuses (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/dec/02/closed-labs-cancelled-classes-inside-us-higher-education-largest-strike).

10. We have argued earlier that the research work itself would be the most important consideration, and removal of erroneous papers from the literature archive is thus necessary. A paper could be retracted either because of fraudulent results, or simply honest mistakes. In the latter scenario no authors would be blamed or punished beyond the customary sentence of apology in the retraction notice.

11. At least not in the defined acts of scientific misconduct, i.e., acts of fabrication, falsification or plagiarism of data and results (https://ori.hhs.gov/definition-research-misconduct). Administrators could be involved in other forms of fraud, such as financial fraud, but these are unlikely to directly affect the scientific integrity of data and results.

12. The ICMJE list of journals following ICMJE guideline (https://www.icmje.org/journals-following-the-icmje-recommendations/#L) includes journals that cover management, marketing, education, ethics, law, culture, philosophy and the arts.

13. Acknowledgement: The author is grateful to the reviewers and handling editor, whose insightful and constructive comments improved the manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.